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I think I know where I made my mistake

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Skoal Brother
Skoal Brother Posts: 4
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
I was trying to cook a 7.85lb Boston Butt last night. Had it all figured out, 235 degrees for 14 hrs. I started to make my fire at about 9:30pm and realized that I would have just enough charcoal to last through the night. So I dumped the rest of my bag into the egg, added my wood chips and noticed that there were so many tiny tiny pieces of charcoal that I didn't see how the egg could breath efficiently enough to hold a temp. Getting the BGE up to temp took about an hour and a half. Put the meat in the BGE and checked it again one hour later. The BGE was still at 230 I went to bed and this morning the temp was 160. I shut off the egg, broke the news to my wife, she was kind enough to say "it's ok I'll make something else for dinner for the 15 extra people that will be at our house later today"

Please help me learn from my mistake. I think it was the extra tiny hole clogging suffocating pieces of charcoal that would not let the BGE breath like it needs to. Thanks for the help
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Comments

  • jagweed
    jagweed Posts: 188
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    even jammed with tiny pieces, the open/free area in the lump is larger than the area of the lower vent opening. i don't think it's that. maybe the lump grate was clogged... i take the ash tool, stick it in the lower vent opening with the "ell" sticking up, and give the grate a couple quick jumps to shake stuff loose.

    if you are concerned about air flow, you can jam the sah tool into the lump to open it up. i'd also runt at 250... the egg seems to prefer 250 for some reason
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  • BayouMark
    BayouMark Posts: 284
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    I think you nailed it. When I do a low and slow I try to build my fire with larger pieces on the bottom interspersed with smoking chunks at differt levels. Then the smaller pieces on top. Cook your butt at 250 dome and be sure to calibrate your dome probe. Some are quite a bit off. Welcome to the party B)
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  • Skoal Brother
    Skoal Brother Posts: 4
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    I opened the lower opening and tapped the grate to try and shake/mix things up while I was trying to get the egg going. Maybe I should have stayed up and hr more and confirmed that the BGE was going to hold the temp. First total failure, not happy about it at all.
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  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,767
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    your mistake was not to check on things around 2 or 3 am. now i would have opened the vents in the morning and continued cooking that butt, may not have served it to guests, but would have cooked it for me.
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
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  • Weekend Warrior
    Weekend Warrior Posts: 1,702
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    Unless I'm missing something here, it sounds like you chucked your meat. Why? Your dome temp dropped from 230 to 160. No biggie. Your butt should have still been fine if it was a bone-in. Hope it's not too late. Mark
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  • Skoal Brother
    Skoal Brother Posts: 4
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    I agree. In the past I have always checked the meat at least twice during the night. I know I would have caught the fluctuation if I had checked.
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  • jagweed
    jagweed Posts: 188
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    maybe if we explain it for a seven thousandth time it will stick?
    hahahaha

    i don't think so, though
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  • fieroguy
    fieroguy Posts: 777
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    DigiQ II or other temp. controller...
    No more mistakes.
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  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,767
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    just so you know, 160 is hotter than 140, it was still ok to finish cooking even if you finished it up in the oven ;)
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
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  • jagweed
    jagweed Posts: 188
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    is 140 hotter than 120? or 130?

    the numbers fell off my thermometer and i could use some help putting them back on.

    i'll put in your vanity if you renumber my thermometer
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  • Weekend Warrior
    Weekend Warrior Posts: 1,702
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    hahahahahahaha. poor fish. :lol:
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  • danny285
    danny285 Posts: 360
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    Research the TurboGrate from The BBQguru along with the digiq2, no more worries about temp control with your cooks.
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  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,767
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    i just hate to see someone toss out something thats still good :laugh:
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
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  • fieroguy
    fieroguy Posts: 777
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    Danny - I use the TurboGrate in both of my LBGE's as well as DigiQ II's. Highly recommend them.
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  • bryansj
    bryansj Posts: 79
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    I think you should invest in a wireless thermometer with an alarm that has a pit probe like the Maverick ET-73. You probably could have started the fire earlier and allowed it to be stable for longer prior to putting in the food.
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  • jeffinsgf
    jeffinsgf Posts: 1,259
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    More heresy.

    Not only am I going to agree with fishless that there's no reason to throw that beautiful roast away, I'm going to tell you how to serve delicious pulled pork to your guests (or, maybe as fishless suggests you just keep it for yourself).

