- Mar 23, 2009
- 436
- 325
I picked up the Masterbuilt 7-in-1 20qt on clearance a while back for $75. I've used it 3 or 4 times with mixed results, I think it has a bit of a learning curve compared to smaller air fryers. I decided after seeing some pork butt cooks on a FB group that I'd give it a go.
Started with a 7.92lb boneless butt that I had picked up from Wally the week before. I was pleasantly surprised that whoever the processor was did a good job of cutting out the bone while leaving a pretty evened out butt, this was a nice change from others I've had. Fat cap was pretty well trimmed too so I saved myself a little prep time.
Fired up the air fryer set to 250 on air fry setting and let it preheat. While waiting I ran inside to rub my butt down. Normally I don't use a binder, as 8 really don't have any issues with my rub adhering, but since this cook would have air circulating I figured I give myself a bit of a security blanket. My girlfriend absolutely loves Kosmo's Honey Killer Bee on everything, it kinda sucks because I like to try every rub I can find. But she who is pregnant is the one who makes the rules. So for this butt I decided a light coat of Kosmo's Texas Beef topped off with a healthy coat of Killer Bee to appease the round one.
I let the rub set while I tried to burn the house down. Normally I smoke with just oak, it's cheap, it's usually easily found, and I like the flavor profile. Wally didn't have any oak chips, so cherry it was. Every post I've seen regarding smoking in this thing says ditch the lid on the chip tray. After looking at it, it's simple to see why...the little box has no ventilation with the lid on it. I loaded it up with cherry chips, set the torch to it, and let it do its smoky goodness thing and placing it into the fryer.
Back inside I took another tip straight from FB and inverted one of the fryer baskets onto the bottom basket so I could have a flat surface to lay my beautifully seasoned butt. Before dropping it onto said inverted basket I HEAVILY sprayed it down with Pam. A stuck butt is a pain in the butt. From here I dropped the butt loaded basket into the fryer and shut the lid.
At this point I set a timer on my phone for an hour to remind myself of an important thing I always forget whole cooking...take pictures. Every 15 minutes I went out to check on the state of the smoke, and this so far is my biggest issue with smoking in this cooker. I could not get steady long term smoke. If I decide to continue doing smoked meat in this thing I intend to mock up a mailbox mod to give that nice steady flow.
As I said I fixed the smoke every 15-20 minutes and checked the butt every hour, and then 30 minutes and 15 minutes.
I added smoke for roughly 2 hours, before finally just letting it ride. After just over six hours of cooking unwrpped I was happy with the color and jiggle of the butt at 196, so I pulled it off put it in an aluminum pan covered with foil. I opted out of putting it an a towel lined cooler, because frankly I didn't want to dirty towels as I had been doing laundry all day, and I have no idea where my cooler is. At this point I let the butt rest while I made my weekly Wally grocery pickup. I got back a little more than an hour later and went to pulling.
Results? Honestly I fairly happy with a first pass at this. The biggest pain in the butt was the smoke, which outside of doing a smoke generator or mailbox mod, it don't think it can ever consistently give steady smoke. There was smoke flavor on it, not a lot but enough to atleast scratch that itch a little.
All the pics that follow should be in order, but if not...well I never claimed to be a smart man lol. That and I'm attempting to do all this from my phone.
Started with a 7.92lb boneless butt that I had picked up from Wally the week before. I was pleasantly surprised that whoever the processor was did a good job of cutting out the bone while leaving a pretty evened out butt, this was a nice change from others I've had. Fat cap was pretty well trimmed too so I saved myself a little prep time.
Fired up the air fryer set to 250 on air fry setting and let it preheat. While waiting I ran inside to rub my butt down. Normally I don't use a binder, as 8 really don't have any issues with my rub adhering, but since this cook would have air circulating I figured I give myself a bit of a security blanket. My girlfriend absolutely loves Kosmo's Honey Killer Bee on everything, it kinda sucks because I like to try every rub I can find. But she who is pregnant is the one who makes the rules. So for this butt I decided a light coat of Kosmo's Texas Beef topped off with a healthy coat of Killer Bee to appease the round one.
I let the rub set while I tried to burn the house down. Normally I smoke with just oak, it's cheap, it's usually easily found, and I like the flavor profile. Wally didn't have any oak chips, so cherry it was. Every post I've seen regarding smoking in this thing says ditch the lid on the chip tray. After looking at it, it's simple to see why...the little box has no ventilation with the lid on it. I loaded it up with cherry chips, set the torch to it, and let it do its smoky goodness thing and placing it into the fryer.
Back inside I took another tip straight from FB and inverted one of the fryer baskets onto the bottom basket so I could have a flat surface to lay my beautifully seasoned butt. Before dropping it onto said inverted basket I HEAVILY sprayed it down with Pam. A stuck butt is a pain in the butt. From here I dropped the butt loaded basket into the fryer and shut the lid.
At this point I set a timer on my phone for an hour to remind myself of an important thing I always forget whole cooking...take pictures. Every 15 minutes I went out to check on the state of the smoke, and this so far is my biggest issue with smoking in this cooker. I could not get steady long term smoke. If I decide to continue doing smoked meat in this thing I intend to mock up a mailbox mod to give that nice steady flow.
As I said I fixed the smoke every 15-20 minutes and checked the butt every hour, and then 30 minutes and 15 minutes.
I added smoke for roughly 2 hours, before finally just letting it ride. After just over six hours of cooking unwrpped I was happy with the color and jiggle of the butt at 196, so I pulled it off put it in an aluminum pan covered with foil. I opted out of putting it an a towel lined cooler, because frankly I didn't want to dirty towels as I had been doing laundry all day, and I have no idea where my cooler is. At this point I let the butt rest while I made my weekly Wally grocery pickup. I got back a little more than an hour later and went to pulling.
Results? Honestly I fairly happy with a first pass at this. The biggest pain in the butt was the smoke, which outside of doing a smoke generator or mailbox mod, it don't think it can ever consistently give steady smoke. There was smoke flavor on it, not a lot but enough to atleast scratch that itch a little.
All the pics that follow should be in order, but if not...well I never claimed to be a smart man lol. That and I'm attempting to do all this from my phone.
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