My first pork butt

Beaumonty · April 2013

I cooked my first pork butt this weekend. Since I had a lot of things going on this weekend, I opted to try the turbo method as explained by @Charlie_Tuna . In fact, I IM'ed him and got some solid advice. Everything he predicted turned out to be true.

First, I prepared the fire by loading it up and using a chimney starter on a small batch. After dumping the starter batch in, I waited about ten minutes and added my pecan chunks. I used about three handfuls of half-fist sized chunks with a big one or two thrown in.

I did my homemade rub and mustard on a 5#, bone-in shoulder butt. I trimmed the fat cap off. I did not inject because (1) I don't have an injector and (2) I have never made a butt before. I wanted to have a baseline set so I could compare future cooks.

I put the but on at 10:00 and used my Maverick for the first time. I was surprised to find that my dome and my grid temps were basically the same. I thought the grid was going to be cooler.

At 12:30, the butt was only at 140*. @Charlie Tuna told me his Egg temps start creeping up during the cook and mine was no different. It was constantly edging up to the 260* range without any adjustment; which is a bit unusual for my Egg. It's usually set it and forget it.

I had to leave for a party, so I just left it on. By 2:00 my wife was surprised by the Maverick's alarm indicating it had hit 160*; she turned it off. At 3:30 it was in the 165* range, solidly in the stall.

I wrapped it three times in foil and cranked up the heat to 350* because i was running out of time to FTC before 6:00 dinnertime. At 5:00, the butt had it 199, so I pulled it, and popped it in the cooler. I took it out at 6:00 and it was still 180*.

Here are the results (pre-pulling):

Here is the pulled version:

Finally, here are some new potatoes steamed with chives from our garden and butter (from the store).

The family really, really liked it.

I think I needed a more flavorful rub for that much meat. I'm going to try to find some Byron's. The bark was a beautiful color but not the caramelized shell I I thought would result.

I may inject next time but this was so incredibly moist, that the only reason I would want to do so, would be to supplement flavor. In the end, I was really happy that I had the turbo method available to make sure I didn't run out of time. Also, I was pretty happy that I didn't have to get up in the middle of the night to monitor the cook. I will definitely be doing this again.

Foghorn · April 2013

"I will definitely be doing this again."

No doubt. Strong work.

shtgunal3 · April 2013

Well done. =D>

tazcrash · April 2013

Looks great, I always marvel at how easy PP is on the egg.

As far as the temp creep, I saw the same thing on long cooks. Just always assumed it was the temp of the food helping the increase.

IME with injection, it effects flavor much less than the cooking time. Injection sped it up.

Beaumonty · April 2013

As to the injection speeding time up, that makes sense. It took a little longer than expected to get to 160*. I may have to experiment now that I know what non injected tastes like

tazcrash · April 2013

Beaumonty said:

I may have to experiment now that I know what non injected tastes like

And that's the fun.

chris123stock · April 2013

Awsome cook, looks very tasty. =D>

Skiddymarker · April 2013

Congrats, great cook.

Turbo, because of the foil wrap tends to result in less crust character, IMHO. You end up braising (steaming) the meat and the crust softens so you continue to cook.

If you want that bark crust, use low and slow and foil tent for the rest. Great looking sammies!

My first pork butt

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