BBQ NOOB first boston butt

[Canyon Runner]

Picked up a beautiful butt tonight (honest honey, it's what these guys call the top half of the pork shoulder I swear!) weighing in at 7.92 lbs. My plan is trim as needed, could use some advice on this step or point me to an existing thread or video, inject with apple based marinade, could use a simple recipe, coat with yeller mustard, my rib rub, and wrap tight in saran wrap for 24 hours. Will plan on smoking at 250 for 10 hours with a mix of Alder and Apple chips, rest in a cooler wrapped in a towel? for 2 hours and then pull by hand. Two pans for pulled meat, one with sauce (KC masterpiece original I think, don't laugh, I'm new to saucing too lol) and one plain so we can see what we like piled high on a kaiser roll with the wife's choice of homemade slaw dolloped on top.

I have been doing a LOT of reading here, but I could use some clarification and all around pointers...why wrap it in a towel? Do I trim the fat cap off or not? The rest of the visible fat or not? Anyone have a pretty simple apple based injection recipe? I want to try and keep it simple so we don't overpower the meat and so we can see what we like or don't.

Keep in mind I grill, and as such I have no other choice but to be doing this on my Brinkmann 4 burner, with the #1 burner hot and the smoke pan between #1 and #2 and the meat above #3 and #4. Do I need a pan of water or apple juice or something in there too? Wrap when it stalls at 170ish? Pull it at 200?

Thanks for all the help thus far and the awesome site! Food Porn to follow! :grin:

- CR

 

[Max1]

Trimming the fat, well you will get mixed feelings around here about that. Me personally, I don't trim any of the fat off. Just put your rub all over that thing, and place it in your smoker fat cap up, then smoke it until it hits about 180° or 185°.

When wrapping it in the towel you are letting the meat rest to pull all the juices back into the meat, and to let the cooking process finish. Letting this happen will allow the meat to raise the temp maybe another 10°, or 15°.

When you are smoking this make sure that you spritz it, or mop it about every hour or so, and like everything else, after about 3 and a half to 4 hour wrap it in foil. If you do not foil your meat, well too much smoke can make the meat have a bitter taste to it. You said about 8 lbs. I would foil after about 3 hours with something that small.

As far as a mopping sauce I have one that I think you may enjoy.
http://www.bbq-4-u.com/forum/f12/michigan-rib-mop-21812.html

You should really try to make a BBQ Sauce yourself, it is really easy to do. Most are ketchup, or vinegar based, really all you have to do is add some sugar, and other ingredients that you like. Just try experimenting. Start by making small batches, and work up for there. I have something in the order of about 15 BBQ Sauces that I make. There are a lot of good peeps here that have great recipes. Don't go out and smother something good with a store bought sauce, you will regret it.

As for temperature while cooking, I would run at 225° to 250°. Any lower would just be a waste of time. I smoke jerky at around 175°, doing a lower temp will just prolong your cook and make the meat dry out.

Just food for thought,
Max

 

[oompappy]

Do I trim the fat cap off or not? The rest of the visible fat or not? Anyone have a pretty simple apple based injection recipe?

I usually trim off the fat cap only and cook with that side Down. otherwise, leave the fat cap on and cook with that side down for better bark on the "lean" side.

Simple (and good) injection =
1 & 1/4 Cup Apple Juice
1 Tb Sugar
1 Tb Salt
1 Tb Worcestershire Sauce

 

[Larry D.]

Wrapping in a towel would just add a little more insulation while it's resting in the cooler - there's nothing special about a towel. I have a mid-size Playmate cooler that will hold two cooked butts easily, and I normally wrap the butts in foil, put some newspaper inside the cooler (more for easy cleanup if the foil leaks than anything) and it works great. Another plus for doing this is, you can time the cook to finish well ahead of your planned serving time, which gives you a cushion if the cook takes longer than you expected.

 

[Canyon Runner]

I have read your wise words and also done some more research, think I will trim the fat cap off and leave the rest, and then smoke it that side down, sounds good in theory.

