smoking first pork shoulder this weekend

[carpetbagger, esq.]

hey y'all...

saturday is d-day for me. i'm doing my first shoulder. the meat market i ordered from said their average shoulder is about 15lbs. i'm preparing this for roughly a dozen people, but could swell up to about 16 or so. i was hoping to have some leftovers for myself and the guests (assuming it tastes good!), but i'm wondering if this is simply too much bbq!

assuming i lose a little over 1/3rd while it's smoking, that knocks it down to a little under 10lbs cooked pork. most everyone will be adults, and they all have big appetites (let's just say a lot of us are supersized). do you think 1/3rd lb per person is a fair estimate? if so, then i will be somewhere around 4-5lbs of meat with another 4 or 5 in leftovers. i guess split up amongst everyone that's not horrible. there should be 4 families attending, so they would each get 1lb to take home.

i think i may have convinced myself i'm not getting too much, but i would love to hear everyone's thoughts and advice!

in order to answer some q's in advance:

pregame

injecting - yes, probably apple juice?

brining - overnight (still trying to work on keeping it cool)

gameday

wood - hickory (wouldn't mind getting apple though)

coal - probalby just normal kingsford

method - minion pending further research

smoker - el cheapo brinkmann vertical gourmet smoker

menu

sauces - 3: vinegar, mustard, red/sweet

sides - baked beans, potato salad, creamed corn, ???

desserts - hopefully some fried pies and homemade ice cream

[Bombdog]

On occasions like the upcoming holiday I normally add a couple slabs of ribs to the mix along with ALOT of butt. What can it hurt? After all, you want leftovers, and have you ever met someone who will eat pulled pork who WON'T eat some ribs too?

[Mayhaw Man]

Well, I feel pretty sure that you can handle it because everything, and I mean everything, that you could ever possibly want to know about butts is right here in the Giant thread of Butts

Of course, you'll need to start reading now, because, otherwise, you won't have time to cook the butt.

[carpetbagger, esq.]

yeah, i've read that thread before. it has some good info in it after the first couple of pages detailing al dente's butt.

i'm actually pretty damn nervous about making this shoulder. it's probably a combo of feeding a bunch of people with something as subjective as bbq, the stress of figuring out if everything is going okay for over a 15 hour period of time (and probably more like 18 hours), and figuring out what kind of mods i need to do to my cheapo smoker before i even get to cooking! it all just seems rather imposing - at least moreso than other things i have done in the past.

i have a super cheap brinkmann that i got as a gift (see below) and it doesn't seem up to the task. first of all, the temp gauge says "warm/ideal/hot." wtf marketing genius came up with this imprecise gauge?!?!?! he should be fired on the spot. there's also no vents on this (unless you assume the charcoal replaement door is a vent), unlike the wsm bullet. i have already picked up an additional thermometer that has a 200-500 degree range on it, and i may drill some holes in it and attach a vent cover.

i guess i'll have plenty of time to make sauces!!!

[BigHoss]

carpetbagger.......you generally will lose closer to half of the total......to leave you with about 7-8lbs of meat. BUT you will generally have 4 sandwiches per pound which should give you about 28-30 sandwiches which would give 2 per person. i have seasoned hickory and apple wood (12-18 months)

and since you live in nashville i would be more than happy to drop some of this wood off to you....if you need it (i live around franklin/brentwood). cook your shoulder at 210-225 for about until the internal temp gets to 195-200 degrees. make sure when you take that reading that your therm. is not touching bone at all! because you are doing a whole shoulder it should take you about 18 maybe even 20 hours from start to finish. you may want to think about cooking two butts instead because you could have those done in 12-14 hours. if your cooker spikes to 250 degrees every now and then dont worry about it just adjust your intake as needed. those brinkmans are very thin and therefore not good at holding their temps very well so you'll need to stay with it. id check your temp every 30 minutes or so.....which means you'll need a lot of beer and some buddies to stay up with you. they are A LOT of work! i have a small off-set cooker that you can borrow if you like. it will make your night a little easier because it holds the heat a lot better. your internal will get to about 160-170 within about 3 hours or so....then it will stay there for, literally, about 8-12 more hours. this is what we call the "plateau" in bbq terms. so dont worry when the thing has been sitting at the same internal for hours on end. when it breaks that barrier it will quickly (couple more hours or so) move on up to 195-200. you'll want to flip your meat at the 1/2-way point and baste your meat every 45min-hour or so thereafter. i pull my shoulders and let sit (wrapped) in a cooler for an hour or so. hope this helps.....ill shoot you an email with my contact info if you need it and i am serious when i offer you the wood and off-set cooker, please use them if you like.

