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First Butt!

Kat
Kat Posts: 46
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
Happy New Year! We did our first overnight butt and can only say we now know what all the fuss is about :)

We started about 5:30p and followed instructions found in the forum about how to manage an overnight burn. We stayed up till about 10:30p checking every little bit to see that the temp was pegging at about 230 degrees.

Woke up just before 5am and checked to see that the fire was almost out, so we took the butt out, there was still about half the lump left so shoveled some into a chimney starter and quickly got it going again. Roast back in, and no problems after that. Cooked about another 5 hours at 230 and when the probe timer hit 200 degrees pulled this beauty off. Wrapped in foil about 30 minutes, pulled the pork and poured a carolina vinegar sauce over it.

Never tasted anything sooooo good!



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Comments

  • BBQMaven
    BBQMaven Posts: 1,041
    Congrats!
    Next time, just before you go to bed, note the exact spot the lower grate is in, open wide & wiggle stick the fire grate, and then put lower vent back where it was - bet you are still holding when you wake up!

    Great job and looks good
    Kent Madison MS
  • Nice looking butt. I like your little cook hut too.

    -John
  • NICE! I hope mine comes out that nice. I did sneak a peak a little earlier and mine didn't seem to be getting any bark. Do you know if yours got the bark in the last little bit of cooking? Mine has been on for 14.5 hrs now and is at 185.
  • BBQMaven
    BBQMaven Posts: 1,041
    it will start building bark now... the process of the connective tissue breaking down seems to "sweat" the meat, after it get to 185 the bark seems to build from there... my two are at 195 and have been on for 18.25 hours... LOOKIN GOOD!
    Kent Madison MS
  • Looks great. I'm still trying to figure out when to cook my first Butt. I have 3 slabs of babybacks on now so I can get my BBQ fix.

    Bryan
  • Mine are at 14.75 hrs now, and I just peeked again and they are barking nicely! I hope they hurry up bc I wanted to have time to wrap and cooler them for a bit.
  • Rib Bones
    Rib Bones Posts: 449
    Congrats! Looks great! :):)

    Wishing we had put one (or two or three) on last night. Would make for some good eatin' about now.

    Happy New Year!!!
  • Looks great. Hopefully I will have pics of my first later today. No snow photos for me though. Maybe a palm tree instead.
  • Kat
    Kat Posts: 46
    Thanks for the tip, we'll give it a try :)

    Though I'm happy to see that one going out isn't something you can't recover from.
  • Kat
    Kat Posts: 46
    Bark formed about the last hour of cooking and MERCY, but that stuff tastes fine!
  • Nice butt. Also like your cooking set-up. Sure is easier to work with the snow overhead rather than being in it. Agree with the earlier post, you should get the full cooking time with the original load of lump. Air flow must be the issue. Enjoy.

    Barry
    Marthasville, MO
  • Hoosier
    Hoosier Posts: 107
    When I first got my Egg and was preparing to do an overnight cook I read and re-read the Elder Ward writeup that Naked Whiz has here... http://www.nakedwhiz.com/elder.htm

    I paid particular attention to the level of detail he uses when building the fire. While I didn't separate into three piles, I did cut open the bag all the way down the side and pulled out the largest pieces to place down first and then took a scoop to put more on. I still do this every time...never just dumping the bag of lump in..for a long cook. Knock on wood but a couple dozen overnight cooks later and I've never once had a problem with temp fluctuations. I think alot of people overlook this but in my humble opinon it is absolutely the single best use of 10 minutes you can spend.
  • Kat
    Kat Posts: 46
    We also followed the Elder Ward's directions, and took the time to put larger lump at the first level after completely cleaning everything out of the egg.

    When we opened the egg this morning there was not a lot of ash. We shoveled the top layer of lump into a chimney to get it going again and while that was lighting we checked the ash and scraped under the grate to knock anything plugging it loose, but got very little out of it at all.

    We put the re lit lump back on the top, leveling it per the elder's instructions and then set the platesetter, drip pan, grate & butt back on after the egg was up to about 250 degrees. And for the next five hours, like the first five hours we were up with it, it didn't fluctuate much at all. So we really do not know why it didn't cook all night, but will try again.