Cooler and towels and newspaper all lined up, check.

I bit the bullet and picked up this smoker, well paid for it with one of my deck orders and will pick it up tomorrow, anyone have any experience with the MasterBuilt Pro Dual Fuel? It has a few features for the money, liking the double doors and multiple racks, plus a thermostat in combination with my new Maverick, and it's a legitimate smoker so I can at least play at doing this properly lol.

Masterbuilt Charcoal and Propane Steel Smoker-20050412 at The Home Depot

Oompappy - liking the simplicity of your injection, thank you for that sir I will be stealing that for this cook. Max, thank you also for the Michigan Mop, I'll have to leave the red pepper out as the wife and heat don't sit on the same bench, do you think the two recipes will go together? At my uneducated glance I think they will be fine?

I am officially on a 4 day Memorial Day weekend now so will get started in the morning with the injection and rub phase.

- CR

 

[dledmo]

Remember, no pics = no cook, feed us some food porn!!!

 

[bbquzz]

Remember, no pics = no cook, feed us some food porn!!!

Yeah!

 

[Canyon Runner]

Trimmed the fat cap off, left everything else. Injected, rubbed and then wrapped tight in saran wrap and back in the fridge. Was all finished at 1PM so will leave her in til midnight or so and then take her out to warm up, hope to have her on the smoker by 2AM...

oompappy was I supposed to boil that injection?

just realized I forgot to rub her with mustard first, what benefit did I miss out on?

- CR

 

[bigwheel]

Think I saw the pit in question in the paper. Looked very kewlish...congrats. I am a dedicated fat cap trimmer so glad you listened to reason about that..lol. Still not too late for the Frenchies slather. Another lawyer of rub...a spritz of apple juice with a giantic amount of good black pepper applied to wherever it might tend to stick..followed by a 10 min rest..then another spritz of apple juice followed all the copious amounts of brown sugar it can hold. There ya go. That make you a grand prize winner..if you cook it right..lol.

 

[oompappy]

oompappy was I supposed to boil that injection?

No Boil... In fact I chill the mixture before injecting, especially if doing it the night before the cook.

 

[Canyon Runner]

I am 5 minutes into the seasoning of my new smoker. HOLY SMOKES BATMAN! I never had this much smoke on my grill unless something was burning! LOL Now I can see why some say you can't really smoke on a grill, there is no comparison to the amount of smoke I am getting off this MasterBuilt.

I have venting questions, with charcoal you open the bottom vent to get more air to the fire and thus more heat, but with propane does it work the same? I need to hit 400 to vaporize all the factory snot in it, how would you go about getting that hot? Also, when smoking my meats, do you guys open the top, how much, close the bottom, how much? And one more, positioning of the meat, I have four racks but will only be using one on this cook, does the meat go as far away from the heat as possible, so the top rack? or down at the bootom, the middle maybe, or does it even matter?

Thanks to everyone here, I officially have "the bug."

- CR

 

[MUShand]

With the sounds of things maybe your fire is not clean? Good luck give us food porn!

 

[oompappy]

I have four racks but will only be using one on this cook, does the meat go as far away from the heat as possible, so the top rack? or down at the bootom, the middle maybe, or does it even matter?

If you're only using one rack it would probably be a good idea to use the one that is on the same level as the temperature gauge.

 

[Max1]

I would have to agree with MSUhand, if you are getting alot of smoke, your fire may not be clean. When smoking you should have a lite wispy thin gray, or blue smoke. Not big blotchy white smoke. You should have to almost strain your eyes to see the smoke. When at full smoke, you should see smoke like the following picture.

Hope this helps.

