First Smoked Pulled Pork!

[DinnerIsComing]

Great cook - you never forget your first! I’m with many others in this thread - pork butt is so much fun because it’s so forgiving. Give higher temps a try if you want to experiment. Shorter cook, probably avoid the wrap, great bark, and still juicy and tender.

Actually... I looking forward (and for an excuse) to do it all again!

BTW: I love your Doobie Bros. quote!

 

[HalfSmoked]

Awesome first cook there are many tips been given to you. Try and see set your own pattering keep notes of what you do and what you like for reference.

Warren

 

[JC in GB]

This past Sunday, I smoked my first pork shoulder! ...and it was that a grueling experience too! Twelve hours of waiting and checking in like an expectant father!

My day started around 6am. The first order of business was to caffeinate the cook, then pull the pork shoulder from the fridge to let it warm up to room temperature. This is where I started:
View attachment 667853

I started with a simple injection of apple juice, water, sugar, salt, and Worcestershire sauce (I used "W Sauce" and if you haven't tried it, I highly recommend it!). After making a mess of that, I added the rub; btw: I got the inspiration from this "Girl Carnivore" recipe online.

Onto the Gravity 980 it went at about 8:30am (a little later than I had planned).

In my excitement, I didn't snap a picture of the shoulder post-rub, but I do have this first look after about 4hrs of smoke time:
View attachment 667854

The rest of the time was spent trying to keep the fires burning properly... I was getting some spikes, but since I had temp probes in both the chamber and the pork, I wasn't all that concerned.

Once I got to about the 165-ish range, I pulled the pork off and wrapped it in butcher paper, re-inserted the probe, and waited... and waited... and waited -- you get the idea; long, low-temperature smokes can be a little nerve-racking, to say the least.

As expected, I hit my target temperature around 7pm. I pulled the pork from the smoker and let it rest.
View attachment 667855

The moment of truth had arrived! The bark was absolutely gorgeous!
View attachment 667856

As I worked on this thing of beauty, my wife started to film me with her phone (and just today I -- unfortunately -- learned I couldn't actually add them to a post)... first, I was probing around to feel how tender the meat was (first "Oh, my God" moment), then I started pulling on the "money muscle" and is nearly disintegrated in my hand!... and finally, I started pulling soft, juicy chunks with almost no effort at all! Needless to say, we ate very well Sunday night! [edit: I neglected to mention just how easily that bone pulled away from the meat!]

As I had mentioned before, this was my "freshman" attempt at a long, 12hr cook. Prior to this, I'd smoked quite a few chuck roasts for pulled beef; I think those were more on the order of 6hrs. As far as I was seeing this cook, it was the prelude (and experiment) to another infamous long cook, the brisket (frankly, I'd rather screw up and learn on a pork shoulder than screw up on a full packer brisket). If there were lessons learned here, it leaned more toward the fire management side; not knowing any better, I filled my 980 chimney about 3/4 full with a mix of Jealous Devil Max XL briquettes, and apple and cherry wood chunks. Prior to this, I really didn't have experience in estimating the total available burn time. Subconsciously, I was trying to gauge the time such that I can start a cook (I'm thinking brisket here) late at night, go to bed, and still have the Gravity 980 rolling smoke when I get up for coffee in the morning. As I type this, I'm thinking that I should eat the cost of fuel and test it out for myself... but that "thou shall not waste fuel!"-minded engineer in me is singing loud. I think I should give him a beer (or twenty) and just do it.

Looks wonderful. Well done!

JC

 

[OldSmoke]

A successful smoke for the books! Good job. I use 250 as well.

 

[smokin peachey]

Looks good. Congratulations on making it onto the featured threads.

 

[indaswamp]

Congrats on the carousel ride! And kudos for your first pulled pork butt....that bark looks awesome!

 

[bertman]

As usual, I'm late to the party, but that first attempt deserves praise. That's really impressive!

 

[DinnerIsComing]

Looks good. Congratulations on making it onto the featured threads.

So since this my first "featured" -- what does that mean?

 

[DinnerIsComing]

Congrats on the carousel ride! And kudos for your first pulled pork butt....that bark looks awesome!

Yeah, my wife was just as impressed by the bark as I was surprised. From all the "pre-game" videos I've watched on YouTube, it just makes more sense to wrap in paper than foil.

 

[DinnerIsComing]

As usual, I'm late to the party, but that first attempt deserves praise. That's really impressive!

Better late than never! Thank you for the praise bertman !

 

[uncle eddie]

Heck ya! Congrats on the excellent looking butt and the ride on the carousel!

 

[noboundaries]

This past Sunday, I smoked my first pork shoulder! ...and it was that a grueling experience too! Twelve hours of waiting and checking in like an expectant father!

Great first shoulder! You fret over everything with your first. By the time you do your 3rd or 4th, you'll be sleeping thru most of it.

 

[912smoker]

Congrats on a successful 1st shoulder and on the ride !! Great color and bark!

Keith

 

[smokin peachey]

So since this my first "featured" -- what does that mean?

Featured means it rotates on the home page with the other featured threads. It’s an honor to have a thread featured.

 

[tallbm]

Yeah, my wife was just as impressed by the bark as I was surprised. From all the "pre-game" videos I've watched on YouTube, it just makes more sense to wrap in paper than foil.

Here is something that I believe will help you produce an even BETTER pork butt by simply doing a slice into the butt so it is still one whole piece but can be "spread" open a little bit so you get more flavor, bark, and smoke in there. This was the last piece to put my pork butts over the time and is really a minor change the prep you were already doing.

Let me know if this thread makes sense :D

Butterflied Pork Butt (or Pork Butt Butt)

Well a few weekends ago I did 2 pork butts at 17.5 pounds total. I butterflied them so that the pork butts were more like butts hahaha. The reason I did this was to: get more seasoning on the meat for flavor get more bark because there was now more surface area get more smoke flavor and...

www.smokingmeatforums.com

 

[Houndstooth]

Congratulations. That feeling of pulling the bone out never gets old! Mmm pulled pork enchiladas

 

[Texas Cookin']

Very nice job! Gotta love HEB.

 

[DougE]

Very delicious looking cook! Well done!

It looks good to me and Chris @gmc2003 has some good advice on the temp. I always run AT LEAST 250℉, but prefer 275℉. But I'm using an offset stick burner so my temps will fluctuate. No wrap for me.

Yeah, my OKJ kind of likes to settle in up closer to 300° I used to fight with it to keep temps lower, but learned to just go with where it likes to run (within reason). No real difference in the end product running higher temps.

 

[DinnerIsComing]

Featured means it rotates on the home page with the other featured threads. It’s an honor to have a thread featured.

Since asking this question, I've seen my picture scroll across the front page... I definitely feel honored!

 

[tx smoker]

Very very nice and congrats on a successful first attempt. Pork shoulders are pretty forgiving so you chose the right cut for your first long-haul smoke session. Don't be scared of that brisket though. Go for it!!

Robert