My First Pork Butt


 
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Rick M...

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I did 2 4lb pork butts, they turned out great although I didnt leave the first one on as long as I should for pulled pork because I had guests comming in. Started the Q up at about 11am(too late to start I found out.) took the first butt off at about 630 when the temp was at about 180, it tasted great but I found that leaving that bad boy on till atleast 195 would have been a lot better. I used 2 Cherry and 1 Hickory block of wood for the smoke and rubbed it with the BRITU rub....I also brined it with the "basic brine" from the weber cook book that came with the grill (this I am sure I did not need to do but figured it would not hurt it.)

Two questions.

1. Refilling that water pan, I had to lift the lid, take the top grad off and then poor water in, is there a better way or should I just goto sand?

2 I used probably a good 15lbs of charcoal, too much overkill, what would you suggest just filling up 2 starter stacks????
 
Rick,
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>1. Refilling that water pan, I had to lift the lid, take the top grad off and then poor water in, is there a better way or should I just goto sand? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> Use sand instead of water! Serves the same purpose and you do not need to add anything during the cook!

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>2 I used probably a good 15lbs of charcoal, too much overkill, what would you suggest just filling up 2 starter stacks???? <HR></BLOCKQUOTE> 2 4lb butts should use about 10lbs, using the MM for a full length typical cook. You can reuse what is left though so don't toss it!
 
Or... for refilling water, use a wine bottle or a small gas can (new, no gas) with a filler neck on it.

Or... by a brinkman charcoal pan to use as your water pan. That will cut down on refills except on really long cooks. Brinkman pan is $4 at Bass Pro Shops.
 
Rick, I find that you can top up the water by just opening the hatch and using an empty coke or even wine bottle full of water and pour directly into the pan, no splashes and makes refiling very easy..

Bren..
 
Chris bet me to it by a couple of seconds
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Sand will be my next bbq, I didnt like having to refill the water (although I did have an Idea of using a brine solution in the water pan so the flavor goes to the meat, maybe not origional but gave it a try)

I gotta say the butt turned out really good thats waht I am having for dinner again tonight... Had a few folks over for my maden run, and let me tell you they all liked it.
 
Whatever you put in the pan will only act as a heatsink. Additives to the water have long been the subject of debate-- they might smell good during the cooking process but don't flavor the meat. As to salt, I always think of the basic science experiment where you boil saltwater until the water's gone, and you have the salt left in the pan. You could just add it to your mop, though, and apply it directly.
 
I use an empty beer bottle....OK when I'm smoking I usually have LOTS of empty beer bottles or if I am opening the top to turn the meat or spray it with juice then I just pour the water from a pitcher straight down thru the grate into the basin. I have brinkman pan that I use for long cooks and I'm going to give using sand a shot later this week.
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I use a watering can to fill the water pan. Open the door, insert spout and pour away. I use this method to fill and refill. I can fill the pan (Weber not Brinkman) with one can full and then refill as needed. That being said, I think sand might be in my future because I am really beginning to get sick of cleaning the water pan.

Also, I knocked the legs a bit hard last Friday right b4 going to bed and had a small water problem - water over the edge and it followed tinfoil seam to the low point right in the middle of the charcoal. I bet I spilled a 1/2 pint of water but the WSM recovered nicely. Somehow the WSM maintained temp., dried the charcoal and burned it later during the cook.

Rick N
 
I used to think water in the pan made a difference! After switching to sand, I now know it does not make any difference whatsoever! Using water actually makes the cook more difficult than it needs to be! (adding water and heat sinks and spikes) Switch to sand! There will be no need to worry about an empty bottle of any sort to refill the pan!! The sand serves the exact same purpose as water, to help maintain your temperature with the "mass" of a heat absorbing substance! PERIOD!
 
You are right there Larry. After taking your advice, I switched to sand for last nights all nighter. It works the same as water except for one difference I could see. Before with water, my WSM wanted to run about 225-240 depending on venting. With the sand my I noticed the vents closed a lot more and the WSM still wanting to run 250-270. Once I got use to the new vent settings to look for, all went well. I put two 7lb. butts on at 11pm last night, (after watching my Astro's whup the Braves), and finally got to bed around 3am with all the adjusting. Checked em all at 6am and turned em over. Got up at 10am though to go check internal temp and wrap them and the WSM had done got cold on me somewhere between 6-10am. Does using the sand eat up the charcoal more? I seemed to have gotten a more thorough burn. ??
 
My question about using sand is this...

If you fill the water pan with sand, then shouldn't the temperature of the lower grate be much hotter than usual (e.g. when using water).

Sand seems to be a wonderful conductor of radiant heat. I'm no scientist, but on a sunny day at the beach...with no shoes...OUCH!

Ergo, shouldn't the radiant energy of the fire be transmitted to the pan and then the sand to the point where eventually it is DARNED hot?

What does this do to the dynamics? How does one compensate for this. Has anyone trained their thermo to the lower grate above sand and measured it vs. H2O?

Just don't want to burn my butts. AR
 
Art, I have a therm at each grate and ever since switching to sand the bottom therm has registered hotter than the top therm, sometimes by as much as 50 degrees.

But, the stems on the therms are 2 1/2", which puts the tip "just" past the outer hot zone by about an inch. And, for some reason I can't explain even to myself, I'm using the larger Brinkman pan, which has to be a part of the problem, the larger mass of sand.
 
John,

If you have a therm that has a metal stem, and I'm guessing that's what you've got, and this metal stem is being placed over the outer edges of the cooker, you will definitly see higher temps. The high heat will be conducted along the shaft of the therm and affect the reading at the tip.

AL
 
Looks like sand will be what I use for my next Q. after reading more I can see that I made a bunch of mistakes with my first round but let me tell you, the butt turned out great(even with the screwups)....Sunday pulled pork sandwiches, Monday pulled pork sandwichs, Tuesday we took the pork and put it in spagetti sauce and had pulled pork spagetti, I am now looking for new ideas for pulled pork since i still have about 2lbs of it left(and it is NOT going into the trash) I really need to get a vacuum sealer.
 
Hmmm, Al, I never considered that. I think I'll try to fashion a couple of heat shields for them and see if the temp variance changes.
 
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