WaterRat
Master of the Pit
Temp wise showed it was done? I'm still learning, only been smoking for a little over 6 years
Taste wise everything is amazing, my sauce is even better than amazing. Best batch ever
Only 6? lol, I'm a baby in comparison. Temp can be a tricky thing. When we're cooking big butts, ribs, brisket, things where we need to break down those tough proteins - it needs time at a certain temp to break down. For instance if I cubed up a chucky and tossed it in my chili pot, it would likely be at ~200°F in the first half hour - but would still be as tough as a shoe - but 4 hours later - ya boy!
There are really good cooks here, far better than me that can cook to temp, but that's on their system that they know really well and have tons of cooks on. The rest of us? - Poke, prod, jab, tear off a little chunk, wiggle the bone, to see if that sucker is done - you won't hurt it. Use temp to know you're in the right neighborhood. On my smoker chuckys, butts, and short ribs have never been done till 205°F+ Part is simply thermal mass, my cooker generates heat fast - and I bet your's does too. So you get to temp faster but it hasn't had the time at temp.
Hope none of that sounds preachy, just sharing my thoughts, it seems like lots of people on a rather regular basis post that they got X meat to Y temp but it still wasn't as tender as they wanted - so poke, prod and probe it till it's done!
Again, that sauce looks great!
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