Finally Holding Perfect Temps


 
T

TJStanley

New member
Well I’ve struggled through enough of my first cooks now I can say I’m starting to get the hang of it.

put a 9lb Pork Butt on my WSM 18 this morning at 8:30AM. Planning to give it it’s first spritz around 2-3pm and expect the whole cook to be finished @ 201F around 7-8PM.

Just about 2 hours into the cook now and temps are holding steady the whole time (fluctuating between 255-260F). I dialed my bottom vents back to about 1/3 when it hit 250F. Got a 70:30 mix of RO Lump to RO hardwood briquettes lit via MM hybrid, couple chunks of cherry wood and half of a white onion. The smell is incredible.

The real secret this time was putting less water in the water pan to get my temps above 250F. I’m still quite cautious about dry pan cooks because of how hot the pan can get and the potential for grease flashing. All I do now is add 2 cups hot water every 2 hours, super easy.

some pics of the setup are attached.
 

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That looks like a great setup!

Here's a little unsolicited advice 😉

I've never bothered with water in the pan, and many don't. If it's the grease that you're concerned about, just double line it with heavy-duty foil to make clean up easier. The trick is to make a small air-space between the 2 layers of foil. I just crumble a few small balls of aluminum foil, and leave them between the layers. The air-space acts as a buffer, and prevents grease from burning. I think @Chris Allingham has a video showing how he wraps the water pan. I also stick one of those disposable aluminum trays in the water pan.

If you're taking the butt to a higher temp, (for pulling), note that spritzing will add an hour, or more, to the cook. You might also consider checking the meat for probe tenderness, when it hits 193. I used to wait until they hit 200+. Years ago, I found that they can end up being perfectly tender anytime after they hit 190. Probe tender, moist and flavorful. My wheelhouse has been ~195. YMMV
 
TJ,

If it helps, I never use water in my pan, I just foil the empty pan, and I run my temps at 275 for pork butt, never had any "grease flashing". Comes out to around an hour per lb. I do spritz though around once an hour though, up until the bark is formed and I wrap.

Charlie
 
Update: 7 hours into the cook now and still on the original coals. They’re running their course around now though as the temp has dipped to 220F. I’ve got half of a chimney lit with coals I’ll be adding them in on top shortly.

the butt has stalled at 155F and hasn’t budged for around half an hour now.
 
Sounds like you are getting the hang of it.

Water is like driving a car with one foot on the brake. 2.5 gallons (the 18 WSM water pan size) of cold water is a lot of braking power. That is overkill in most cases and super inefficient.

You burn up a lot of charcoal to produce a lot of BTUs. And then many of those BTUs are consumed by heating all that water up to 212F and keeping it there. And with a big mass of water at 212F, it is difficult to get the cooker temp much above 225F. No matter how big you stoke the fire.

A quart of hot water is often more than enough to keep the temp from spiking out of control. I normally cook without any water at all and let the grease drip down onto a metal FireDial difuser plate. Zero grease fires ever. For moisture and to collect drippings, sometimes I use a disposable foil pan with a few cups of hot water.

You'd only need to use 2.5 gallons of water if you are trying to do a long overnight cook without having to refill. But even that is often unnecessary. As the water boils off, the cooker may trend hotter. Which is a nice counter-balance to the trend of the fire to run cooler as the coals gradually ash over and die down.

And unless you have unlimited time and charcoal to burn, use hot water versus cold.
 
the butt has stalled at 155F and hasn’t budged for around half an hour now.

How is your bark looking?

After 7-9 hours, you've got most/all of the smoke effect you are going to get. So once the bark gets to where you like it, all you are doing thereafter is raising the internal temp. And any application of BTUs will work for that. So you can keep using the cooker or switch over to your kitchen oven. A foil or butcher paper wrap will speed the cook up and keep the bark from getting darker and chewier.

At 4 pm and looking at a 7 pm dinner time, I'd say pull, wrap, and into a 300F kitchen oven. When it probes tender, turn the oven off and hold the butt in the warm oven until serving.

Nothing worse than failing to land the plane by dinner time.
 
Jim C in Denver said:
the butt has stalled at 155F and hasn’t budged for around half an hour now.

How is your bark looking?

After 7-9 hours, you've got most/all of the smoke effect you are going to get. So once the bark gets to where you like it, all you are doing thereafter is raising the internal temp. And any application of BTUs will work for that. So you can keep using the cooker or switch over to your kitchen oven. A foil or butcher paper wrap will speed the cook up and keep the bark from getting darker and chewier.

At 4 pm and looking at a 7 pm dinner time, I'd say pull, wrap, and into a 300F kitchen oven. When it probes tender, turn the oven off and hold the butt in the warm oven until serving.

