60 Pounds of Butts

DMW

And this cook is finished and served. 116 pounds of boneless butts yielded approx 70 pounds of finished/pulled meat. Pulled 6 off this morning and FTC'd til serving time. The batch that came off yesterday I pulled and then put in gallon zip lock freezer bags fairly flat. Those then were in an ice water bath until meat was cooled, then in fridge. Reheated in electric roasters with coke, turned out perfect. Just needed to stir frequently to keep bottom and sides from scorching. Coke added no flavor that I could tl. Thanks for that tip @RRP. Came home to an absolutely filthy egg. Taking 12 butts off in 2 days you will get grease drippings everywhere. Oh and my gasket is shot in multiple spots. And I have a brand new Rutland from @RRP on hand. And there was some lump left in the egg. Sooo...its fired up and self cleaning. I'm watching the Phillies spank the Twins and enjoying some Crown Royal. Will fall asleep for a much needed nap soon.

Was quite the experience and I would do it again. Eliminating the reheating would nice. Already started dropping hints to SWMBO a larger smoker may be in the future...

Enjoy what little is left to the weekend fellow eggers.

grege345

Epic butt cook!!!

cazzy

Great job DM!!

yzzi

Great job! We're always trying to think of creative fundraisers for couples adopting at our church (just did a quail tower shoot a couple weeks ago). Looking back how many total people do you think that 116 fed? If I remember correctly you were feeding 200 so I'm wondering if your calculations were accurate and what you'd do differently the second time around. And if you don't mind me asking, how much were you able to raise all said and done? Feel free to Pm me if you'd rather.

DMW

yzzi said:

Great job! We're always trying to think of creative fundraisers for couples adopting at our church (just did a quail tower shoot a couple weeks ago). Looking back how many total people do you think that 116 fed? If I remember correctly you were feeding 200 so I'm wondering if your calculations were accurate and what you'd do differently the second time around. And if you don't mind me asking, how much were you able to raise all said and done? Feel free to Pm me if you'd rather.

@yzzi Final count I had when I bought the meat on Tuesday was 227. I assumed 50% yield and 1/4 lb portions. With boneless yield is a bit higher. In retrospect I think I would go back to bone in. Doesn't save any space on the grid, and pulling bones from butts is quick and easy. Also boneless needs to either be tied or skewered to keep it together. As far as how much raised, not sure, it was all by donation and I didn't get a total. Ran out of sides before the pork, so sold trays of pork only after that. I'll find out how much was raised and PM you.

henapple

Nice job. No problems with sitting the top grid directly on the butts?

yzzi

I thought you were selling per plate. I didn't realize it was donations so don't worry about it.. Hopefully they did well.

DMW

henapple said:

Nice job. No problems with sitting the top grid directly on the butts?

I have 4" bolts with nuts/washers but still wasn't enough clearance after shrinkage. The top layer finished about 2 hours before bottom. Someone on here suggested rotating top/bottom mid-cook but that just seemed like too much of a PITA in the middle of the night. So I let the top butts finish first and FTC'd while I SSS'd and waited.

AlbertaEgger

Great cook, and very generous. Well done. Love it.

NPHuskerFL

Nicely done! Donated too...keeping it classy! :-)

columbusBGEgg

what was your set up, cook temp, and cook time.  Is that mustard for your rub?  Looks like an awesome day on the egg.  

DMW

columbusBGEgg said:

what was your set up, cook temp, and cook time.  Is that mustard for your rub?  Looks like an awesome day on the egg.  

There are pics of the setup in the thread. I used Fogo lump with Oak chunks mixed in. Plate Setter legs up, wrapped in foil. Nuts on plate setter to raise the drip pan. I used an 18" aluminum catering type tray lined with foil as drip pan.

That is mustard you see, helps the rub to stick and I like the bark I get. However, not as much bark this time do to the setup, which was...

3 butts on the factory XL grid, homemade extended grid on top of those. I have 4" bolts on the top grid and still it sat on top of the bottom butts all cook long.

Cook temp on the first run was 225*  to start, bumped up to 250* later, then 275*. The first run was started at 2:30PM or so Friday and didn't finish the last 3 butts until 22 hours later. 

Second run, I started at 275* around 3:30PM, bumped to 300* sometime Sat night, don't remember exactly when, then bumped to 325* around 3:00AM (I remember that...). Pulled the top ones of around 5:30AM, the bottom ones were finished around 7:30AM.