Welcome Home, Brother!!
Hey Bear ... gonna give this a try tomorrow. This is my virgin initiation with my SmokeHouse Pro smoker, newly seasoned and ready to smoke! Got the 8# butt seasoned and refrigerated and plan to get it going at 0-dark-30 tomorrow. I'm gonna try Pecan/Hickory just for shits & grins, I love your step-by-step and will post pics as I progress. Can't wait for my first results!!Also ... fellow Viet Nam vet
I would use your 225° smoker temp, and take it to about 190°.
bear, everyone here talks about pulled pork, i like to slice a butt, as long as i get lots of smoke flavor.
now that i have a maverick i think i can get a better product by cooking to an exact temp. til now i've been doing ok with a $5 probe n guesswork. i've been shooting for around 165 IT. but, i have no idea what IT i've been getting.
i'm happy with what i've been doing but i wonder if that's the optimum temp to shoot for?
essentially i'll be using your method within the limits of my equipment. i think i can get a sustained temp around 180, then up to 225.
i'll put this on around 6 am tomorrow, so what do you think? 165 for non pulled butt?
Yup----For slicing, I want the connective tissue broken down, but I don't want it falling apart.
thanks, bear. the range between 165 to the 200sdidn't seem right. that's why i asked.
Hmmmmmm, Sounds like it's not "only" the cold----Sounds like the wind is playing games with your temp control.
Bear ...
Thanks for the reply ... -7F this morning when I fired the smoker. In fact, I've been so busy trying to maintain a constant temp I totally spaced out photos. I turn it up a little and it gets too warm down a little and it cools down too much.
Glad to hear my method & your MES 30 did good in real cold weather.
Used this method today myself. Great results! Thanks Bear.
It was way cold here too I think -3 when I fired it up at 4am. MES30 did pretty good though. Kept the chamber ~235* all day and ~250 when the butt was foiled. Not too bad.
Chris
That's Great !!!
Great post followed the steps here and came out very nice with a 7.6 lb pork shoulder/Boston Butt I smoked in the MES30. I mix up my mustard with 3 tbls of yellow mustard, 1 tbls of honey, and about 1/2 tbls of squeezed lemon. Put the mustard and some rub on and double wrapped in the fridge overnight. I used apple wood pellets in the AMNPS. I used two rows of pellets in the AMNPS which burned for roughly 5 hours.
I put the meat in the smoker about 7:55am and removed when it reached 200 degrees IT at 6pm without any cool down time in the smoker. I pulled some off to eat and then let it rest about 45 minutes before pulling apart. First time I've every smoked a pork shoulder, so thanks for the great tips!
You can inject, as long as you keep your smoker temp high enough to get it from 40° IT to 140° IT in no longer than 4 hours.Can you speak to the 4 hour danger zone?
If you are taking the meat up to 195+ degrees, then what is the concern about the amount of time at a lower temp?
I am going to cook a couple of large pieces of meat and was going to inject, but don't want to risk contamination.
Thanks for any info you can share.