Nothing worse than failing to land the plane by dinner time.
Click to expand...
The bark is a darkish mahogany colour with some crispier/darker portions of it on the bottom/grate side.

I’ll definitely be wrapping in butcher paper for at least 45 mins wrap. I was planning on doing that in a cooler once the butt hits 200F. I’m not too worried about the stall as I do realize it’s due to meat sweating.
 
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Well the smoke took 18 hours from start to finish. Had to refill charcoal around 3 times but it was worth it, the finished product was amazing and HD a great bark.

what I learned from my first pork butt:
1. The stall is real.. and extremely frustrating. I ended up resorting to the Texas crutch. Had I done the Texas crutch earlier I would’ve finished much earlier but wouldn’t of gotten as nice of a bark. Next time around I will try butcher paper instead of foil.

2. I will use large lump charcoal in the future (most likely Jealous Devil Large Lump or Cowboy). Royal Oak lump pieces are excruciatingly tiny, will never use the product again.

3. pork butt leftovers last a while but are highly addictive.
 
My big discovery with "the stall", which I learned by listening to many other here and elsewhere, is to smoke at higher temperatures. I find little difference in taste cooking at 275 rather than 225, but it sure cuts down on stall time and overall cooking time. Makes timing things a little more predictable as well when cooking per/pound.

I'd really love to hear from others if 225 has any other advantage from your experience.
 
I'd really love to hear from others if 225 has any other advantage from your experience.

18 hours tending to the smoker (even with an ATC) is too long for me. So I will do one or more things to shorten it up (butterfly the butt; cook at 275F; wrap; finish in the oven; hold in coole; etc.) so I can land dinner on the table and have the smoker shut down and cleaned up by then.

Only time I do very low (more like 240F than 225F) anymore is on an overnight cook. Goal being to make progress on the cook, not run out of charcoal, and get some sleep. For a cook starting in the morning, I'd always start at 275F.

225F maybe gives you more smoke flavor. More time in the smokey cooker, and perhaps more smoke particle adherence at a lower temp.
 
I don’t wrap, spritz or use water, light it and walk away. I love it. It’s the beauty of the WSM. Did an almost 12# butt a while back, 17 hours! No water, only looked when it got to about 195 and pulled on the bone, not quite ready.
Another hour and a half I think and it was magic, off, foiled, toweled, popped in a cooler, rested for about four hours.
Bone slipped out clean as a whistle shredded up just beautifully, took a big dish over to the neighbor who says sometimes it’s hard to stay asleep when I’m doing an overnighter! The smell puts her in a dream state and she wakes up wanting whatever I’m cooking then goes back to sleep and dreams about food!
I figure if I screw up her sleep, the least I can do is take her a treat!
 
Same as TFL. I assemble everything from the get-go, grub on, probes in and bring it all up to temp together. Light it up Minion style, take a shower and a bite to eat then check the temps, maybe an hour. Fettle the lower vents at 30 degs below target temp of +/- 260F. No water pan. A 3mm stainless steel diffuser plate with a foil drip pan on it. I will not lay eyes on the grub again until my magic number of 203 IT is reached.
 
It’s does not surprise me that you do it about the same as I do, I learned most of that from you Tony!
I need to look into a stainless disc as a diffuser, I like the idea.
The big difference I see is you take a shower and have a bite and I have a cocktail and go to sleep! I guess the real point of the thing is once you find a method that works for YOU, use it. I’ve borrowed technique from so many of the folks here I could print a book, if I said write, that would be plagiarism! Everyone finds a technique that works for them. They are all worthy pursuits because the pursuit of good barbecue is worthy!
 
I definitely don’t think there is anything magical about 225, especially for pork shoulder. My preferred temp is about 260 and I have no trouble keeping that even with water in the pan. Overnight cooks are the way to go with a larger shoulder. Get it going around 11pm and get a good sleep. Pull it off when it is done and give it a long rest.
I do think the RO lump played a part in some of the challenges that led to an 18 hour cook (two hours per pound!). You should be able to do an entire cook on a full load of fuel, even with water. The Stall is real! Sandwich looks tasty though!
 
I do think the RO lump played a part in some of the challenges that led to an 18 hour cook (two hours per pound!).

I know some folks dislike briqs for various reasons, but they do work very well for long WSM cooks.

The regular shape lets you densely pack a lot more fuel in the chamber and facilitates a very even and gradual spread of the fire throughout the charcoal pile. And if you are trying to cook at 250F for many hours on end, the higher heat coming from lump isn't really necessary or helpful.
 
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