[Bombdog]

I wouldn't stress about it. You've got your bases covered and already thought of a different thermometer...your timing is about right...Just get the beer and have a good time. I'm the lucky recipient of a Bradley Smoker from an ex fiance, so the whole ordeal is fairly painless here.

[Lan4Dawg]

those little Brinkman cookers actually do a decent job. I used one for years before I got my off-set smoker and still take the little one for tail gating, &c. Keep the water reservoir full and an eye on the thing and you should be okay (a neighbor got one of those for Christmas a few years back and kept complaining that it did not work. We made a point to help him smoke on a Sunday and I found out the problem almost immediately. He kept removing the lid to watch it cook!)

As for brining nothing works better than a large ice chest (or if you have room in a fridge then one of those ten gallon buckets). If using the ice chest fill some liter bottles w/ water and freeze them then replace them as necessary to keep the meat cool or freeze part of your brine solution.

If you have room you might consider throwing a couple of whole chickens on there (if memory serves it comes w/ a couple of racks so you should be okay). When ever I am smoking I fill the blasted thing as much as possible and freeze what ever is left over. The up side w/ chickens is you have extra (just in case some one does not eat pork or you do need extra) and dinner for the next night. Brine them as you would the pork and they should be good to go.

I am not 100% in agreement about the basting of the meat--at least the timing but I am not a big fan of basting any way. Granted BigHoss is the professional but if you marinated the pork and are using a water bath then you probably do not need to baste it--at least not every 45 minutes. I would think about it every hour or there abouts and then only if you wish to add a particular flavor of sauce.

Some thing else to consider (& I realize this is sacrilege to many) is that if you get really desperate and after you have smoked the pork for 12 hours it has taken all the smoke it could possibly take so you can finish it in the oven if so inclined (if you do so then wrap it heavily in foil & bring your water bath w/ you.) Another suggestion is to get a couple of "remote" thermometers w/ alarms--the ones w/ the probes on a cord. Set one for 225* & the other for 190* and place both probes in the smoking chamber. At least you do not have to be quite so diligent just keep an ear peeled for the alarm (that is also quite handy if you have one too many beers).

Good luck and if I did not have to work on Saturday I would smoke some thing just to assist vicariously (they have been doing some work on the water pipes in our neighbor hood and last week I was smoking a couple of chickens, a small brisket, some pork chops, and a pork loin. It was about noon and I put the meat on the smoker at about 8.00am so things were going along pretty well. I went to check temps &c and sensed that I was being watched. When I turned around there must have been about half a dozen of the construction crew just standing there staring at the smoker. One of the guys finally spoke up, "That smelled so good we just had to see what was going on back here." I had to apologize that things would not be ready for a while yet so no sampling despite it being lunch time.

[carpetbagger, esq.]

thanks everyone!

after thinking it over more, i think i am going to change my order to two butts. besides the reduced cooking time, i think it would be good to try a few things out and compare the results. by doing two butts, i can use a rub on one while doing the other naked. ideally, i will pair the rub to one of the sauces. right now, i'm doing a south carolina, eastern north carolina and nashville/tn sauce so everyone can get what they want.

lan, good idea about the chickens. maybe i'll throw one or two on there. if i do that, i could make one to be paired with some northern alabama white sauce....mmmm....white sauce </homer>. talk about sacrilege, i think i prefer the white sauce at hog heaven (here in nashville) to the original at big bob gibson's in decatur, al. ooo, and cornell chicken for the other. hmmm...this has possiblities.

talk about some regional variety - ny, nc, sc, tn and al all in one meal!

now i really might be biting off more than i can chew! just when i was making things easier...

