1st wsm lump charcoal run

[marshall]

So I wanted to try something a little different, smoked a 9lb pork butt mmd

with b&b hickory lump , my thought was I could cook hotter to beat the stall without wrapping, have a cleaner cook, and a different taste profile, also did not use any water for the first time doing pork butt ( ive only been smokin for less then 2 years so still trying to find the best method)
I tried to replicate Harry soo video on youtube with lump, using soo donut for lighting.

It was a much hotter cook 280 to 300 degrees finished in 9.5 hrs with no wrap!
temps were pretty stable for the whole cook with a few swings here and there, but I only tweaked the vents about 2x slightly.
I didn't put as much wood in as normal cause I didn't want to over smoke using hickory lump.(needed more wood)
Finished result maybe slightly less moist, not enough smoke flavor for me, had a good bark but may have been slightly burned.(maybe the high heat?) Not the candy bark I have gotten before.
It did have a really different clean flavor, almost like cooked over a wood fire (who would have thought lol) I would definitely try lump again for a long cook, but feel my kbb cooks with water were better. Either way it was fun and still great bbq, I really like the low ash produced by lump and I think I could have gotten another 2 or 3 hours of burn time, used about 3/4 of the bag. any tips on getting more flavor on meat? inject,spritz?

[JeffJ]

9 pound butt? Cut it in half. You’ll get more surface area for more bark - more flavor. If you didn’t do this put it in really cold. You’ll get more smoke adhesion at the beginning of the cook with cold meat. No water bowl? Spritz a couple of times during the first hour and a half of the cook. If you remove the bowl the meat will need to be flipped a few times especially when running hotter. If you didn’t that may have been what caused a slightly burned flavor. Even without water an empty bowl protects the meat from radiant heat. I frequently cook on the top rack of my 14.5 with the bowl removed but it’s for hotter/faster cooking.

[marshall]

I always put in cold, and left empty water bowl in, didn't think about flipping that would make sense, any favorite things to spritz with??? only the first hour and a half?
thanks for input, Merry Christmas!

[JeffJ]

If the bowl is in you won’t need to flip. I read your post kind of quickly. The advantage of early spritzing is that I typically front-load the wood chunks. I try to apply the wood smoke during the first two hours of the cook. After that smoke is mostly superfluous unless you are spritzing periodically. Once the surface of the meat is hot and is mostly dry it’s not picking up much in the way of additional smoke unless moisture is added to the surface. For spritzing pork apple cider vinegar works pretty well.

For pork butt the best thing you can do is to cut a larger butt into smaller butts. I always trim larger butts down to 2 pound to 5 pound butts. The extra bark really makes a big difference.

Did you brine the meat?

[marshall]

yes dry brined overnight, thanks for tips, ill definitely cut it into smaller pieces next time and try spritzing,,thanks!

[JeffJ]

Keep in mind the invisible gasses from the charcoal is adding to the flavor profile. I could close the top vent on my Bradley Electric smoker and it will not deliver that same BBQ taste as my WSM with significantly less overall smoke.