First Boston Butt


 

Gib Gibson

TVWBB Member
I'm smoking my first butt tomorrow and I had a few questions. It is about 6.75 pounds, bone-in, and I have a 18.5" WSM. I plan on smoking at about 250F.

Here are my questions:

1) To marinate or no? Or is a matter of preference? If yes, any suggestions on what to use?

2) To wrap in foil or no? I've heard from 2 different guys who smoke a lot of them, and one wraps the whole time, and one just does it at the end. It seems this is a matter of preference as well. I prefer a little more smoke flavor, so I would guess wrap it at the end?

That's all I can think of for now, I'm sure I'll be back later for more knowledge.

Thanks yall!

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Oh yeah,

All I have at the house is an apple rub and mesquite wood. Would this combo work okay, or is there something that would work a little better? I'll be going to the store anyway. I plan on using standard Kingsford Blue Bag for whatever that's worth.
 
I would not marinate. I do inject, sometimes. On your first but I'd keep it simple and just use a dry rub. I'd wrap in foil once your bark is set, but I cook them sometimes without foil. I'd get some other type of wood. I find mesquite to be too harsh on pork. I barely like it on beef, but that's just me. If you do decide to use it, I'd only throw a couple of chunks in.
 
No marinate.
No foil.
DEFINITELY NOT mesquite. Usually used for beef and in small quantities. If you have no other wood to use, don't worry. You'll enjoy the pure pork flavour (with your rub) all on it's own.

Go for it!

P.S. if you want to try an experiment, go ahead a use a chunk or two of the mesquite to see for yourself if you like it. Don't need to listen to everyone else ;)
 
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I agree with Dustin on the mesquite. I think there is a tendency when first starting out to want to beat people over the head with the smoke flavor. If you like a lot of smoke, that's fine, but you might want to go easy at first until you've got it dialed in. I think milder smoke woods compliment the flavor of the pork rather than dominating it. Apple is good with pork. I got some peach this year and really like that with pork. I do usually add one chunk of oak or hickory along with the fruit wood.

The pork butt is so big and dense you'd have to marinate it for a week to make much difference. Injecting, like Dustin said, can be beneficial. I've injected with apple juice.

If you wrap in foil right from the start you might as well just cook it in the oven. I've never wrapped a butt until after pulling it from the smoker, though after recently reading about the cause of the stall I probably will wrap after the bark is set next time I do a butt. Wrapping should nearly eliminate the evaporative cooling and speed cooking considerably. My advice would be to either not wrap at all or wrap as it approaches the stall, ~165F.
 
Do yourself a favor and find the recipe for "The Renowned Mr. Brown" posted in the Cooking Topics section here (Link: http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/pork2.html). It's quite easy and takes you step-by-step. I've only been smoking pork butts once a year for the past few years. I just did it again last weekend and it came out every bit as good the first time I did it as it did this last time. This last time I used two bone-in butts weighing between 8 and 9 lbs. each. I smoked for about 10 hours, which is when I start to run out of coals. By then it was getting late and it gets dark earlier now and I didn't want to be messing around in the dark. So I chose to wrap the butts in foil and finish in the oven at 300°. Total actual *cook* time including the oven was about 11-1/2 hours. Pulled after resting for 30 mins. Came out great and yielded around 9 or 10 lbs. of meat.
 
Great stuff. Glad you mentioned the coals, Jim. The Minion method pretty much just sounds like fill up the charcoal ring, and then light maybe 15-20 briquettes in my chimney starter, let them get started and then pour them on the existing pile. Am I over simplifying that? With my old horizontal smoker, I was just pouring one chimney full at a time and I stayed busy more than I would like.

Thanks for the advice everybody! I was leaning against the Mesquite, but it sounds like yall have confirmed it for me.
 
I use an offset minion and have found it extremely easy, put your ignition hollow at the side near the door. The fire crawls across the entire area a little more slowly than central ignition set up. That's just my opinion and may be completely full of beans but, it has worked for me with no regrets!
I have used primarily Cherry (hey, I live in Michigan) for smoke. Pecan/Apple/Oak I've used them all and they are all good, just different, I agree on the mesquite, use that sparingly on something else.
Don't overthink it, my first was no water, no wrap, no worries! Temperature control the first time will teach you what does and doesn't work for you.
Have a swell feast!
Doggone it, now I want to do a brisket or a butt, rain predicted for tomorrow and I've already set things up for something else! Just saw prime brisket for 2.99 per at Costco!
Gib, when you fire your chimney, don't use more than about 20 briquettes, no need to fill one and have to choke vents back too soon.
Just one mans opinion as I said before.
 