[Lan4Dawg]

thanks everyone!

after thinking it over more, i think i am going to change my order to two butts. besides the reduced cooking time, i think it would be good to try a few things out and compare the results. by doing two butts, i can use a rub on one while doing the other naked. ideally, i will pair the rub to one of the sauces. right now, i'm doing a south carolina, eastern north carolina and nashville/tn sauce so everyone can get what they want.

lan, good idea about the chickens. maybe i'll throw one or two on there. if i do that, i could make one to be paired with some northern alabama white sauce....mmmm....white sauce </homer>. talk about sacrilege, i think i prefer the white sauce at hog heaven (here in nashville) to the original at big bob gibson's in decatur, al.  ooo, and cornell chicken for the other. hmmm...this has possiblities.

talk about some regional variety - ny, nc, sc, tn and al all in one meal!

now i really might be biting off more than i can chew! just when i was making things easier...

←

you are welcome and, again, good luck.

I love the white sauce at Hog Heaven. Let me have a dish of that and a spoon and I will be happy--the chicken just might be an after thought. ":^)

There are so many great places to eat in/around Nashville (& now BigHoss is opening his joint just South of there) that we never have enough time to visit all of them.

[carpetbagger, esq.]

there's a new guy on the block - mothership bbq. i haven't been yet, but just left a bunch of q's for him on his blog. his restaurant website is here.

[Luckylies]

You sound really set up. give yourself 20 hours for the cooktime. Start the meat the day before, and when it's ready, wrap it tightly in tinfoil and stash it in a cooler for at least and hour (for some reason this really helps the texture of the meat for me. Also, in a heavy cooler, wrapped in foil, then beach towels you can safely hold two shoulders for quite a few hours..so it will give you more leeway in starting earlier, the day before (you might actually try to get some rest too, make for a better host)

yeah, I'm doing two shoulders on the third. Starting them at about 8pm for a 3:00 cue. No brine but injection (salty apple cider) rub one, naked other. Minion method, kingsford bricks, hickory. I'll light another can of bricks at 2am before bed then pass out till 9am...and go from there. I hope you have a good spouted waterer to refill the water pan, it's really handy.

what, no brisket?

[carpetbagger, esq.]

i don't think anyone in the fam is a brisket person. this really is a pork family. in fact, i think we have pork at every g2g, and most of the veggies are cooked with pork somehow.

brisket is something i'll try down the road. for now, i'll stick with the more forgiving pork butt.

good luck to you!

[bandregg]

I'd start the cooking the night before. You can use the Minion method from the Virtual Weber Bullet website to easily carry you through the night without any trouble at all. Or you can sit up all night keeping an eye on things and sipping your way through a bottle of bourbon. I've done both and they're both good solutions.

I reguarly smoke pork butts and I don't bother with the brine. There is more than enough fat in the meat to keep it all tender and flavorful. And I agree that there just isn't call to baste it. A nice dry rub and you're set. Put it on the smoker, let the temperature regulate and then just sit back and watch it go.

I keep a little oven thermometer on the lower rack by the side door to check the temp. on when I add water to the pan or wood to the coals.

And as I believe Lan4Dawg said, you should fill the smoker racks up with as much meat as you can get on there. Think of anything that comes off early as chef's treat.

[BigHoss]

c-bagger, post us with your progress/end result when you get time...........

[racheld]

I hope you have a good spouted waterer to refill the water pan, it's really handy.

We've got one---it's my watering can, and everytime I go out to see to things, it's been used to soak woodchips, as well. I have to get the soggy mess out in order to water the small pots, so I just leave the stuff in a little wet pile on the concrete in the sun, awaiting another day.

Chris is doing a smoked butt today, just for us; our group will be here Tuesday evening for ribs and a walk over to the park for fireworks.

