22hr cook for a pork shoulder? Wow. I did not know they could take that long.
I put it on at 4:00pm yesterday afternoon and set the temp at 225. Front burner on med, rest of the corners off. A 19x12x3 aluminum disposable pan filled to the top (1.5 gal?) with water as hot as I could get out of the faucet was on the lower level of flavorizer bars. Makes a great heat stabilizer. The upper bars were removed. Overnight the grill temp dropped to 217 as I slept and it got colder outside. At 5:00 am I dialed up the temp and it hovered around 235 until about 2:00 pm. At that time the internal temp was 183 and it was at that temp for a couple of hours. My friend who smokes a lot of meat was over and after probing and slipping the bone out, declared it done. After resting an hour wrapped in foil and towels in a cooler, it was pulled and taste tested. It was deemed a success!
Now, why did it take so long?
When I inserting the probe into the pork before cooking, it registered 34 degrees. Obviously I should have let it thaw in the fridge a bit longer.
When I was done cooking, the water pan was still half full of water. On previous cooks, the pan would be almost empty.
The meat was placed at the rear of the grill and the grill temp probe was just in front of the meat. I think next time I will move the meat a bit forward and put the grill temp probe behind the meat. I’m thinking that with the cooler ambient temp, maybe the meat was only getting the 225 degrees on the front face and the rest was much lower.
Anyway, the pulled pork is delicious and that’s what counts!
Cheers
Gerry