Pasture raised pork problems

180 is too low to pull (as in pulled pork). conversely, it's overcooked if you want to slice it and serve as a roast.

you want maybe 140-145 MAX on the plate if you are serving it as a slice of a roast and want moist pork. if you want pulled pork, gotta take it to 195, 200 slowly to allow the collagen to break down.

trichinosis, if present (hasn't been a case from commercial pork in decades actually), will die when it hits 138 for a very brief period of time. after 138, you are cooking it to your liking. it doesn't need to see 160+ to be "safe".

your pasture-raised pork is likely to be very lean. do you know what they are fed? grass fed beef and pork is lean, with a 'different' flavor than grain fed or grain finsihed. the grain basically fattens them. if you have grass-fed or lean pork, you will need to cook it as close as possible to medium or lower (medium-rare to rare). commercial pork is very lean, but is often also brined to guard against overcooking. you can cook lean meat without brining, but you won't have any safety measure of that added moisture if you overcook it.

if the pork is actually fatty, then you will have an easier time keeping it moist, but it will still suffer at anything over 150 on your plate.

FWIW, if i want a pork chop at 145 on the plate, it comes off at 138 or so and coasts to 145

the meat in a chop is different than the meat in a butt. a butt sees a lot of action and is a tough piece of meat because of that. the shoulder or butt gets a continuous work out and would be tough if cooked to "normal" temperatures, say 140-145. you can slice it thin and do a quick seared steak from it, or cure it and make it into buck board bacon, also sliced thin. the toughness might not be noticed that way if it's cut to bacon-thin dimensions. but if you cooked the butt instead at 250, it would steadily rise in temp to about 155 before you saw the temp hold steady to a long slow plateau between 155 to 175. checking the thermomoter repeatedly it qould appear stuck on 165, couple degrees either way, maybe even temps dropping a couple degrees then back up.

what is happening is a break down of the collagen sheath around the muscle fibers. the more muscle is used, the more collagen and connective tissue. so. if you pulled it out the minute the shoulder hit 165 you'd likely have dry overcooked meat. all the moisture (that you look for in a steak, for example) would be long gone. that's water, after all. so why take it to 200? by then, the tough collagen becomes LITERALLY gelatin. that wets the otherwise overcooked meat and gives it the moist mouth feel you want. also, the meat fibers are no longer bound together, and so the meat isn't tough. there's also usually more fat in those cuts, and that melted fat further moistens the meat.

if you cooked a chop, from a rib roast, well. that doesn't have a lot of connective tissue. so if you go over 140-145, then moisture is gone. if you tried to continue cooking it low and slow to make it pullable, the fact that there's much less connective tissue means you won't get the moisture from the gelatin. it'll fall apart (some folks use tenderloin, for example, for pulled pork), but you'd have to sauce the heck out of it to end up with anything moist. the fibers would be freed, so it'd be tender. but dry and tender.

so we cook the already-tender and less-fatty cuts (chops, tenderloin) to the minimum temp required for them to be 'done'. anything much over that ("well done," for example) means they'll be dry and tough.

but the fattier and tougher cuts need to be cooked long enough to allow the collagen and fat to melt and moisten the meat, which means the fibers break apart also, making it tender

So, can a lean pasture-raised pork shoulder be successfully cooked low and slow for pulled pork? Should it it be brined first for best results?

Try brining your chops. I usually brine mine in water with kosher salt and sugar for 6-plus hours or overnight. I get all my chops from pasture hogs and have had great results. The brining adds moisture to the meat.

Great thread guys! Really!

I'd say that yes the meat will kind of re-hydrate when it melts in to the pullable state. But I'd also suggest wrapping it it foil with a splash of apple juice at 175 to finish it up. It'll go quicker and the moist environment will help.

As for the ham, there's a reason most hams get cured and it's because they get dry real easy during cooking. So I'd brine that for sure.