First time butts


 
K

Karl Repsher

TVWBB Fan
Hi everyone, I’m planning to cook a couple of butts for pulled pork on WSM day, this will be my first WSM day cook and my first attempt at cooking pork butts, I’m been reading the posts here, getting a lot of good info and I feel confident in doing it and looking forward to participating in WSM day.

I have a couple of questions; first, can any one suggest, from there own experience, rubs that are not hot? I use Santa Maria Style rub on beef, but I don’t think that would be very good on pork. My wife and her family likes the Q, but to them black pepper is too hot; I need to use something that they will like and not pass out from the heat.

Second, my wife gets off on chicken on a throne; we’ve found a great recipe and she thinks it so neat to see the chicken sitting up like that while it’s being cooked. She is tentative about the pork and wants me to cook a chicken in case she doesn’t like the pork (some of my previous cooks experimenting with new rubs caused her face to literally turn red and she’s Tahitian with naturally brown skin), so..., can I cook my butts on the bottom grate and about 3-4 hours before the butts are done put the chicken on the top? Will my temp drop drastically; will it lengthen the cooking time very much or will it interfere with my butts coming out ok, I don’t want to take a chance on ruining my butts for a $3 chicken.

My WSM heats up really quick so if I open the bottom vents will that compensate for the cold meat being put in the cooker? Just to give you an idea how my WSM runs I cook chuck rolls at 225° for 14 hours (Minion Method) with my bottom vents set at 0-0-10 % open and the top vent at 100 % open, if that’s of any help.

Thanks for your help and advice.

One more question, if I may, when I cook my chuck roll I fill my WSM water pan to within
½” of the top bend in the pan, in a 14 hour cook it takes about a quart of water to keep the pan at this level, is that normal?

Karl
 
Why not trying to make your own rub. There are lots of rub recipes for rubs on this board, use one as a base rub that sounds good to you and leave out or cut back on the spices that you think may give it too much heat.
My wife doesn't like much heat either but she doesn't seem to mind what I put on the butts even though they taste hot in their raw form the cook time and smoke seem to temper the heat after a long cook. But if you are concerned just leave out the hot spices.

As far as cooking the chicken on top of the butts I would NOT recommend it. You would be taking a big chance on cross contamination with the chicken drippings going on the pork. I would not take the chance.
I would put the butts on the top rack and when it is time for the chicken I would put that on the bottom rack and leave the pork on top. You will not have to worry about cross contamination from the pork to the chicken since the pork will be beyond the safe temperature by the time you put on the chicken, and the pork drippings will help to baste the chicken.
I can't help you with your water question since I use the clay pot base.
 
Hi Karl,

I recently did my first butts on a WSM, so I'm no authority by any stretch. I used the rub in the "Renowned Mr. Brown" recipe on this site and honestly it didn't seem to have any heat at all to me, but was really delicious. My wife isn't much of a spicy aficionado, either, and she loved it. I would guess that any heat desired would come from the final sauce.

Billy
 
While I disagree with Randy on the chicken-on-top issue (as long as cooking temps are safe and both meats are cooked to safe temps there is no chance of cross contamination), I completely agree on the rub front. Make your own, eliminating or decreasing the pepper and converting any hot chile to a mild one and perhaps an increased level of the other spices/herbs.

Here's a quick conversion from a somewhat spicy one to mild:

1/2 c light or dark Muscovado sugar or Turbinado
1/4 c Ancho chili powder (use paprika if you must)
1/2 c onion powder
1/2 c garlic powder
1/3 c dried thyme
3 T marjoram
1 T ground coriander
1 T ground cumin
1 t ground black pepper
2 t allspice
2 t cinnamon
1 t ground bay leaf
2 t ginger
1 t rubbed sage

Blend everything.

As always, I do not include salt in my rub mixtures.

I prefer to apply a nice even amount of Kosher salt to the meat, wait several minutes for the surface of the meat to become moist (often I salt first, then mix the rub while the meat sits), then apply the rub generously.
 
You can put a tray with edges under your beer can chicken on the top grate.....you'll still get the smoke and will no drips to the butts and will have very easy cleanup on the top grate
 
My wife doesn't eat anything with sugar in it, so I make my own rub and leave out the sugar found in many recipes. It's always a hit. I'll post that recipe soon.

But, my children don't care so much for my homemade rub. What they love for a rub is a commercial product that's available in every grocery store around here. It's called "Adobo," and it's made by Goya. Most "Anglo" stores have it in small bottles - you'll use a whole bottle for a butt. If you have many Latinos in your area you can go to a store that caters to that population and buy big bottles for about $2.50. I did 4 butts with about half a bottle. Next time I'd use a little more.

So, my top recommendation would be Goya Adobo for a no-heat, sugarless rub.