Smells great from HERE!!!

[carpetbagger, esq.]

will post more later tonight once they're done, but so far:

i prepared 2 rubs last night, applied and wrapped up in the fridge. also figured i would just make the sauces while i was at it since i had pulled all the ingredients out earlier. was up til about 2:30 working on them and some other things.

up at 7:30 to get the wood chunks soaking and prepare the chimney.

short version - minion method did not work well at all to start. WAY too hot! how hot? like 400* hot. so after a lot of charcoal removal, it's where it should be. the smaller butt is getting too warm to fast imho. already at 140* after 2 hrs. i don't have a probe in the larger one, so i have no idea where that's at. the smaller one is on the bottom level, although i may swap them at some point.

i do plan on having a full writeup later, so stay tuned... hopefully these aren't beyond salvation.

[carpetbagger, esq.]

hoss and others,

the full post re my butts can be found here in the "behold my butt!" thread

[BigHoss]

nice job c-bagger................sounds like you had fun. the larger butt was a little too big. sounded like your "smaller" one was the right size. you should be looking for a butt in the 8-10lb range. as large as that butt was (15lbs) you might as well had cooked the whole shoulder like you were originally planning to do. glad that brinkman worked out for you....with it being in the 90's saved you a little anger. in the fall/spring (and of course winter) or very windy days you have to really work hard to manage your heat. in 57 minutes ill be cracking open a pabst blue ribbon (waiting till 9:00 am......and no i dont do this often but im looking forward to doing it today!). 1 sholder going on at 12:00. 8 slabs of spares going on early tomorrow morning.........have a good 4th!

[carpetbagger, esq.]

that was 15 lbs total for both of them - they put two in one bag and sealed them together.

[BigHoss]

i gotchya........i saw that close-up pic on your thread and thought to myself "ga-dang thats the biggest damn butt i've ever heard of". seen them 12-13lbs but never one 15lbs. that explains it! we are rolling along right here in arrington.....trying to stay cool. im in the barn with the fan on, ipod going (waylon jennings), feet in my little boys pool and 12-pack (minus 5) of P.B.R.. all that and im still sweatin' like a whore in church! temp is at 216*.......planning on taking them off and wrapping in a towel in the cooler about 9:00 or so tomorrow.

[Lan4Dawg]

I was going to have an "empathy" smoke for c'bagger today and tomorrow but realized I do not have enough wood. I am too cheap to pay some of the exorbitant prices charged around here for wood when my parents--who have 100 +/- acres in NW GA--have more than I can ever use sitting there for the taking. There is always a stack of oak, hickory, apple, pear, and usually some peach sitting around the farm fr/ trees felled or trimmed for one reason or another and it is just a matter of bringing it home to Larry Town.

And I am kicking my self as I was just there on Fathers' Day and did not even think to fill the bed of the truck. Luckily I checked the wood supply before I started de-frosting, purchasing, rubbing, brining, marinating, &c. I suppose we will celebrate the 4th w/ some thing else American like shrimp & grits. Of course hearing Big Hoss talk about how hot it is up there manning the smoker and just checking the temp here (96*) perhaps it is wise that I wait.

[GRITS]

Oh me oh my. You got enough $$ in your budget to fly me up to Nashville from Miami?

I am ADDICTED to pulled pork (in my parts, we call it bbq and thats the ONLY thing we call bbq. Everything else is grilling).

You sound like you are set, my friend.

I have cooked about 3 butts now - the third with wonderful success. Of course, I couldnt use a smoker, I used my oven, but I didn't pull it out of the oven or start pulling it until it was 190*F at the bone.

Let me tell you something. That stuff shredded like heaven served on a platter. I doused it with my Charlotte, NC Vinegar Sauce I bought when I was back home and ate like the GRITS girl that I am.

I have firmly come to believe that when I die and go to heaven, I will float on a cloud of pulled pork doused with vinegar sauce served on a bun with a side of brunswick stew and flatbread.

I just don't think there is anything better on the planet or for that matter, the universe.

I wish you the best of luck.