Pork Butt Three Ways

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mneeley490

Master of the Pit
Original poster
OTBS Member
SMF Premier Member
Jun 23, 2011
3,756
2,216
Everett, WA
Ok, I opened a cryovac'd two-pack of boneless pork butts on Wednesday.
Sliced off the fatty top of each about 2" down and put those into a bucket of Pop's brine to make BBB later this week. I will be hot smoking it for the first time.

With the remainder of one of the butts, I sliced into roughly 2-1/2" x 2-1/2" lengths and put into a char siu marinade. Cooked those indirect on my Weber at 350° yesterday, and they came out pretty good. Much more like the char siu I buy in Seattle's Chinatown, than what I've made before, with pork tenderloin.

For the third piece, I lubed up the remaining butt with mustard, and rubbed with Mossymo's Tatonka Dust. This spent the night in the fridge, then into the MES 30 at around 8am Saturday morning. Good thing I started early. The butt was about 6 lbs. 6oz., but still took 14 hours to finish at 230°! I foiled and finished in the oven for the last 3 hours. Used Pitmaster's Choice pellets in the AMNPS, which I dried in the microwave. Oddly, I think I may have gotten them too dry, as it burned completely thru 2 rows in 2 hours, with little airflow. I had to reload and smoke again.

But the wait was worth it. It is the most flavorful butt I've ever done, even the wife said so. That Tatonka dust is nothing short of spectacular!
The funny thing is, we were out with friends today at a wine tasting, and some of them bought pulled pork sliders at the winery. My wife and I did not, and we were kidded about being PP snobs. I wish I had brought some for them to compare. I did try a little taste of their PP, but it was mushy, soaked in bbq sauce, and you couldn't really taste the meat itself. This is just SO much better!

Here's a few pics of the pulled pork. I'll try to post pics of the other two later.

Naked and afraid.


Mustard slather.


The secret ingredient. The label is actually a lot more orange than this. Don't know why it's so washed out in the pic.


Liberally coated, and going into the fridge.


And into the MES 30 in the early morn'.


14 long hours later! It came apart like coffee cake


So much porky goodness!


And, the money shot.

 
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Okay, I finally got the bacon sliced and pictured. But first, the Char sui! After marinating the strips for a few days, I cooked indirect on my Weber at about 350° to 375° for about 30-40 minutes. That was long enough to bring the IT up to 150°.
I made the mustard for this also. I may have mentioned before that I think store bought Chinese mustard just isn't hot enough. Not like what you get at a good Chinese restaurant.
I start with a pouch of mustard powder from the Asian store. No English on it at all, so everything is done to taste. I add water, white vinegar, sugar, salt, garlic powder, and white pepper. It is pretty powerful at first, so you need to let it sit in the fridge for a week or two before serving, or you could knock somebody's head clean off with it.

Marinating...


Sliced...


 
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Now for the bacon.
I brined the top of the butts in a 2 gallon bucket for 8 days. (They're only about 2" thick.) Then dried overnight to let the pellicule form, and placed in my MES 30, which was a bit harder to regulate at lower temps than I imagined. It went between 110° & 140° for 12 hours. I used a full load of pellets in my AMNPS, with about a 60/40 blend of cherry and corn cob. It smoked nicely for 11-1/2 hours. I opened only a couple times to spray with apple juice. After 12 hours, it had a really nice color to it that I never got when cold smoking.

Pop's Brine


Drying...


About 30 minutes in, and setting up the AMNPS.


5 hour mark...


Almost ready...


And, done! Now off to the fridge for a rest.



Slicing. Sorry for the poor quality of the pics here. The lighting in my kitchen just does not like my phone camera.

The real color is more like the pics above.


You can hardly tell it from belly bacon!



Saving some for the daughter and s-i-l.


Didn't need to freeze it to slice this way. I just used a large, rounded-end, slicing knife.
Fried some up, and I think I finally have the salt ratio the way I like it. I used 1/3 cup for 1 gallon of water. My wife thinks this is the best batch (#3) yet.



This just proves to me that the butt is one of the most versatile cuts on the pig!
36.gif


 
 
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Looks good man... looks good! What was final IT of the bacon butt? I wanna do bacon but its still to hot to cold smoke it. But hot smoke I can do...
Mike
 
Char sui and baby boc choy soup served over glass noodles is one of my favorite dishes! Nie job on all three pork butt smokes! I too have found that 1/3 salt in Pop's brine is what we like too.
 
That looks great, I have the tatonka dust and like it ( I wish I would have thought of that when I rubbed mine (butts) down last night) I really like it on steaks. Your whole feast looks great. good job.
 
Looks good man... looks good! What was final IT of the bacon butt? I wanna do bacon but its still to hot to cold smoke it. But hot smoke I can do...
Mike
As I recall, the IT on the bacon was around 110°-112° at the end. I read that you can go as high as 128° before it starts to actually cook. This seems to firm it up some, so it does slice easier, as opposed to the cold smoked bacon I've done in the past.

Mossymo, I'll try that Tatonka dust brine the next time around. This was the first time I've used Pop's Brine, and I wanted to establish a base line.

I did use it on burgers the other day. Great!
 
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