2nd Pork Butt - Much better after your tips. Thanks!

[ajgrills]

Hi All,

I solicited and got a bunch of great advice from the community after my first pork butt was not where I hoped.

Last weekend I did my second one on my Rec Tec Stampede Pellet Grill and it came out way better. Here's what I did, and I included some pics.

I got a nice 6lb, bone in butt, cryovaced from the butcher. It looked pretty good to me, and still had a significant fat cap. I trimmed off a lot of that fat cap, and saved those trimmings for later. I dry brined it with salt over night.

I used Meathead's Memphis Rub the first time. I wanted a more savory, more Mexican flavor this time, so I did my own rub, borrowing from Santamarina with a little bit of brown sugar added in for bark formation.

Put it on at 225 with RecTec's ultimate blend pellets and let it get up to 165 in the stall range. In the meantime, I rendered out the pork fat I had trimmed off earlier and got a quarter to a half cup of rendered fat out of it. And I also made a batch of spicy, tomatillo salsa verde. My idea here was to go for a carnitas style and try and get it to braise in its own fat, and add some flavor with the salsa.

I did the crutch, because I'm just too impatient to wait it out, but also because I wanted to get some braising effect in this case. I poured in the rendered fat and about a cup of salsa verde when I tightly wrapped the butt in two layers of foil. Reset my probe, put it back in, and I kicked the temp up to 275.

It took about 2 more hours to get to 203 internal. I pulled it. Made sure it was probe tender, then I cambro'd it for about 90 minutes to allow for continued breakdown of remaining collagen, etc.

The key difference between this and my last attempt were:
1) Bone in Butt instead of boneless.
2) Added liquid during the crutch.
3) Pulled at 203 vs 196 last time.

The end result was great. The pork was super tender. The bone fell out on it's own. The jus left over from the combination of the fat, salsa, and pork jus during the crutch was delicious, and I left it all in the pan while I pulled the pork.

The only disappointment was it still really didn't have that much Mexican flavor over all. The flavor of the pork still dominated.

At this point, if you really wanted to go for real carnitas flavor, I think you could put it back in a pan after pulling it, and add onions and citrus, and more seasoning or salsa to taste and throw it back on the grill, stove or oven to simmer for a couple hours and get the desired result. But if that was your end goal, probably easier to start with a braising method in a DO in the first place.

But I'm now confident in the above method and temps to make me some killer pulled pork in future attempts. Plus I have a bunch of leftovers in the freezer that I'm excited about.

Thanks to all for the advice.

[Dewesq55]

Nice job and write up. The food looks absolutely delicious! Since you are into Mexican flavors, have you every made cochinita pibil? I am doing to try it.

[ajgrills]

Thanks much. Have not tried cochinita, but definitely need to make more Mexican . I'm in SoCal and it's pretty much staple food here.

[BBQ with Bry]

making cochinita pibil this weekend! possibly the greatest mexican dish I have ever tasted. Do you have a recipe you've used before?

[Dewesq55]

BBQ with Bry No, I don't. But I've been planning to try it Kenji's recipe one of these days.

[RonB]

Congrats on a successful cook.

[klflowers]

Beautiful looking piece of meat. Congrats!!!

[fzxdoc]

Nice job and write up. The food looks absolutely delicious! Since you are into Mexican flavors, have you every made cochinita pibil? I am doing to try it.

Dewesq55 Would you smoke the marinated pork butt nekkid in your Cochinita Pibil recipe or cover it with banana leaves? Seems like the banana leaves would retard the smokiness of the final product.

Kathryn

[Dewesq55]

fzxdoc I agree with gcdmd. I think the bananas leaves are essential. I wasn't really concerned about smoke flavor for cochinita pibil.

[mnavarre]

The banana leaves are absolutely essential for pibil. Pibil is not a smoked meat, it's a braise and the banana leaves really have a major contribution to the flavor.

[fzxdoc]

Now I'm on the hunt for some banana leaves. Thanks for the wise advice, gcdmd , Dewesq55 , and mnavarre . This place is great. I so could have headed down the wrong path on this one without you all.

Kathryn

[jfmorris]

Looks like a good cook! A few comments.

