Costco pork butt: couple questions please

[jjdbike]

Hello friends,

I got the biggest pork butt I could find at Costco. My plan is to cut it into smaller pieces as Dogfaced Pony Soldier posted in the holding pork butt thread.

First question, they had two different types, boneless & bone in, neck attached. What the heck is a pork butt neck? I got the bone in neck attached & it was 21+ lbs. How do I trim that to smoke & pull?

Second, when I got home I noticed that the cryo package had small leak. As soon as I got it home, I put it inside another HD vacuum pack bag, sealed it up, and placed it in my deep freezer chest. Fo I need to worry because the original packaging was compromised?

Respectfully,
JD

[SheilaAnn]

jjdbike I would have purchased the same cut. Pork neck is one of my favorite cuts! Also known as coppa. Use it as coppa steaks or a roast pork entree. I just read that it’s makes great char siu.

Re: broken seal, if the pork didn’t have any funky smell, you should be fine.

[smokenoob]

Wait, you’re sayin’ the neck bone is connected to the butt bone? 21# 🤯

[Oak Smoke]

Well that explains some pains I’ve had!

[Murdy]

Ever notice how "pain in the neck" and "pain in the a$$" are used just about interchangeably?

[mrteddyprincess]

Often Costco packages two pork shoulders in the same package. I would guess that when you cut the package open you'll have two pork shoulders. I don't know anything about the neck being in there. That's not a thing at my Costco and I'd love to see pics of what that looks like when you do the cook!

Brian

[DogFaced PonySoldier]

Ditto that. My Costco doesn't even have bone-in butts. Only boneless butt 2 packs.

[mrteddyprincess]

DogFaced PonySoldier I think my Costco has bone in pork shoulders, but I have bought some boneless pork shoulders and I'm not sure where they come from.

I looked this up and on preliminary research, sometimes they label an extension of the scapula as "neck bone", but the true neck bone designation is a part of the vertebrae in of the neck. It's confusing. Never seen neck bones on a pork butt (shoulder) around here.

[DogFaced PonySoldier]

Pork 'butt' is actually the shoulder. The 'bone in' pork 'butt' is a shoulder with the shoulder blade bone in it. So the cut you got, they left part of the neck muscles (and bone?) attached. I've never seen this cut, so I can't comment on it.

Here's Meathead's explanation from the free side of Amazing Ribs:

Butt (a.k.a. Boston roast a.k.a. Boston butt a.k.a. pork butt a.k.a. shoulder butt a.k.a. shoulder roast a.k.a. country roast a.k.a. shoulder blade roast). The top of the shoulder from the shoulder socket up to the spine excluding the picnic. This is the cut that is best for pulled pork but it can also be cut into steaks, stew meat, roasts, and ground for patties and sausage.

It is a complex weave of muscles, fat, sinew, connective tissue, and bone. Butts can weigh from 4 to 14 pounds and they usually have shoulder blade bones in them although some butchers remove the bones and sell “boneless butts”. Butts are often are tied with string because they fall apart easily. Butts are the most popular cut for pulled pork because they are best when roasted low and slow. They are also good for braising and in slow cookers.

It is not unusual to find partial butts in the 4 to 5 pound range. These small cuts are especially nice because they cook quicker and, if smoke roasted, there is a lot of the crispy, crusty surface, called bark, or Mrs. Brown by aficionados. This cut also produces blade steaks.

Why is it called a butt? Some say that because, when trimmed, the butt is barrel shaped, and barrels were often called butts by English wine merchants. Others say that they are called butts because they were shipped in barrels. A reader has suggested that a butt is a name for a joint in woodworking, and the shoulder is a joint area. One can only speculate why it is called the Boston butt, but my friends in New York have offered some unkind suggestions. No ifs ands or butts, it makes the best sandwich meat on the hog and it has the added benefit of being inexpensive.

https://amazingribs.com/tested-recipes/pork-recipes/pork-cuts-explained/

[johnec00]

The "neck", AKA "collar", AKA "coppa", AKA "money muscle" is (IMHO) the best part of a pork butt. It is the muscle at the "top" of the butt (side opposite the blade bone). We buy bone in butts and liberate the collar to smoke to about 145º as a pork roast. The rest we either cut up for sausage or smoke for pulled pork. There are you tubes showing how to cut the collar off a butt. Here's a picture of one we cut and trimmed late last year. I guess you can get the same thing from a boneless butt, although I never buy them.

[SheilaAnn]

#truth

[Finster]

I've never seen anything but the 2 pack boneless butts at my local Costco. I only bought them once because I feel like they needed to be trussed, and that was an extra step my lazy a$$ just didn't feel like dealing with..

[DogFaced PonySoldier]

I used to be the same. I don't like it "floppin' all over the place" when I'm tryin'a season it and get it situated on the smoker. Now, though, since I cut 'em up into chunks before smoking (most times), it ain't such a big deal. But they're more expensive, and I can get bone-in for $1.74/lb. So I bite the bullet and debone myself.

[johnec00]

Can't speak for costco (I have an aversion to big box stores with a cover charge), but I just got a 7.5lb bone in butt from Walmart for $1.74/lb. Sometimes Winn Dixie has them on sale for $1.49 or even $0.99, but I wanted one for cutting up for kielbasa next weekend. I like to debone myself, leaving a little extra meat. Then smoke it next time the smoker is fired up and save for use in flavoring soup or stew.

[johnec00]

Another comment, even if you want to smoke a whole boneless roast, get bone in and debone it yourself. The mechanized assembly line meat cutters just "butcher" the piece any way that's easy to get the bone out.

[jjdbike]

Thank you everyone for all the great responses.

I agree with DogFaced PonySoldier, I bought the twin pack boneless Costco butts and didn’t like them flopping around. Didn’t want to be bothered trussing them.

I’m planning on cutting them into chunks DF PS style so like him I’ll cut the bone out myself.

I wonder how many folks "liberate" the Coppa, a.k.a. Money Muscle, a.k.a. Pectoralis Profundi, for slicing medallions... But that's for another thread.

Respectfully,
JD