Questions on cooking 200lb of butt

[gooose53]

I'm doing about 200lbs of butt on Sat for a fund rasier. I've not done anything even close to this volume so I'm looking for some advice. I would like the pork to taste great but with as little work as possible. Can you have both and still have great tasting "Q"? Thanks for your input!

 

[bbq bubba]

There's nothin EASY about cookin 200 lbs of butts, 200 lbs of anything is a lot of work. Though butts are more forgiving than most meats, you still gotta slather, rub, smoke, spritz, foil,rest n pull...........piece of cake except you have to do that how many times???

Hope ya got a big smoker and good batteries in your camera

 

[flash]

Boy you better have ALOT of aluminum foil.

What are you smoking them on? Its going take some time, anywhere from 7 to 14 hours. Charcoal, propane, etc. Give us some more info on this great smoke. One butt or twenty, its going to still be bar-b-que in my eyes. Anyway you look at it, its will still be a bit of work.

 

[gooose53]

I'm cooking on a gas/charcoal Alveron...pretty good size. I put about 50 lbs of chk qtrs on it not long ago. I'm going to use the below method I think...about 5 hours.

http://www.kickassbbq.com/Quick_Cook_Boston_Butt.htm

 

[flash]

That looks good. I have a friend that does butts on a gas grill, no aluminum pans though and more a cuban flair to them. He only goes for sliced to moderate chunks, not fully a pulled pork. I say if time is an issue, might very well be worth trying.

 

[chadpole]

This sounds real good. The only problem I can see with the website is the amount of aluminum pans you would have to have. Will two butts fit to the pan? Will 200 lbs. of butts fit into the smoker? If not you would have to have more than one smoker. Just my observation. I have cooked 200 lbs of butts before but they were stacked in tight against each other until some fat was rendered out to make them shrink up. I had aluminum pans under the grate to catch the grease. Everything else sounds good. I just cook them at the 300 to 350 degrees for the 3 hours then double wrap them in alum. foil until they reach 195 degrees internal then let them rest in a large cooler with towels in the bottom and top of the butts. The smoke has had a chance to get into the meat by then when you foil them.This is my opinion and my experience on doing this much meat. Have a happy and safe smoke.
Paul

 

[gooose53]

Chadpole, interesting observation. I think we can do it in two shifts, we are starting early on Sat am and not serving until 5pm. BTW, your pretty close so if you have nothing to do on Sat come on up and lend a hand :)
Thanks so far for your suggestions and don't be shy about giving me more...the more I hear the better I'll be!