One big shoulder

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cornman

Smoking Fanatic
Original poster
Sep 30, 2016
445
370
South central PA
We had a get-together with work friends this past weekend and I made some pulled pork. Picked up an almost 10 lb. picnic since porkbutts are going up in price. Put the shoulder on right before 4 pm Friday afternoon using Apple and hickory chunks on the WSM, no water in the pan (I used my home concoction rub of pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cumin, chili powder, and a healthy dose of brown sugar).

I reloaded charcoal around 8:30 pm, around midnight, 4:30 am, and again around 7:30 am. Up through the evening the pork temp was climbing steady. From midnight thru the morning I seemed to working through the stall. No big, I’ve had this happen before. My issue was when I checked in the morning, the pit temp was barely hitting 200 despite opening all three vents and adding new charcoal. The meat temp was hanging in the 160-170 range that it had been since around midnight.

I was getting concerned that my Royal Oak charcoal was junk as I had seen some of the recent reviews. I’ve always had good smokes with Royal Oak, but the meat was stalled and I couldn’t get the pit temp to save my soul. Finally I started to get the pit temp to come up around 250-275 mid-morning and we were back in business.

The meat finally came off at 2:15 pm and was pulled at 3.

1BA331B2-49A8-4802-A926-E558651F668B.jpeg


Sorry, no more pics as it was a busy day prepping and entertaining. The pork was delicious, juicy, and earned great reviews from the guests. I thought the long stall was the charcoal pooping out at first, but now that it’s all over, I believe it was more a case of one huge piece of meat that just was eating up the heat through the stall. Any other thoughts or input would be appreciated, but that’s my guess. Thanks for looking/reading!
 
Looks really good from here. The stall I would guess might be a combo of the charcoal and the size of piece of meat. Did it seem to be really thick?
 
That was along haul. After 12 hours, I would have finished in the Oven. Congrats on sticking it out. To go 22 hours and a long,6ish hour, stall. The smoker temp was 225°F or less, most of that cook...JJ
 
We had a get-together with work friends this past weekend and I made some pulled pork. Picked up an almost 10 lb. picnic since porkbutts are going up in price. Put the shoulder on right before 4 pm Friday afternoon using Apple and hickory chunks on the WSM, no water in the pan (I used my home concoction rub of pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, cumin, chili powder, and a healthy dose of brown sugar).

I reloaded charcoal around 8:30 pm, around midnight, 4:30 am, and again around 7:30 am. Up through the evening the pork temp was climbing steady. From midnight thru the morning I seemed to working through the stall. No big, I’ve had this happen before. My issue was when I checked in the morning, the pit temp was barely hitting 200 despite opening all three vents and adding new charcoal. The meat temp was hanging in the 160-170 range that it had been since around midnight.

I was getting concerned that my Royal Oak charcoal was junk as I had seen some of the recent reviews. I’ve always had good smokes with Royal Oak, but the meat was stalled and I couldn’t get the pit temp to save my soul. Finally I started to get the pit temp to come up around 250-275 mid-morning and we were back in business.

The meat finally came off at 2:15 pm and was pulled at 3.

View attachment 513144

Sorry, no more pics as it was a busy day prepping and entertaining. The pork was delicious, juicy, and earned great reviews from the guests. I thought the long stall was the charcoal pooping out at first, but now that it’s all over, I believe it was more a case of one huge piece of meat that just was eating up the heat through the stall. Any other thoughts or input would be appreciated, but that’s my guess. Thanks for looking/reading!
Great job!
Concerning your charcoal, I had the same issue as what you experienced. I switched to Kingsford briquettes and that solved my problem. Royal Oak changed something up in there briquettes.
 
The last pic is killer!
Just give me a couple slices of rye with some mayo and a dill pickle on the side and I'd be all over that!
Good job!
Looks really good from here. The stall I would guess might be a combo of the charcoal and the size of piece of meat. Did it seem to be really thick?
You are on the right track. Stall is normal. Anticipate it. carry on.
That was along haul. After 12 hours, I would have finished in the Oven. Congrats on sticking it out. To go 22 hours and a long,6ish hour, stall. The smoker temp was 225°F or less, most of that cook...JJ
It sure looks good from here. Way to hang in there & get-er-done!
Al
22 Hours???
A Man could get half Polluted in that amount of time!!
Like.

Bear

22 Hours???
A Man could get half Polluted in that amount of time!!
Like.

Bear


First time trying to reply to multiple quotes so sorry if I botched it up, but thank you for the kind words and support!
 
I've overloaded my bullet style smoker's ability to breathe before with chicken leg quarters and adding a pop-up grate (that I actually suspended between the factory food grates). But this became pretty evident early on that cook session. Dunno about doing OK, then not, than doing OK again.
 
The last thing I smoked on my offset smoker was a 12lb picnic roast. It almost killed me, it took 26 hours getting up to feed the beast every 2 to 3 hours. With my jacked up spine that cook was all I could handle and I sold the smoker the next week after thinking about it good and hard.

Man, your pork looks absolutely killer!!!!
Way to ride it out.
Dan
 
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