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Pork butt on a PBC

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    Pork butt on a PBC

    Bought a 10.5 lb run-of-the-mill pork butt at Sam's Club. injected it with 1/2 cup KosmosQ Pork Injection and 2 TBS Moisture
    Magic dissolved in 16 oz of water, and salt brined it overnight.

    The next morning, I seasoned the butt with KosmoQ Hot Dirty Bird and Honey Killer Bee rubs, fired up the PBC, put in two fist sized chunks each of hickory and cherry, and hung the meat. Time was 0935. The pit temp was being controlled by a CyberQ Cloud set to 275°. As evidenced by the graph, it did a beautiful job and the only blips were from me spritzing the meat and finally pulling it to wrap. After 4 1/2 hours and an internal temp of 166° I wrapped the butt in foil and put it back into the cooker. The meat went into a minor stall and after 40 minutes or so, I decided that I'd better try to power though it because we had guests arriving at 1600 and we wanted to get dinner on by 1700. I reset the CyberQ to 300° and finished the cook at that temp. When internal temp got to 203°, I pulled the butt out of the cooker and let it rest for an hour in the kitchen. Total cook time was 6 hours 25 minutes.

    Our guests raved about the flavor, but I was a little disappointed. The last time I did pork butt, I'd used Meathead's Memphis Dust and I believe I much prefer that flavor to the rubs that I used. Please don't think for a minute that I'm putting down KosmosQ's rubs because I'm not, they're great. I think I would have done better to use one or the other instead of combining them. I believe the yellow coloration of the pulled pork is from the Honey Killer Bee rub. The other mistake I made, and it wasn't apparent when we ate dinner, but became glaringly obvious when I reheated the pork for lunch, was that the meat was way oversmoked. I should have used only 1 or 2 chunks of hardwood instead of 4. Oh well, won't make that mistake again.


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    #2
    Looks pretty good from here!

    Comment


      #3
      It looks good. But one thing I would suggest you not do is spritz if you look at your pit temp the first time you temp did not get back up to temp for about 15 min. the second time about 10 min. If you use Meatheads recipe he does not spritz and in reality pork but does not need it. It does two things. Cools down the pit and cools down the pork.

      Comment


        #4
        If your guests were satisfied, it was a successful cook. ') And I always think my cooks could have been better.

        Comment


          #5
          Looks delicious

          Comment


            #6
            The important thing is that your guests were pleased, AZ Fogey . I bet it tasted great, despite your misgivings. After all, we're all our own worst critics.

            I agree with mountainsmoker about the spritzing. The PBC generates a very moist environment on its own, so more moisture might be counterproductive. Plus it might wash off some of the rub as the bark is setting.

            And you're right, that might have been way too much wood. One or two (4 to 6 oz) pieces are more than enough for a 6 hour cook.

            I'm with you on the fact that MMD and pork is a match made in heaven. Hard to find a better rub, but we all keep experimenting. That's part of the fun of smoking.

            Kathryn

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              #7
              I use very little wood when cooking with the PBC. It tends to get overpowered by all of that grill smoke from the drippings hitting the fire.

              Comment


                #8
                Great looking cook from here!

                As others have said, main change, aside from reducing the number of wood chunks based on your smoke preference, would be to eliminate spritzing altogether. Boston butts simply don't need it as they have such a high fat content. Plus it hurts the bark, cools things down (slowing the cook), and potentially in a PBC environment snuffs out some coals from the liquid dripping.

                I used to spritz many years ago - mostly with apple juice. It's just what I saw people doing online. Ribs, butts, etc. I've not done it in years, and think my BBQ results are better for it, among other things.

                Comment


                • RustyHaines
                  RustyHaines commented
                  Editing a comment
                  +1 jfmorris and fzxdoc for not spritzing. IMO just not needed in the PBC for any cook.

                #9
                Thank you for all your comments. OK, no more spritzing pork butts on the PBC. Now that I think about it, almost all of the pitmasters on YouTube that recommend spritzing are cooking on stick burners which, I think, is a much drier environment.

