First pork butts


 
J

John West

TVWBB Member
Tonight I started on my first butts. This is also my first real "slow and low" cook.

I'm cooking 2 7.5 lb butts. They went on at around 9:30 pm. I'll hover around the smoker until I go to bed, then sleep until morning unless the Redi-check wakes me up. Smoker temp is now hovering around 260.

Lessons learned so far:

--If you send your wife to the store for "Sugar in the Raw" make sure you specify that you don't want a box of individual serving sugar packets.

--It takes approximately 13 individual sugar packets to equal 1/4 cup of sugar.

--A chimney of 20 briquettes for the Minion method lights a lot faster than a full chimney for the standard method.

--You can't trim the fat from and apply rub to 2 butts in the time it takes for a chimney of 20 briquettes to light. If you try you'll cut your finger.

--Don't throw that last big chunk of hickory on top of your coals until AFTER you've assembled your smoker, positioned your meat on both racks, and placed your thermometer probes. *COUGH* *COUGH*.

I'll post an update in the morning and let everyone know how it went!
 
About an hour into the cook my Redi-check claims that my meat temp suddenly jumped from 80 up to 206. I took the probe out of the meat and apparently the air temperature on my back porch is 212. I think some juice from the meat may have dripped down the probe wire and into the transmitter. Looks like I'll have to rely on periodic checks with the candy thermometer for the rest of the cook. At least the smoker temp on my Redi-check is still working so I can get some sleep tonight!
 
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by John West:Lessons learned so far:

--If you send your wife to the store for "Sugar in the Raw" make sure you specify that you don't want a box of individual serving sugar packets.

--It takes approximately 13 individual sugar packets to equal 1/4 cup of sugar. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>That's pretty funny, but I have to admit something:

My wife was having a fancy tea thing at the house and I was charged with picking up a few things including sugar in the raw.

I came home with packets.

Boy was she pissed when she had to empty those things into an "appropriate" container.
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Ok, now it's suddenly started pouring rain. It was a little cloudy this afternoon when I started, so I set everything up under our covered porch. The only problem is that the wind is really blowing hard and the rain is soaking everything under the porch, including the WSM.

I swear I'm not making any of this up. I guess God doesn't want me to have any sweet tender delicious pulled pork for the 4th.
 
I'm loving this....keep it coming! I haven't expelled any liquid through my nose yet, but the cook is still young!

Pics would be priceless about now!
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Sure, whatever will bring some good out of all this.
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I took a couple of pics. First is the sugar packets and my misbehaving probe. Next is the wet smoker.

The rain is letting up now and I managed to keep it going at a steady 246 degrees through the storm. That is unless my smoker temp probe is acting up now.... Come to think of it, my remote's been reading 246 for a pretty long time now. Maybe I'd better go check on it...

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Thanks for the pics - I just finished and delivered a butt cook myself. Yeah, I hate those long times of the same temp too....I mean that is what 'we' really want but....they are just little electronic gadgets....which I live by when smoking...so nice to just glance over while doing the 'couch potato' thing and check the temps.

Anyway, so the bullet is stable for now and what's next.....the story can't end so soon!
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The rain has stopped. R2 (our pet name for the WSM) is holding steady at 249. Everything seems perfect... Almost too perfect. I'm afraid to go to sleep.

I'm trying to decide whether the family we're visiting tomorrow will be more upset at poorly cooked pork or at me being tired and grumpy from babysitting R2 all night. I'm also wondering if trichina can enter the body through a cut. I think I'll go wash my finger again.

Yeah, washing my finger should kill some time, then I can see if the smoker temp is still holding steady. If so, I should be ok to get some sleep... maybe... Or maybe I should stay up a little longer just to make sure.
 
Just R2.....what about D2....I know....you are just referring to it by its first name, R2.

Don't worry too much about sleeping and being grumpy tomorrow, if someone says anything just show'em the finger!
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Just curious, fat caps up or down?
 
Fat caps up or down? Funny you should ask. The fat cap on one butt is "mostly" cut off. The other is completely intact. Both are up.

I originally planned to cut both fat caps completely off and also trim any other large pieces of fat from the outsides as recommended in the preparation instructions on this site. The combination of the chimney being ready when I was halfway through trimming the first one and my finger bleeding all over the place made me decide to just leave the cap on the 2nd one. I guess it will be interesting to compare the results with and without the fat cap.
 
