Porxperiment: Dueling Pigskets

[DaveD]

Hey folks, documenting an experiment in porknography here: two nearly identical pigskets cooked two different ways: one low and slow on the kettle, the other with a long sous vide, chill, and reheat on the kettle.

Pigsket is the analogous pig muscle to the brisket on a steer, and far as I know, they're available only from Porter Road. So happens that I have a pair of them with nearly identical shape and size, about as close as two cuts could be without being a single piece that has been cleft in twain. They're 1.6lb/725g each with a similar, irregular shape, and none too thick, no more than about 1.5in/3.8cm at the thickest, and pretty thin at the tapered edges. Here they are right after I salted them for dry brining.




For one of these, I'll cook it low and slow on the SnS kettle with B&B coals and apple wood. Simple so far. For the other, I'm vac sealing it up, running it in the sous vide at 165F/74C overnight for about 10 hours. Then will take it out of the bag, pat dry, and either reseal in a fresh bag or just wrap tightly in plastic wrap and put it in the fridge.

In the morning, I'll get the SnS kettle going with a target temp of 200-225F/93-107C and get one of the pigskets on there. And then comes the tricky part. I'll want to reheat the SV'd piece timed in such a way that both pieces hit about 175F/80C at about the same time. The SV'd piece will be at fridge temps, but should get up to target within a couple of hours, I would think. So I'll try to time it right. I'll add one chunk of wood when the kettle cut starts, and a second one when I put the SV'd cut in, so that they both get the benefit of fresh smoke when they're at their coldest.

Last wrinkle: Because these are so so small, I'm concerned about the edges getting overcooked. So I rolled them up (after hitting each piece with coarse ground pepper & granulated garlic), tied off with twine, so that the grain is close to parallel with the long direction of the cylinders. Should cook more evenly this way. Then I vac sealed up the piece for the SV, which just went into the meat jacuzzi for the night.





I'll be firing up around 9am tomorrow, see ya then

[Jkahnert]

Hey Dave, just curious as to why, if the SV roast is going to be at refrigerator temperature and you are smoking it at 225 or so, it would take any more or less time to get to your 175 target? Won't it take the same amount of time to cook from say 38 degrees to 175 regardless of what has previously been done to the roasts?

[STEbbq]

My guess is the SV step will mean it will skip the stall.

[DaveD]

Reheating something that's already cooked goes a lot faster than the initial cooking in my experience anyway. Probably won't take more than 2-3 hours I'm guessing. Main reason to get it to fridge temps is to promote smoke uptake when it goes on the kettle. I'll have to stay on my toes for this one for sure...

[STEbbq]

Love it. Did each get an equal amount of rub?

[DaveD]

No rubs yet, those will go on tomorrow shortly before each piece goes on the kettle.

[STEbbq]

Oh, we need to do a blind taste test at the end? Or even a double blind?

[DaveD]

My lovely bride will be my blind taste tester - no way for her to know which is which.

[DaveD]

Good morning pig fans! It's going to be a porktacular day today with this ongoing dueling pigsket cook, plus I'm smoking up some thick cut bacon in the Pit Boss later this morning to make us some BLTs for lunch. Yes, it's a day of swine and roses... (which I realized only after typing that in that it's been a "thing" for ages...)



Here's the SV'd pigsket this morning. When I first saw this in the tub, I had a panic moment thinking that the vac seal bag had ruptured and was full of the SV bath water. Nope! Just a prodigious about of juice produced from the cut. Wish I was making something that could use that liquid, but...



Got it out and patted it dry, then sealed it back up in a new bag and into the fridge for the day. Step one complete...

[PGH_RAM]

This is the kind of science I can get behind! I can't wait for the results!

[wrgilb]

I've got my bib on, waiting for the results.

[Draznnl]

Have you considered applying for some grants for your experiments? There’s no question you are helping improve life as we know it.

[DaveD]

Now there's a proposal I would actually enjoy writing!

[DaveD]

Update! It's a glorious winter solstice today, with cloudless sunshine and relatively mild with temps in the mid to high 40sF/8ishC and barely a breath of wind. Great day to have two smokers rolling (even though the smoke is very hard to see in this shot).



Got the kettle-bound piece doused in Flavor Hog, part of my haul from my generous and highly accomplished Secret Santa and on the SnS running at ~215F/100C, I don't want the cut to cook too quickly. Dropped an apple chunk on the coals when I loaded in. Temps are leaping out of the starting gate, went from 32F/0C to low 90sF/low 30sC in 40 minutes... but it looks like it might already be starting to flatten out a little.





Meanwhile, I got some thick-cut bacon in the Pit Boss for BLTs for lunch later on... 8 slices in the 12oz/340g package, so nice and substantial.


The pig-out continues!

[DaveD]

And just an hour later, we have unmistakably entered the outskirts of Stallsville...


