Hey I have a few whole pork loins I plan to cook on my Traeger smoker grill.
A friend of mine marinates his overnight in a red wine and I forget what else.
Any fave ways of cooking this ? Should I sear it before cooking? They are pretty lean in my experience, is there a risk of drying it out if I smoke it for too long ?
Grill/Smoke/Roast = SnS Grills Kettle + SnS Deluxe Insert & Drip n' Griddle
Grill/Smoke/Roast = Hasty-Bake Gourmet Dual Finish with HB rotisserie and Grill Grates
Smoke = Weber Smokey Mountain 22.5"
Pizza = Blackstone Propane Pizza Oven (Stacy's, but she let's me use it sometimes)
Indoor Cooking = LG Studio 30" gas range
Camp Cooking = Coleman 2 burner white gas stove
Thermometer = FireBoard FBX2 with 2 ambient and 6 meat probes
Thermapen Mk IV = Light blue
Thermapen Mk IV = Black
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Auber 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 1 fan)
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Fireboard 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 2 fan)
Knives
Wusthof Classic Ikon set: 9" carving knive, 2X 8" Chef's Knife, 7" Santoku and three utility knives
Kamikoto Kuro set: 7" Santoku, 6.5" Nakiri, 5" Utility
Amazing Ribs Brazilian Steak knife set
Favorite wine = whatever is currently in the wine rack
Favorite beer = Sam Adams Boston Lager or Shiner Bock
Favorite whisky = Lagavulin Distiller's Edition 16 year old single malt
Best Cookbooks - Meathead's "The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling", Chris Lilly's "Big Bob Gibson's BBQ Book", Aaron Franklin's "Franklin BBQ"
Cookbooks to check out - Raichlen's "Brisket Chronicles" and anything by Adam Perry Lang.
Current fanboy cookbook - "Chasing Smoke: Cooking Over Fire Around the Levant"
Wet brine the loin. I use brine from Meathead/Doc Blonder. I cut this in half, I don’t need a full gallon for a pork loin. Put the loin in a gallon ziplock, add the brine to it, squeeze the air out, stick it on a cookie sheet and into the fridge. At least 1 hour, can go 24 hours. Here’s the brine itself
I fire up the grill and get to 250F, adding some wood for smoke. On a Traeger, you may need to start at the smoke setting, then push to a higher temp in order to get smoke flavor.
LIberally add your rub to the loin. I like Memphis Meat Dust personally.
Put the loin on at 250F with good smoke going
Cook until internal temp is 145F, pull, slice and serve :-)
Grill/Smoke/Roast = SnS Grills Kettle + SnS Deluxe Insert & Drip n' Griddle
Grill/Smoke/Roast = Hasty-Bake Gourmet Dual Finish with HB rotisserie and Grill Grates
Smoke = Weber Smokey Mountain 22.5"
Pizza = Blackstone Propane Pizza Oven (Stacy's, but she let's me use it sometimes)
Indoor Cooking = LG Studio 30" gas range
Camp Cooking = Coleman 2 burner white gas stove
Thermometer = FireBoard FBX2 with 2 ambient and 6 meat probes
Thermapen Mk IV = Light blue
Thermapen Mk IV = Black
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Auber 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 1 fan)
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Fireboard 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 2 fan)
Knives
Wusthof Classic Ikon set: 9" carving knive, 2X 8" Chef's Knife, 7" Santoku and three utility knives
Kamikoto Kuro set: 7" Santoku, 6.5" Nakiri, 5" Utility
Amazing Ribs Brazilian Steak knife set
Favorite wine = whatever is currently in the wine rack
Favorite beer = Sam Adams Boston Lager or Shiner Bock
Favorite whisky = Lagavulin Distiller's Edition 16 year old single malt
Best Cookbooks - Meathead's "The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling", Chris Lilly's "Big Bob Gibson's BBQ Book", Aaron Franklin's "Franklin BBQ"
Cookbooks to check out - Raichlen's "Brisket Chronicles" and anything by Adam Perry Lang.
Current fanboy cookbook - "Chasing Smoke: Cooking Over Fire Around the Levant"
Couple of comments about this ..... pork loin is fairly lean, don’t cook at too low a heat or take the temp past 145 or you will get a dry piece of meat. One solution to that is to stuff the loin. I just just use good old Stovetop and stuff it, but you can do whatever you like.
Wine, vinegar, etc are acidic. Submerging meat in acidic liquids for any length of time may leave you with mushy meat, which is not all that great an idea. If you want the flavors your buddy does, don’t add all the stuff beyond the basic salt brine until, maybe, 20-30 minutes prior to cooking.