    I'm not exactly sure where the idea that pork shoulder can only be cooked at 200 - 250 came from, but I find it to be confining and just plain wrong. You can make beautiful pulled pork in half the time by getting your fire up to 350. In my experience the bark is much nicer (both crisper and less charred). It shreds just as well (if not better) and 6-7 hours with a moderate amount of chunks gives the meat plenty of time to absorb smoke.

    In my latest effort to perfect this technique, I put the BB in a baking dish full of cut up onions and peppers. I also cut slits in the meat and poked a garlic clove in each slit (a whole bulb of garlic's worth). With the fat side of the BB down on top of the onions and peppers, 5 sides of the roast barked up beautifully, the fat rendered out and cooked off the onions and peppers (which infused the meat) and no grease dripped on anything hot, avoiding any sooty smoke at all.

    It works without the vegetables, too, but the meat sticks to the bottom of the pan a little bit. Even with the sticking, I like this technique better than having a drip pan below the meat.

    Come by the Springfield MO Eggfest, if you want to try out some pulled pork made this way.
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  • ibanda
    ibanda Posts: 553
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    I'm thinking I would have just opened the vents some and kept going. As said many times on the forum the egg likes to cruise at 250° dome temperature, which means the grate temperature is somewhere around 220°. On my egg that's about a quarter slot machine width open on the bottom vent, and the daisy wheel top closed with the petals open.

    I do add lump manually, big pieces at the bottom, and I don't shake out the bag of little pieces on an overnight low and slow. For an overnight cook I get up once and check it, use wiggle stick and open vents if needed. An electronic temp monitoring device might be handy but I don't really see it as a need.
    "Bacon tastes gooood, pork chops taste gooood." - Vincent Vega, Pulp Fiction
    Small and Large BGE in Oklahoma City.
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  • gtalvola
    gtalvola Posts: 42
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    jagweed wrote:
    even jammed with tiny pieces, the open/free area in the lump is larger than the area of the lower vent opening. i don't think it's that.

    I wouldn't discount the fact that a lot of tiny pieces of lump can mess up the airflow even if the grate is clear. I've seen it happen in my own cooks with large amounts of small lump/chips -- it can take forever for the temperature to rise, you can get puffs of flame out the bottom vent, and so forth. The air having to work its way around all of the little surfaces of the charcoal chips adds significant airflow resistance.

    Other people mentioned the turbo grate which looks like a nice way to improve airflow. I use my own homemade alternative, which is to place a vertical chicken roaster on top of the fire grate and pour the charcoal around it. This keeps a clear airflow up through the middle of the lump. All of my airflow-related problems have gone away since I started doing this and it doesn't seem to negatively affect the cook in any way.
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  • Grandpas Grub
    Grandpas Grub Posts: 14,226
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    For me using the ash tool to bump the fire grate just puts smaller pieces of lump and more blocking of the air path through the lump.

    Make or buy a wiggle rod and use it through the lower vent to clear the air holes in the fire grate.
    http://thirdeyebbq.com/WiggleRods.aspx

    If you are not using a powered vent system to regulate the temperature then I strongly suggest cooking at 250° (calibrated dome thermometer).

    Other than the potential of blocking the fire grate and fire box air holes there is no problem with using smaller pieces of lump or old lump from previous cooks.

    GG
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  • jagweed
    jagweed Posts: 188
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    i posted this when spring chicken was talking about making a basket to hold the lump. i thought flipping it over would provide better flow.

    upside_down_fire_basket.jpg

    as for lots of chips and chunks... i can only go from my experience. my overnight cooks are actually where i prefer to use my chips and smaller bits.

    whatever it is that caused his dying fire, much of it would have been helped by going at 250, and/or checking on the thing once in the middle of the night.
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  • gtalvola
    gtalvola Posts: 42
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    jagweed, you're probably right about chips and small pieces being OK on a low-n-slow. Several times I had problems with airflow on higher temperature cooks, but never on low-n-slow's that I can remember. The one caveat is that if you do need to boost the temperature for whatever reason, for example if your low-n-slow is done and you want to cook something else at a higher temp, you may have trouble.

    Your inverted bowl concept looks like it would provide the same sort of airflow improvement as my chicken roaster technique.
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