Pork Butt Baby Shower
Alright! Time to BBQ for some other people. We’re throwing a baby shower for some friends of ours, and one of the I’m going to bust out the pork butt recipe I used last time, and do it the same.
I got a 15 lbs butt from Costco again - it looks beautiful. There’s a bunch of dry rub from last time leftover in the cabinet.
24 Feb 2018, 1420: Began trimming the pork (took out chunks, left layers of fat about 1/8" thick - leaving a little more fat than last time), and then salting it. 1/2 tsp per pound meat, so 2.5 Tbsp. I cut the pork into three large pieces.
1500: Salted butts going in the fridge.
25 Feb 2019, 0200: Wake up, put 1 cup dry rub onto the meat, start smoker at 225℉.
0230: Put the butts on the smoker! Let them sit for at least 6 hours, check them before 7 hours. Check it again when you wake up :-) Well, except that you gotta wake up after the first 1:20 to check the wood… Try to go for an internal temp of 203℉.
0930: Butt temperature ranged from 160℉ to 165℉. 7 hours, and still a long ways to go… Looking at the temperatures from the last time I smoked butts, oh man - we’re off. If I’m lucky, this is due to the “stall”, and we’re getting towards the end of the stall… If I’m not lucky this is going to take 12 more hours and everyone at the party will be hungry. I cranked the smoker to 275℉ like last time - except, note, last time I cranked the temp after only 4.5 hours. If we’re unlucky - I’ve cranked the temp too late to get the butts all the way to even 195℉. We’ll see. Next check - 2 hours from now.
1130: Butt temperature ranged from 180℉ to 185℉. Hopefully this means we’re past the stall, and we’ll be done around 1330! That’d be excellent, but we’ll have to wait and see.
1230: Butt temp ranged from 185℉ to 190℉. It’ll be done in time, but maybe not the temp I wanted…
1345: Pulled the butts off the smoker - temps ranged from 197℉ to 200℉. Almost perfect! I’ll take it
After smoking - we shredded them, froze most of it, but dropped 5 pounds in the crock-pot on the warm (lowest) setting. I added 1/2 cup of water, 5 Tbsp melted butter, and 1 cup Sweet Baby Ray’s in there, then stirred it all around. It was delicious and everyone loved it. Pretty much perfect.
For next time:
* Remember that it takes more than 12 hours if you keep the temperature low the whole time. Bumping the temperature during the cook cuts off time. I'd love to keep it low and slow the whole time though, so next time budget 20 hours maybe.