Put the meat on straight from the fridge. Just stop long enough to pat it dry, add your rub, and then get it to the grill. Moist cold meat takes on smoke better.
Come to think of it, I think he uses orange juice as well. But yes it does come out a bit soft.
Also, his pork loin is always a dark color all the way through the inside (from the wine?). The ones I am seeing on line are all pretty light colored on the inside.
???
So, no need to sear then ?
Last edited by zzdocxx; September 20, 2020, 06:40 PM.
zzdocxx I don’t bother searing, I like the crust I get with method above. You can sear if you want to, but I’ve not really noticed much difference.
I would say that long amounts of time in wine and orange juice is going to leave the meat soft/mushy. As noted, if you want that particular addition to the flavor, I would do it right before going on the grill, maybe 25 minutes or so.
I do pretty close to what ecowper suggested though I don't brine and run at 275ish. Here are a couple pics, the one shows what the Memphis Dust looks like on the outside when done, the other shows the inside color and moistness. I pull it off the pit at 140-142 and let carryover bring it to 145 at slicing.
We have done quite a few pork loins over the last few months. They cook quick enough for a weeknight dinner and a whole 8 lb loin can feed a couple families if needed. I keep it simple and dry brine it overnight, hit it with some rub before cooking, and then smoke it at 275 or so until it hits 145 degrees. It usually only takes 2 hours to get there.
For the last 15-20 minutes of the cook I also like to glaze the loin with a bit of sauce. Again, most any sauce will work. I also like using an apple cider syrup from a local farm as a glaze: https://www.atholorchards.com/produc...-cider-syrup-1
zzdocxx Are you talking pork loins or pork tenderloins? Two very different cuts. A whole pork loin is usually 8+ lbs. Pork tenderloins are much smaller (usually 1 1/2 lbs each) and usually come two to a pack.
If you are talking tenderloin (based on asking how many are in a pack I would think that is the case?) those can easily cook in under 20 minutes. Cook them until they are ~140 degrees and then sear them nice and hot for a couple minutes.
Grill/Smoke/Roast = SnS Grills Kettle + SnS Deluxe Insert & Drip n' Griddle
Grill/Smoke/Roast = Hasty-Bake Gourmet Dual Finish with HB rotisserie and Grill Grates
Smoke = Weber Smokey Mountain 22.5"
Pizza = Blackstone Propane Pizza Oven (Stacy's, but she let's me use it sometimes)
Indoor Cooking = LG Studio 30" gas range
Camp Cooking = Coleman 2 burner white gas stove
Thermometer = FireBoard FBX2 with 2 ambient and 6 meat probes
Thermapen Mk IV = Light blue
Thermapen Mk IV = Black
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Auber 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 1 fan)
PID Controller = Fireboard Drive + Fireboard 20 CFM Fan (FB gen 2 fan)
Knives
Wusthof Classic Ikon set: 9" carving knive, 2X 8" Chef's Knife, 7" Santoku and three utility knives
Kamikoto Kuro set: 7" Santoku, 6.5" Nakiri, 5" Utility
Amazing Ribs Brazilian Steak knife set
Favorite wine = whatever is currently in the wine rack
Favorite beer = Sam Adams Boston Lager or Shiner Bock
Favorite whisky = Lagavulin Distiller's Edition 16 year old single malt
Best Cookbooks - Meathead's "The Science of Great Barbecue and Grilling", Chris Lilly's "Big Bob Gibson's BBQ Book", Aaron Franklin's "Franklin BBQ"
Cookbooks to check out - Raichlen's "Brisket Chronicles" and anything by Adam Perry Lang.
Current fanboy cookbook - "Chasing Smoke: Cooking Over Fire Around the Levant"
And they have quite a bit of taper in their shape which will require folding and tying to even up the shape. Alternate is to trim off the tapers and bundle them, but that leaves you with some small chunks of naturally shaped pieces.
I also threw a "London broil" on the Traeger I had cut from an inside round primal cut a few months back. The first one of those I cooked came out very tough. This one not tough, but not much flavor either. Nowhere near as good as prime tri-tip, but that's OK. Had a great burrito.
I put the four pork tenderloins on with a little standard rub and tried to not over or undercook them. The narrow ends I cut off and put on separately. This meat might have benefitted from a marinade, it isn't so flavorful. It is much better (for me) with a little lemon squeezed on it.
Thing is, I took all this meat out of the freezer to thaw a few days ago. Then I had a very short notice that I was needed to work out of town, leaving tomorrow. So I had to just cook it all up in a trice.
I used a propane torch to sear everything.
I'm neither disappointed nor wowed by my results. Pics to follow.
Attached Files
Last edited by zzdocxx; September 21, 2020, 09:06 PM.
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