Great stuff. Glad you mentioned the coals, Jim. The Minion method pretty much just sounds like fill up the charcoal ring, and then light maybe 15-20 briquettes in my chimney starter, let them get started and then pour them on the existing pile. Am I over simplifying that? With my old horizontal smoker, I was just pouring one chimney full at a time and I stayed busy more than I would like.

Thanks for the advice everybody! I was leaning against the Mesquite, but it sounds like yall have confirmed it for me.

I've done same with my offset when I started out. The minion method is pretty simple. People tweak it several way but it all amounts to the same thing.
 
Great stuff. Glad you mentioned the coals, Jim. The Minion method pretty much just sounds like fill up the charcoal ring, and then light maybe 15-20 briquettes in my chimney starter, let them get started and then pour them on the existing pile. Am I over simplifying that?
Nope, that's pretty much it. There are variations like suggested above. To me it depends on what I'm trying to achieve. Last time I did brisket I held the WSM at 180F for the first five hours, and then jacked it up to 275F for the rest of the time. Because of the very low starting temp I put just a few lit coals on one edge, with the idea that the fire would slowly work its way outward from there. Toward the end of the five hours it was getting hard to keep the temp down because of the spread of the fire, but it generally worked just as I had planned.

If I want to go a little hotter to start I'll put the pile of lit coals in the center so the fire spreads evenly outward. Then when I want to put the spurs to it I just open the bottom vents a bit more. If I want a steady temp the whole time I'll spread the lit coals evenly over the top so I end up with a fairly even distribution of lit coals the whole time.

The large charcoal capacity on the WSM is great. Before getting mine I had an offset with a far too small firebox and it was a pain trying to maintain temperature. Every hour I was adding more coals and raking out hot ash so it wouldn't block the air flow. Buying that POS was a huge mistake. The WSM is vastly easier to use and control.
 
I remember my first pork butt. If marijuana is the gateway drug, pork butt is the gateway meat. Gib, sounds like you're on your way!
 
The butt turned out pretty good, I cooked it until about 205F and then took it out and let it sit in the oven on 170 for about 30 minutes while I finished up some other stuff. I didn't have a cooler handy, rookie mistake. All I've got that would fit it is a soft Yeti cooler, would that still work? Anyhow, when I got ready to take the bone out, the meat just absolutely fell right apart when I pulled it and tasted good. I won't so great, but I was satisfied for my first try. I've never tried to post pictures on here, so if something weird happens, yall forgive me. Thanks again to everybody for your input, it was a lot of fun! Can't wait for Thanksgiving.

So when I try to post a picture, it says I can post from a URL, but I can't figure out how to just search my computer and post a picture I have saved. Can anybody help with that?
 
Gib,
I don’t do the photo thing here so I’m not too worried, it sounds like it came together just fine! Congratulations, you are now officially inducted into the addiction of smoking!
The Yeti would be fine but, save a foam one from Omaha Steak and throw a couple of old towels in it. I have one dedicated for the job and it just lives on a shelf in the garage. If it gets damaged, who cares? I’ll get another one.
Have fun, just don’t eat TOO much!
 
Re: cooler... You're just looking to slow down thermal transfer. Anything that will do that will work fine. Wrap the butt securely with heavy duty aluminum foil, then wrap newspaper around it as best you can. The more newspaper the better. Paper is an excellent thermal insulator. Wrap it in several layers of old bath towels. Toss your heavy winter coat over it. Just be sure it's not sitting on something like an aluminum baking sheet that will pull the heat away, defeating all that insulation you added. BTW, simply covering it with foil and setting it in the oven, even if it's turned off, would probably be sufficient for an hour or two.

There's nothing magical about the cooler. It's just a thermally insulated space with a handy carry handle. If you don't have one, MacGyver it.
 

 

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