How To Keep Meat Warm?

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jgruberman

Fire Starter
Original poster
Jun 11, 2016
41
11
If I have slabs of ribs or pork shoulders that I want to keep warm for an extended period of time for serving the same day hot... Can I put my oven at 170 and put the meat in there and it won't overcook it? That's the lowest setting it goes... Anyone have any better(or good) suggestions? Thanks!

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Most people wrap up the meat in foil the place it in a cooler with towels under the foil and over the foil wrapped meats. Keeps in cooler hot for several hours. But you can't pile in 20 or 30 lbs of meat wrapped right out of the smoker.. it will stay to hot. You could let it rest and go to say 170 or 160 then close up the foil and put it in there with the towels adding insulation.
 
So how long could I keep it in the cooler wrapped in foil(and it stay reasonably warm) if I let it come down to 170 first?

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if you have a high quality  cooler like a YETI or Pellican  or a cambro warmer you can keep hot food  hot  for hours and hours . or if you wanna get super obsessive get a food warmer/ holder like an alto shaam then you could hold stuff at 150 degrees  with no problem for as long as you'd like 5,6,8 hours 
 
My oven only goes down to 170, and it will keep food hot indefinitely.

Just double wrap in foil or put in an aluminum pan with foil on top.

Al
 
My oven only goes down to 170, and it will keep food hot indefinitely.



Just double wrap in foil or put in an aluminum pan with foil on top.



Al
And it won't do any additional cooking of the meat if it stays in the oven at 170... Say, for 6 hours?

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A few weeks again I had an event at 6pm and finished 2 pork butts around 8:30am. Left them in oven at 170 degrees with foil over top until about 4-4:30pm when I pulled them. They were great.
 
Five hours is the longest I've held meat.  I double wrapped SLC spare ribs in HD foil, lined an Xtreme cooler with old, clean bath towels, then put the ribs in and covered with more towels.  When I arrived at my destination, the meat was still hot and it had cooked a little more.  The meat was fall of the bone, but moist and tender.  The folks I was serving are not meat smokers.  They said they were the best ribs they'd ever eaten and marveled at how well they were smoked.  FOTB ribs to non-smokers are perfection.     
 
Do I need to let the meat rest and come down to 170? Or do I just take it out if the smoker and into the over at 170?

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Straight into oven is good
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 Into the oven, wrapped in foil. 
 
And it won't do any additional cooking of the meat if it stays in the oven at 170... Say, for 6 hours?

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It going to cool down from the final temp you smoked it to, i.e. 205.

So it will just stay in a holding pattern.

I do it this way because the whole towel , blanket cooler thing is just a lot of extra work, when this will do the same thing.

Al
 
And it won't do any additional cooking of the meat if it stays in the oven at 170... Say, for 6 hours?

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It going to cool down from the final temp you smoked it to, i.e. 205.



So it will just stay in a holding pattern.



I do it this way because the whole towel , blanket cooler thing is just a lot of extra work, when this will do the same thing.



Al
If I wrap it in foil and put it in a cooler and blankets, will it achieve the same result? Or will the oven hold it for longer?

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I would just throw it in the oven. Foil it and then if you are serving it somewhere else, pull it and take it with you in whatever you are serving from. It will hold perfectly in the oven foiled and covered. Aaron Franklin has his wrapped and holds his brisket for like 8-10 hrs at 150. Yours will be fine!
 
When I use my stick burner I put bricks on the fire box to heat up. Then wrap those in towels and place in the bottom of a cooler. Wrap the meat in foil and put it on top of the bricks followed by another towel on top of the meat. This keeps meat hot for quit a while, at least 10 hours.
 
I seem to always end my briskets and butts smokes at midnight. I wrap in stretch wrap and tin foil put them in a cooler and pack it with towels, threat is still hot the in the morning.

Randy,
 
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