Butt cooked to quickly?

[smokyYank]

Hi all,

Dry brined a 5 lb butt/shoulder (bone in, trimmed the excess fat and skin) last night around 10pm.

At 5:15am I fired up the Pitboss vertical smoker (pellet) which has been pretty reliable. Applied the dry rub, put it in the smoker around 5:30 at 230F.

The temp did vary from about 210 to 260, but I did my best to keep it around 230.

I was expecting to need to cook it for about 8-10 hours, but after 4-1/2, the temp probe (good one, thermworks "smoke") showed an internal of 200F. Didn't believe it, so I probed in a couple of other spots, same temp.

Any ideas why this happened? Thanks in advance.

PS - I've been doing butts for about 10 years and it's always taken 8-10 hrs at around 225 for a 5-8 lb. butt.

[blair2818]

I wish I had your issue. I over slept and now have to try and rush my smoke. If you pull out and don't shred it leave it in you oven at its lowest temp you should be fine till it is time to shred and go. Wrapping it might not be the worst idea either

[HawkerXP]

Sometimes a large hunk o meat likes to mess with us. Yours probably fell into the hardly or no stall category.

[smokyYank]

So sorry, false alarm. I still couldn't believe it so I used my instant-read thermo and it read 150F. Swapped probes, same temp, so the first probe was bac.

Thanks for your comments anyway!

[smokyYank]

"bad"

[Donw]

Glad you found the issue. I in the double check the temp with another device camp too based on past experiences.

[FireMan]

As Emily Latilla would say, "never mind".

[smokyYank]

"And what’s all this fuss I’ve been hearing about conserving our natural racehorses?"

[Steve R.]

So, did it have good bark when you thought it was done? If not, I consider that a dead giveaway that it's not there yet.

As others have advised, there's nothing wrong with just wrapping and holding it intact in a warm oven or cooler for as long as needed.

[smokyYank]

Thanks, Steve, it looked nice, but I didn't think to see how far along it looked.

[smokenoob]

glad ya didn’t try to pull ot at 150°!!!

[smokyYank]

If I had a tow truck and a big chain attached to a tree, maybe LOL

[captainlee]

I always use two probes, mostly to make sure that i have the best center location. It's easy for a probe to fail, just the wrong twist of the lead while getting everything ready can cause a failure. Glad you figured it out.

[smokyYank]

Great idea, thanks! maybe i should have gotten a 4 probe unit instead of just 2; i keep one in the meat and the other in the box.

[captainlee]

You could still put two probes in the butt and just unplug one at a time in your controller.