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Butt or picnic

flajoker
flajoker Posts: 52
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
What is the best ham to smoke on the egg? Winn-Dixie got a little sale going on. Think also have shoulder. I like my ham thin sliced for sandwich. Please advise. Cooked some great burgers on the mini and need to fire up the bigin.

Comments

  • BBQfan1
    BBQfan1 Posts: 562
    flajoker,
    Not quite sure what you're looking to end up with exactly. Hams are from the hind of the hog. If you're looking for ham like you have at Easter or other holidays, that is a cured product before it is smoked, although the cut can be eaten simply smoked indirect in your Egg without curing first. It is a nice, roast cut. If you wanna slice it for sandwiches, pull around 175-180°F internal, let rest, and it should be sliceable; much more internal temp and it's likely to pull or shred.
    Now, the butts and picnics are both on the front of the hog with the butt being the high shoulder cut with a nice marbling throughout and great for pulled pork. The picnic is the lower shoulder cut, leading down toward the foreleg. It too makes nice pork roast. These cuts will slice at the same temps as the hams, but many prefer to take higher, generally 190-210 is the range of preference, for full rendering and 'pullability' for traditional pulled pork bbq.
    HHH,
    Qfan

  • flajoker,
    If you want ham then try a ready to cook ham. You could inject a picnic with a brine and smoke that but I have a feeling you may not be leaning towards injecting at this time.
    You can cook butt or picnic to the internal temps BBQfan suggested and that would be very good, but if you take them to 195 to 200º and pull it's a lot sweeter tasting.
    Jim

  • Gloria
    Gloria Posts: 161
    flajoker,
    When I first began reading on this Forum, I thought some of the people on it were really confused; I thought a butt came from the pig's "butt" and was pretty smug in pointing this out in a reply. However, I done been educated since my initiation into the BGE Forum and I now know that the Butt is from the shoulder.....the ham is from the pig's butt! We had always cooked hams on a lo-n-slo until learning about the proper way to do pulled pork. I agree that it will depend upon what result you want and if you are going to do sandwiches, you might mean the cured hams that are usually used for sandwiches. But nothing can beat a sandwich made from pulled pork butt cooked on the Egg. I owe a big thank-you to all the folks who set me straight on this. You will learn a lot from these same folks. Happy cooking.