The two butts I did last night took the longest time yet to finish - I have always done the fat caps down and these were stuck to the grates worse than ever....fish spatula ended up working pretty good though.

You know, I good pic would have been when you put the hickory chunk on....maybe your wife could've taken it as you were trying to load the smoker, insert probe and avoid the smoke at the same time. I started cracking up laughing at that point....been there, done that!!

So, what are the meat temps.....90s yet?
 
John, Laughing with you, not at you Bud. This is a funny thread.
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Dude! I'll bet my lung intake of 10 big chunks of hickory smoke was more than yours.
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I had to switch probes on my Guru, and as an X smoker, even that was a heavy hit for my lungs. Good luck with your Butts. I just put 2 on myself about an hr ago. I'll be up drinking most of the night. Guru has the WSM on auto pilot till I wake up sometime Sat afternoon or early evening. It's been fun smoking Hickory with you.
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<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Wayne Truelove:

You know, I good pic would have been when you put the hickory chunk on....maybe your wife could've taken it as you were trying to load the smoker, insert probe and avoid the smoke at the same time...
</div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Actually, my wife was holding the flashlight for me at that point, and getting a face full of smoke too. When she finally got out of the smoke enough to open her mouth she asked why I can't ever just have normal "easy" hobbies.

Smoker temp is still holding steady. Now at 248. I haven't opened it up to check the meat temps yet, and probably won't until morning. Besides, my wife has "organized" my candy thermometer away somewhere where I can't find it without her help, and she's asleep.

It's 12:45 here and R2 seems to be doing fine without me. I'm going to go to bed for the night. My 2-year-old will wake me up around 7am and we'll go check the smoker together.

Good night. It's been nice e-smoking with you guys!
 
LMAO - I can picture the scene of smoke everywhere and that glare in her eyes about the hobby comment while holding a flash light and probably missing something important on TV....too funny. I picked on my wife once too many for watching any and every stupid reality show that comes on these days.....she finally came back with most of the programming on Food Network is cooking which is reality......things that make you go hmmmmmmmm

E-smoking...I like that! Keep us informed of any other happenings of your not so 'normal hobby!'
 
Good morning Internet! Thanks to everyone who spent time sitting up and e-smoking with me last night. You all provided some much needed entertainment and humor!

Best quote from my smoke last night --

Wife: You're letting tons of flies into the house! How much longer are you going to be going in and out, in and out?

Me: 12 - 16 hours.


Well, I went to bed around 1am and slept through the night with no interruptions. Our son woke us up at around 7am and a quick glance at the Redi-check on my bedside table showed 264. Not bad at all. Apparently R2 stayed right on temp all night without me. I'm proud of the little guy.

About 5 minutes after we woke up, the Redi-check alarm went off. The temp had suddenly spiked to 280. I want to stress how important that 5 minute difference between wake up time and Redi-check alarm time was. If it had been a 5 minute difference in the other direction and the Redi-check had woken us up that would have been strike 2 against my new abnormal hobby. I take back what I said about God not wanting me to have tasty pork for the 4th. Apparently he's on board with the smoke and looking out for R2 and I.

So anyway, the temp's at 280 and climbing fast. I head out for the smoker and quickly close one of the bottom vents. They're now at 25%, 25%, 0%. Then I run in and get my son up and dressed while my wife starts cooking breakfast.

I check the temp again and it's still climbing. Then it hits me. WATER PAN! I open up the side door and the water pan is empty. I fill the water pan back up through the side door and in the process I melted the spout on my wife's plastic watering can a little. Hopefully she won't notice, for both R2's sake and mine.

The temp finally went down, so I went for a morning walk with my wife and son. When I came back, the temp had dropped to 205. Great. Now I need to get it back up. I opened the closed vent back up to 25% and now we're back up to 220.

We're now 12 hours in. Coming up next: The wife's going to help me turn, baste, and temp check both racks of meat. Judging from past experience it should make for some good stories. I'll update when we're done. Wish me luck!
 
I want to see some pictures when you are done. My 2 pork butts have been on for 13 hours now and I am looking forward to a little holiday bbq session.
 
Well I am a few hours behind you guys. I put two smallish (5.5 lb.) butts on this morning at 6:00. I am hoping that they will finish up in 10-12 hours.
 
Good morning John, glad to hear all went well for you over night. Your in the home stretch now. Really no need to flip and baste them. There's a good chance they will fall apart this late into the cook.
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