Need advice and encouragement for July 3 smoke for 100+

[donnylove]

I've cooked something like 20 of the cryopacked pork shoulder roasts from Costco in the past two months. Both pieces are the (boneless) butt portion of the shoulder. I've kept fairly close track of my net returns on finished product vs. the weight printed on the sales label and I'm consistently ending up with around 42-45%. Seems like I do a little better if I foil vs. not and keep in mind that I am extremely thorough about eliminating fat, grisel, etc. from the finished product when I'm pulling, so that may contribute some to the lower returns, but I thought you should know. Good luck and enjoy! Take some pics for us if you have time and please let me know what sort of returns you get on finished pig.

 

[donnylove]

I did a graduation party for around 100 people two weekends ago. First time I've ever really cooked for a group. There wasn't really an opportunity to cook at the party, so I cooked everything ahead of time to around 192-195 degrees, vacuum-sealed chunks of the meat in 3-lb packages, froze it (without finishing sauce), and then re-heat it in a roaster the morning of the party, adding the finishing sauce then and pulling it into shreds. The meat got rave reviews, though up here in the north country there isn't much to compare to. Order pulled pork at a restaurant up here and you get shredded crock pot pork drowned in a tomato-based sauce!

Anyway, in my humble opinion, pulled pork tastes pretty much the same re-heated as it does fresh from the smoker.

 

[crockadale]

Are you getting paid for this gig or are you doing on your own? In any regards cook your meat ahead of time, vacuum seal and freeze, thaw the day of the party and add your finishing sauce and reheat on your cooker.

If you are serving yourself you can control portions but if it is put out and let em at it you will have people that will load up and portion control goes out the window. As mentioned before I suggest at least two sides. You are going to need about 65 lbs raw product for 100 people and figure ¼ lb serving of each side per person.

Good luck!