Patiently waiting for butts


 
D

Derrick Llewellyn

TVWBB Fan
Been on for 14 hrs now. Getting close to being done. Smoking 20 lbs of pork butt for a friends and her family as she lost her mom to cancer this week. Funeral is tomorrow and the last thing they need to worry about is feeding people coming in from out of town.

CyberQ again has worked like a champ allowing me to sleep all night while the 22 sat at 250 all night long.
 
Sounds like a very worthy cause, Derrick, and I'm sorry for your friend's loss. I'm sure all will appreciate your efforts, though.

Post more details if you can regarding probe placement on grate, etc. I'm trying to learn to really dial in my butt cook timing with my PartyQ, and would appreciate any tips. Hope your 'Q meets or exceeds expectations.
 
Dave I always place the gator clip to where it is just over the water pan. To close to the edge of the grate and I feel not a true reading cause more heat coming up between wall and pan. Only thing that I do that has worked for me after trying different methods is once I put in my 12-15 lit coals I replace middle section and lid, immediately turn on Guru and let it bring the temp all the way up with all other intakes closed. I used allow the intakes to be open to bring up temp faster and then when I hit 200* or so close them then turn on Guru. I always had fluctuations and usually ran hot. Now with letting the Guru do it it takes about an hour to come up to 250 but by then I have really nice smoke and when I open lid to put me on I never over shoot as it comes back up to temp.

Hope that helps with some ideas.

Pork turned out great. One of them the bark was a little tough, not sure why?? So beagles got a nice afternoon snack. Otherwise had great texture and color. I kept just a little for dinner. Sorry no pics as I was in a hurry.
 
Derrick couldn't have said it better. You have to wait a little longer to get to temp, but your control on target temp will be much better.
 
Derrick Llewellyn said:
Dave I always place the gator clip to where it is just over the water pan. To close to the edge of the grate and I feel not a true reading cause more heat coming up between wall and pan. Only thing that I do that has worked for me after trying different methods is once I put in my 12-15 lit coals I replace middle section and lid, immediately turn on Guru and let it bring the temp all the way up with all other intakes closed. I used allow the intakes to be open to bring up temp faster and then when I hit 200* or so close them then turn on Guru. I always had fluctuations and usually ran hot. Now with letting the Guru do it it takes about an hour to come up to 250 but by then I have really nice smoke and when I open lid to put me on I never over shoot as it comes back up to temp.

Hope that helps with some ideas.
Pork turned out great. One of them the bark was a little tough, not sure why?? So beagles got a nice afternoon snack. Otherwise had great texture and color. I kept just a little for dinner. Sorry no pics as I was in a hurry.
Click to expand...

Derrick, I know with brisket you can't put the probe clip center grate, but are you saying you don't put it dead center grate between the butts? Thanks for the tip on bringing the temp up solely with the ATC. That was my first mistake with mine. Mainly though, I was wondering about what you get in temps/times with say, 8-9lb. fridge cold pork butts at 250, and exactly where the probe was clipped.

Bark is a funny thing, though, huh? You cook too slow and it can start to dry out to the point that by the time the pork starts weeping, it's too late, but you can do just the opposite as well, and cook too fast and dry it out just the same. Sometimes the fat just never comes to the surface in a particular part of the butt to keep it basted enough, and it goes somewhere else. Anyhow, I certainly like the bark better when going with a dry pan, but I must confess that water in the pan makes for some good insurance against spots of "jerky bark". Glad the pork turned out good, though. I'm sure your friend and her family really appreciated it.

Have a good 'un.
Dave
 
I do not place it center even with butts. Reason I dont is I worry about closeness of cold meat to the probe not giving accurate temps. Now eventually it would all equal out I imagine but just some thing I never have done. Far as temps/times wish now I would have been using my pitpal and I could have shown you 16 hrs of graphs and charts with meat and pit temps...my bad.

If you have Android it is a great app if you are in to that stuff. In play store called pitpal and pay the $5 for the pro version. If you do a search for Christmas brisket shows it: http://tvwbb.com/showthread.php?47695-My-Christmas-Brisket-pics-and-more&highlight=christmas+brisket

yesterday it was about 45* outside and dropped to 34* at night. At 250* for 2 9 lb butts went 16 hrs and I pulled them at 203 IT. These went straight from fridge to WSM with a pit temp of 240*
 
Thanks so much, Derrick. So you're actually measuring the hotter cooking temp, no doubt significantly higher than the average grate temp. Makes sense what you're saying, though, and I just read where one of the guys said that Harry Soo measures outer grate temps, as well.

As for your temp/time, that should be easy for me to remember since I used to often smoke 9 pounders overnight in my 18" with water for about 16 hours. It would be a dome vent avg temp of about 240 and avg gauge temp of 225. Anyhow, I'll definitely try the 250 at the pan edge for overnights and 275 for day cooks. Makes sense to me, and don't get me wrong...I know they're done when they're done. Thanks again.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

 

Back
Top