 

[bigwheel]

Suspect your mainly burning off the factory wax job. Give it all the exhaust you have available. Tinker with the air intakes if you must. Got to give the fire plenty of air..expecially with Propane..otherwise it smothers itself out and turns into a bomb when somebody decides to relight it. I'm nearly sure the new pit gives adequate airflow for that..hopefully. If you choke out a wood fire it starts smoldering and giving the famous creosote flavor. On multiple racks as you have..the one closest to the heat is where the majority of cooking goes on. With big meats..briskets..butts..etc..the one on the bottom tends to block out its bretherns higher on the totem pole. When you fill it up plan to swap top to bottom periodically. A single butt should go on the top of the heap..because that reflect some good heat down from the roof of the pit...brown it up nicely. Lower in the stack normally dont know that trick less you rig up an inside lid or maybe an artificial roof..which can be a great plan on the tall skinny pits. On my long tall model a Weber Kettle Lid or an upside down Sams pan makes a great tool to cut back on the excessive headspace.

 

[Canyon Runner]

Think I was burning the snot out of it as once I fired it up for the real deal I had ample smoke the first 10 minutes and then it settled into a nice leisurly Sunday walk.

I put the butt on the middle rack at 2:30. Unfortunately my receiver doesn't communicate with my transmitter. I have tried everything but all I get are the three lines across. Will be calling Maverick Tuesday for an exchange. The transmitter does read the pit temp and meat temp so I am able to keep her at 226 degrees and the butt was at 155 after 5 hours. I took it off, wrapped in foil, added more hot water and stuffed her back in. It is 11AM (8.5 hours in) now and she is at 196. :p

Plan is to pull her at 200 and put in cooler with towels for at least 2 hours, how long can I leave her in there as we were hoping to have warm for dinner but she is ahead of schedule...

Here are a few pics, enjoy!

- CR

 

[bigwheel]

Looking fair to smiddling..lol. Good job. Next time try to get the heat up. Butts like to be spanked about 275 at least. Too much timid poking can make em dry out..or as Big Jim from Florididdy say a few times..Dont try to warm it to death. I do not mess with towels but fold up a few pages of newspaper on the bottom and top..in a not overly big thick styrofoam cooler like comes from Omaha steaks. Will hold the heat much better than the plastic high dollar models. Once you put it in there do not peak and seal the seam with duct tape..in a warm spot away from ants and breezes. Would not bother me to hold one butt 8 hrs in such a scenario. Would take a long time for a bug to colonize that mess. They are going to have to drill from the outside in..smoke is a preservative..blah blah blah. Sorry about the crappy electric gauge thing. I do not use those very often. Mine works good though. Its an Old timey maverick which got tripled in price and stamped Williams Sonoma. Lot of drunk fat boys have set on that one..got cooked a few times etc. Still keeps on giving a licking and ticking. Have to change out the batteries every few years.

 

[Canyon Runner]

Food Porn

She hit 200 at high noon and I foiled and put her in the cooler with a couple towels for 3.5 hours. Looked fantastic when I unwrapped her. Bone came out like it was in warm butter. Nice smoke and bark. Divided it into two and put a splash of BBQ sauce on one and mixed her up good. Simply delicious! Next time more rub to throw in after it is all pulled I think. Thank you all for your help. One question: If next time I wanted it to be just a bit more firm would I pull it at 190 instead or ? I'll ramp it up a bit higher next time too bigwheel, thanks for the tips!

- CR

 

[bigwheel]

Gosh that looks good. High fives and effeminate manly man hiney slaps from Puff. Looks mighty good to the Hetros. Making some of us fat boys sorta hongry,. You obviously a bad Boy..lol. Where are you at?

 

[Canyon Runner]

Thanks Bigwheel, coming from you that is high praise indeed. I am about an hours drive North of Seattle. Not a Southerner nor a Yankee, suppose I am a Westerner! lol You know we all still fight injuns and ride horses to work on the ranch out in these parts, hell we got our first stop light last week

Grilling up some garlic lime corn on the cob and just finished making some of Emeril's cole slaw (pretty damn good surprisingly enough). Never had slaw on top of a pulled pork sandwich, always had some on the side but never as a capper, this will be something new for us. Pics to follow...

- CR