Saturday I smoked a 5# butt and it turned out ok, I don't think I used enough smoke cause there really wasn't much smoke flavor in the meat. I went through a 10# bag of Royal Oak lump charcoal (which seams a little ridiculous) and about half of an 8.4# bag of Hickory. I don't know if the hickory was just not strong enough or I didn't use enough.
I was battling temps all day. It hovered around 220 or so which I thought was pretty good but I think I let the charcoal burn out too much before I would put more on becuase I was putting cold coal on and it would dip to about 100 or so before the new stuff would light up and get back up to 220 or 250. I had my wood soaking all day so the latter parts the wood was wetter but the earlier it was probably pretty dry cause again I forgot to soak it the night before. After about 7 hours it was only at like 135* so I wrapped it in foil and let it smoke more. After about another hour it was at 150 and I let it sit about another 1/2 hour with foil until I took it off at about 160*. I then let it sit inside for another half hour or so before I unwrapped and cut into slices.
It didn't fall apart at all, I wasn't really suprised at this, but there was a pretty good smoke ring despite the lack of smoke flavor. Shredding wasn't impossible but I had to really get in there to get it shred up. It was pretty tender overall, but the smokeyness just wasn't there. Friends enjoyed it, so I guess that was good.
Looking for anything that will help me improve my game, this is my second smoke and I'm amazingly suprised again that it ended up edible.
Thanks,
Gabe
I was battling temps all day. It hovered around 220 or so which I thought was pretty good but I think I let the charcoal burn out too much before I would put more on becuase I was putting cold coal on and it would dip to about 100 or so before the new stuff would light up and get back up to 220 or 250. I had my wood soaking all day so the latter parts the wood was wetter but the earlier it was probably pretty dry cause again I forgot to soak it the night before. After about 7 hours it was only at like 135* so I wrapped it in foil and let it smoke more. After about another hour it was at 150 and I let it sit about another 1/2 hour with foil until I took it off at about 160*. I then let it sit inside for another half hour or so before I unwrapped and cut into slices.
It didn't fall apart at all, I wasn't really suprised at this, but there was a pretty good smoke ring despite the lack of smoke flavor. Shredding wasn't impossible but I had to really get in there to get it shred up. It was pretty tender overall, but the smokeyness just wasn't there. Friends enjoyed it, so I guess that was good.
Looking for anything that will help me improve my game, this is my second smoke and I'm amazingly suprised again that it ended up edible.
Thanks,
Gabe