Big Job Ahead, Need Some Advice !!

[smittji]

Haven't been smoking too long, but have done alright in the past year with the occasional shoulder here and there :) Now I have been volunteered to do the smoking for a large function this up coming weekend. Looking at trying to get six, 8lb(ish) shoulders on my Char Griller Pro and have a few questions:

1. I like to keep the temp right at 225, wrap when the shoulder gets too 160ish and pull off at 185-190. Do I keep it the same for this many as well ?

2. How much additional time should I plan for with this many shoulders ? I've heard an hour to 1.5 hrs additional for each one but that doesn't calculate to me, hence I ask the pro's here :)

Thanks for the help and I'll try and figure out the picture posting thing before this weekend in case I actually pull this off !!!

 

[justsmoke2]

I haven't done shoulders but my experience with butts the more ya put in the longer it will take. The 1 to 1 1/2 hour per lb rule is just a starting point. You will find out that the meat will be done when it is ready to be done. I can almost guarantee they will not all finish at the same time. As for temp you might want to go up to 250 to 275. I am not familiar with the smoker you are useing. I had a friend who uses a magic chef and with 6 butts the drip pan over flowed. If you can I would do them a few days earlier and reheat on the day to serve. If you try to time it to get done at a certain time you might not meet your time line. If you want to show people on pulling the meat foil one and reheat and pull it in front the crowd. I did a smoke for 200 people in Feb. of this year. Cooked 12 butts over 2 days and put the meat into aluminum trays. Stuck in an oven at 250 for awhile added some apple juice mixed it up and back in the oven til serving time.

 

[capt dan]

I hate to be there Baron of bad news, but 8 butts are never gonna fit on a chargriller at one time. 4 is really pushing it. Better do 2 seperate smoke sessions.

 

[smittji]

Yeah I was debating on two sessions, as I am too worried about them not all getting done ontime.. Trying to 6 on not 8 :) that would be too much !!

Thanks all

 

[meowey]

I agree! I have the same unit and 4 8-pounders will fill it.

Good luck and enjoy!

Take care, have fun, and do good!

Regards,

Meowey

 

[richtee]

Doing them ahead of time is a good idea. The stuff seems to get better after a day or so chilled and re-heated! Save the juices from the foil, de-fat and add a bit back to the meat before reheating in an oven, use the balance in a finishing sauce for the pork.

 

[fatback joe]

Yep..........and up the temps like justsmoke2 suggested..........save yourself a bunch of time, the butts can handle it if you can keep the heat up.

Oh, and the time it takes doesn't change much whether you are doing 1 butt or 10 butts as long as you can recover the temps quickly when you add all that cold meat...........you will go through more fuel though, so be prepared.

Good luck

 

[smittji]

Thanks for all of the advice.. Think I am going to go for two smoking sessions.

One more quick question. What do you folks go by as far as how many people a 8lb shoulder would feed. I was thinking .5lb per person finished but I might be stingy on that number :)

 

[crockadale]

1/4 or 1/3 lb. sandwiches are normal. You are going to loose 40% to 50% of weight when cooked. So if you start with an eight lb shoulder you going to end up with aprox 4.8 lb. of cooked pork X3 or X4 = # sandwiches

 

[bwsmith_2000]

Smittji,
By all means, don't forget the finishing sauce. The recipe in the sauces sections (also a sticky) by Florida Jeff is the best one I have found. Good luck!

 

[teeotee]

.5 lb is about right for a good sammy. Guess would depend on how many adults are eating and how many are guys. Let's face it us guys love to eat

. On average expect about a 60% yield per butt.

Good luck with the smoke.

 

[justsmoke2]

If you have sides that will play into how much they eat also. Such as Baked beans, Cole slaw, Potato salad. Also if you can serve the meal it will make it stretch better. When i let them serve themselves I noticed a lot of wasted food. So out next service we manned the serveing tables and we had huge amount left over which people took plates of pulled pork home with them. If you presauce your pork you may want to cut with 1/3 water and the pork will absorb the extra moisture. So when we reheated we just added a little more water. Thats a secret on cost cutting I got from a comp cooker that caters groups up to 2000 people at a time. We did when pan with water/bbq mix and one without and you really couldn't taste any difference between the 2.