(P.S. I used Adobo when making 4 butts for a church function that had about half Latinos and half Anglos. It got rave reviews from everyone.)
 
Thanks everyone for the replies, they’re great!

For my beer can chicken I use a Weber’s chicken holder and it has a built in bowl so I don’t think the juice dropping on the butts will be an issue one way or another.

For the rubs, we don’t have any commercial American rubs because they don’t cook low and slow BBQ here. As for making the rubs I’m really gun shy, I mean..., I have really lit up my bride several times with the things I’ve tried, that’s why I’m asking for “personal experience." I’m so new to this, I’m just starting to recognize the different spice flavors, and as far as chili powders we have two to choose from; McCormick’s dark and red, oh yes and then there is Harissa, but we won’t even go there.

I’ve been looking at Mr. Brown’s recipe but ¼ cup of black pepper seems to be a lot, I’ve found the paprika doesn’t give much flavor, so it seems the flavor will be a toss up between the black pepper-cayenne and the sweetness of the sugar; I’m afraid it will be too hot for them.

Yes, bbq chuck roll was a first timer here for these folks and was a great success, that was the reason I bought the WSM in the first place, to try and make bbq like I have eaten in the States (it’s been about 20 years since I’ve eaten bbq beef at Thursday Night Farmers Market in SLO town). All of our beef comes from New Zealand and is very good, not very expensive either; I paid about $2.25/lb for it. It’s pork that is hard to get, local importation law prohibits importing pork, so the pork that is locally raised is grabbed up quick by the restaurants and to make Chinese BBQ pork for Sunday mornings, fortunately I have reserved two for May.

So..., it seems to be to be a go for cooking butts and chicken in the same WSM.

Kevin, since I have 2 butts to work with, I think I’ll give your rub a try on one of the butts and try the Chris Lilly’s Six-Time World Championship recipe on the other for a comparison cook.

This is going to be fun; I can hardly wait to try this, thanks everyone for the input and help.

Karl
 
Yes, it should be fun.

I'm doing a couple 9-lb butts tomorrow during the day. Not sure what I'll make for rub yet.

Ancho is a fairly flavorful chile with no heat (as you probably know); if you have something available with more flavor use it. I am not a fan of paprika in rubs unless it is needed to bulk up the mix (makes a good carrying agent); flavor is mild, what is doesn't hold up to long cooking and can tend toward bitter. (I like it for short-cooked sauces and such.)

Been quite a while, but I remember fondly tossing back overly priced French white burgundy then numerous Hinanos in Papeete after spending a day tooling around in the sun...

Have fun with your cook.
 
Wow! Papeete is a looong way from Okeechobee.

I live on the west side of Papeete, and the days of tooling around in the sun are over, we are quickly approaching grid lock, I’ve bought a scooter to get around the traffic problem.

Thanks for the tip on the paprika; I’ll remember that, also, I didn’t know that about Ancho chilies, I thought all chilies were hot, hotter and hottest. Like you said, things are quite expensive here and I don’t like giving my inedible mistakes to the cats, ...I’ve lit up my cats too, have you ever seen a cat stick it’s head into a water bowl up to it’s eyes? I have.

I’m defrosting a 6 lb brisket for a Friday night cook, it’s my first one, they French don’t
“cook” brisket, however, with the use of a lot of pictures downloaded from the internet to show them what I wanted, I learned they use it for “boeuf bourguignon,” ...I won! Madam likes the Santa Maria Style rub so I will try it with that.

Karl
 
Chiles range from absolutely no heat (there are many at the low end of the scale, sweet paprika being one) to scorching. Ancho has virtually no heat in most cases in dried form (occasionally a few are very mildly hot), pasillas are fairly mild. I no longer recall the peppers available in Tahiti.

Great that you found a brisket to cook. Today, for me, chili made with chuck, a mix of several dried chilies of various heats and flavors, dried mango, and plenty of onions and garlic and herbs and spices; and a chicken-andouille (the Cajun, not the French) filé gumbo--plus some sauteed kale. Gotta get on it.
 
Hey friends, I know it's been a long time since I posted this, I'm real busy so I mostly lurk late at night and I've found lots of good recipes to try, also I have added a propane GOSM to the arsenal which I have modded with a PID controled heating element and a homemade smoke generator to smoke sausage.

I still use the WSM a lot and have even cooked pizza and cobblers with great success, I went back to this post for Kevin's rub recipe that I had lost in a 'puter crash and reading Kevin's last post has sparked my curosity.

Kevin, I've made your andouille sausage and it's good, any chance of the recipe for the chicken-andouille file gumbo, and I've made a chicken-jalapeno-mango sausage that is excellent, so I'm on the lookout for recipies with dried mango, so would you share the chili recipe too.

Thanks,

Karl
 
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