                If you all wouldn't mind wading in here again, I watched Aaron Franklin cook pork butt for at least 8 hours at a steady 275° and I think the meat temped at 206°, and his piece of meat looked smaller than what I cooked. I know the PBC is a fast cooker, but I don't get why, cooking at that same steady temperature, it took an hour and half less cook time to reach the same internal temp.

                Comment


                • fzxdoc
                  fzxdoc commented
                  Editing a comment
                  pkadare , are your PBC and Traeger running at the same temps?

                  When I run my PBC at 275° and my WSCGC at 275°, the WSCGC powers through the stall faster, more often than not. I'm guessing it might be due to the drier environment in the Weber. You're seeing the opposite effect with your Traeger. Interesting.

                  K.
                  Last edited by fzxdoc; August 13, 2019, 02:55 PM.

                • Steve R.
                  Steve R. commented
                  Editing a comment
                  My hunch is the more humid environment of the PBC inhibits evaporation and speeds up the cook, sort of like wrapping. When I had a PBC, I did notice less bark formation than with my other cookers, so who knows.

                • jfmorris
                  jfmorris commented
                  Editing a comment
                  Stick burners are much drier, but even on my offset, I don't spritz butts. Just so much fat content that its self-basting. I don't think I've spritzed ribs or brisket in many years either...

                #10
                That looks really good Sir.
                I think MMD is a rub that's hard to match let alone beat imho.

                Comment


                  #11
                  Originally posted by AZ Fogey View Post


                  ...If you all wouldn't mind wading in here again, I watched Aaron Franklin cook pork butt for at least 8 hours at a steady 275° and I think the meat temped at 206°, and his piece of meat looked smaller than what I cooked. I know the PBC is a fast cooker, but I don't get why, cooking at that same steady temperature, it took an hour and half less cook time to reach the same internal temp.
                  Just to clarify, I'm assuming you mean that your cook was 1.5 hours shorter than Franklin's, since you noted a 6 hr. 35 min cook time for this PB.

                  Cook time for most smokers is based more on the thickness of the piece rather than the weight. Perhaps Franklin's piece was thicker in places.

                  Plus, did Franklin wrap the butt? Many folks (myself included) don't. Wrapping like you did usually shortens the cook time.

                  In addition, you amped your temp up to 300° the last hour or so of the cook, which also must have helped to shorten your cook time compared to Franklin's.

                  Kathryn

                  Comment


                  • mountainsmoker
                    mountainsmoker commented
                    Editing a comment
                    Agree every cooker cooks different and every piece of meat cooks different. Your meat may have been grocery store common hog meat, while, Franklin uses one of the heritage breeds. That is just one example of what could be different.

                  #12
                  Thanks to all who responded. BBQ has way too many variables, and I keep trying to pigeonhole them, i.e., if x is this, then y will be that. BBQ just doesn't seem to work that way and I've got to get my head around that. Sometimes if x is this, then y will come out to be that, but don't count on it. Go with the flow. LOL.

                  Comment


                    #13
                    Originally posted by AZ Fogey View Post
                    Thanks to all who responded. BBQ has way too many variables, and I keep trying to pigeonhole them, i.e., if x is this, then y will be that. BBQ just doesn't seem to work that way and I've got to get my head around that. Sometimes if x is this, then y will come out to be that, but don't count on it. Go with the flow. LOL.
                    That's exactly it - its more art and less science. You cannot go by the old rules like "x hours/minutes per pound" and predict an exact cooking time. I know from experience with a given cooker, approximately how long a cook of a type of meat will take, but always plan for an extra 2 hours with butts and brisket, if I am on a schedule, as I would rather have the meat done and held in a cooler early, rather than have dinner late! Trust me - I've done that!

                    About the only things I know exact times on are ribs and chicken, mostly as I always buy the same size baby backs, and same size chickens, and those are shorter cooks.

                    Comment

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