Bark looking a little dry so I gave it a spritz (50-50 water & apple cider vinegar). And I'm most impressed with the stability of the kettle temperature, that is one smooth, flat profile! Nice comparison with the Pit Boss p-smoker with its characteristic sawtooth profile - also highly stable, just a larger standard deviation on that average temp



Bacon is cruising along too, another half hour or so and then they become sammiches. I wish I could post a sample of the aroma from all this lovely pig meat!

[wrgilb]

DaveD Someone gave me a bacon thing, like you have and I've never used it. I'm going to use it in the Pit Boss Verticle like you did. How long and at what temp. do you do yours?

Thanks

[DaveD]

wrgilb I put the Pit Boss on the low-T "smoke" setting first, which typically produces temps around 130-140F/55-60C, for 30-45 min to pick up a good smoke note (SOP on anything I make with this cooker), then 2 hours at 225F/105C. Depending on the day, sometimes I need to set the dial to 225, sometimes 200 (like today) to hit that target.

[DaveD]

Update! The "kettle piece" got the foil boat treatment when IT was about 160F/70C, with a very nice looking bark well set on it.




Got the "SV piece" rubbed up with Flavor Hog and onto the kettle about half an hour later. Its internal temp had reached 50F/10C since this morning.




As expected, the SV piece is reheating way faster than the kettle piece took to cook, the profile difference is very clear, it's much steeper.


According to the "Analyze" function in the app, both cuts are predicted to reach the same temperature, sometime between 60 and 90 minutes from now, in the low 180sF/mid-80sC, so I will start probing them for tenderness. Meanwhile, I resumed monitoring the Pit Boss's temperature after dropping the setpoint down after removing the bacon for lunch. I suspect that I'll need to rest the pigskets in there for a while before dinnertime, so I'm leaving it idling at about 175F/80C.

And the BLTs were fab! We had cheese, and I also had some avocado, so mine was a BLATCh

[DaveD]

Got the SV piece in its foil boat. IT for the kettle piece has been staying right at 180F/82C, with a LOT of liquid pooling in its boat. SV piece at about 160F/71C and has taken on some nice color, although there will be no problem at all telling which piece is which on sight.




Not easy to make out the liquid in the kettle piece's boat, but it makes me think of all that liquid that was in the SV bag for the other piece before I chilled it. It will be interesting to see what ends up in its boat - presumably all that liquid is already gone, so it should be a lot less than what's in the other one. I wonder if the meat will be drier as a result?

Only time will tell...!!

[DaveD]

Welp, the cuts both topped out in the mid-180sF/mid-80sC, and I moved them into the Pit Boss to rest, covered the boats with foil as well. Now we wait...


Temps are drifting down. I can see some liquid in the SV piece's boat, but nowhere near as much as in the kettle piece.

After action will be next!

[DaveD]

Alrighty, time for deliverables. Bottom line up front: Both cuts nearly equally excellent. Really tough to choose a favorite - to my surprise. My preconceived notion was that the SV one would be inferior to the full kettle version. I was wrong.

Temps drifted down to about the mid-160sF/low 70sC over the 90 minutes the pieces were resting in the pellet smoker. Sliced up half of each piece, plated with broccoli and a bowl of the Rancho Gordo Midnight Black beans I started yesterday.

Here they are after coming out of the smoker. Full-kettle piece on top, SV piece below.


And their respective foil boats, showing how much less liquid was in the SV one.


Slicin' & servin'. Full-kettle on the right.



Paired it with a Willamette Valley pinot noir, which was splendid.


And the beans were just unbelievable.


The biggest difference between the two cuts was that the SV piece had a noticeably firmer texture in the "flattier" parts than did the full-kettle "flattier" parts. The "pointier" parts in both cuts were super moist and tender. I was more than half expecting the SV piece to be drier and less savory than the full-kettle piece, especially given the ocean of liquid it threw during the long SV. But no... The kettle piece had a better developed bark of course, but the SV cut picked up a very respectable amount of smoke, more than I'd expected. All in all, a very successful experiment!

Just over 24 hours to complete this cook...! Time well spent.

[Troutman]

Although I don't cook them very often myself (too small and expensive, little bang for the buck) I do like those little pigskets. I usually source them from Porter Road or sometimes locally at my specialty butcher. Although I see some benefit to rolling them, it probably increased your cooking time and lessened the amount of surface area to develop bark. I just cook mine flat like you would a mini brisket.

That said, yours looks delicious. Thanks for taking the time to do a side-by-side experiment. I've never SVd one but do see some benefit in doing so. Love to see this done with other cuts of meat as well.

[DaveD]

I've cooked my previous ones flat as well, but these were the smallest I'd yet seen and I was concerned about the thin edges. It was a worthwhile trade for this cook!