All I read (on AR and elsewhere) on the science of rubs says that the only spice that penetrates meat significantly is salt. You are expecting a Mexican style flavor mix to penetrate into a butt, but in reality, its just on the surface. I make carnitas using pulled pork that I smoked, and it involves refrying the shredded pork in a skillet. I think after shredding is when you would add a Mexican style sauce or spice mix into the pork, or if you want to fry it to crisp it up for tacos spice it at that time.

Personally, I find the bark to be my favorite part of a smoked boston butt, and you did a lot here that sacrificed bark formation - the crutch, the braising in a pan, all of that. I really see zero bark in the final product in the pan of shredded pork, and while some folk (my brother in law) would prefer that, my family always wants bits of that black crusty barky goodness in their pork. Since you found that the braising did not contribute to flavor, my advice next time you are in a hurry is to NOT crutch, but go ahead and crank the temperature to 275 or even 300 to decrease cooking time. Lately, I've been pushing my butts (and brisket) at 275 or higher the entire cook, and its nice how many hours it shaves off the cook versus if I stayed at 225. I know with the Rectec you need at least a few hours at 225 to get more smoke though, which is not an issue for me since I smoke with charcoal and wood chunks.

[IowaGirl]

The last batch of carnitas I made was a compromise between a braise and a smoke. Cut the pork shoulder into large cubes, packed them tightly with garlic, salt, and onion in a low sided CI pan, covered the meat 1/2 to 2/3 deep with melted lard, and smoked it uncovered at 300F until tender. The 1/3 of the meat above the fat got smoky crispy brown but the covered meat was tender and juicy. Shredded the meat, defatted the jus, added it back to the meat, and adjusted the seasonings. Yum.

[jfmorris]

ajgrills fat does not evaporate like water, so I think a drip pan under the grate would do a good job of catching most of the drippings, which you could then add back. Or put the meat in a foil pan but uncovered - the bottom will lose all bark, but you will catch all the juices. Again, with pork butts, I think raising the temp is better than crunching, if you want to preserve or build bark. The only item I crutch with foil are briskets and chuck roasts.

[ajgrills]

Thanks jfmorris, I'll try this next time.

I'm using the first batch of leftovers from this cook tonight with some eggs and jalapenos.

[tbob4]

Great job and thanks for the follow-up. It really looks delicious.

[gcdmd]

Lookin' good.

[mnavarre]

If you really want carnitas flavor, try this recipe. It really is about as close to real-deal carnitas as you can come without a big tub of lard. It also adapts easily to the grill, I use a foil pan and give it 45 minutes to an hour uncovered to get some smoke and then foil it and let it braise. Use the juice to make salsa verde, use the fat to crisp the carnitas. Guac, cilantro, and onion. Money.

[ajgrills]

Puttin' this on my to do list. Thanks!

[T-bone]

Congrats on a great cook. FWIW, I use a rack (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01F9NXFC2/) in the bottom of my foil pan during the braise. It keeps the bottom of the pork butt from getting mushy in the braising liquid. We've been very happy with the results of using it vs. not having it. The racks also clean easily in the dishwasher especially if you hit them with some non-stick spray prior to using.

[JCGrill]

I'm with jfmorris. Smoke the butt, then shred and add the flavors you want. My favorite is a Carolina vinegar sauce. Thin sauce that adds just a little extra flavor to round things out. I think you can use the drip pan to get the jus you want. I've even used a little chicken broth in the pan to avoid evaporation.

[Santamarina]

Looking good! To amp up the flavor when I make carnitas I add a little extra rub after pulling, then fry it in corn oil. Delicious, crunchy...makes killer tacos!

[RustyHaines]

I'm also with jfmorris on this one. Get your flavor from what you add after the cook. Although my pork rub uses hot chili powder the heat and flavor is always in the bark, not the meat.

Although, 20 years ago I cooked a turkey with tamale stuffing. The tamales iused n the stuffing were cheese and hot jalapenos tamales. Somehow the capsaisin in the jalapenos made its way into the dark meat. It was THE best turkey I have ever eaten. I have tried to duplicate this 5 times with no success.

So I rely on spices/flavors after the cook to get what I desire. But damn I would like to understand the science of what happened with that tamale stuffing that one time so I can repeat the cook.

[Voodoo628]

Great cook and write up!

[LA Pork Butt]

Oh the joy of a 225 Boston Butt- crutched or not.