1st Pellet Smoke Underway: Boston Butts

[mbeutler1203]

Good morning, my first cook has been underway.  Received a Blaz'n Grillworks Gridiron this week.  Below is the progress so far:

2:00pm
Trimmed
Injected with apple juice and three little pigs cherry rub mixture
Rubbed with three little pigs cherry
Covered and put in fridge
Loaded Gridiron with Cookin Pellets Perfect Mix

2:10am
Dew on grill cold 33 degrees
Started to preheat unit

2:20am
Smoker at 190
Insert two butts and probed. Fat cap up.


3:50am
Smoker up to 225

4:30am
High temp alarm on maverick went off reading 235. Smoker said 230 or 225.  Can't remember tired.

7:00am
Butts sitting at 150, grill still at 225.


Observations so far:
Seems to be extremely low levels of smoke, I was expecting to see something billowing out of the stack or at least the smoker when I opened it.  I did test runs the BBQ Delight Hickory and that had some smoke.  Maybe it is the Pellets but everyone says great things about the Cookin Pellets.


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[TMB]

Highonsmoke will be here in a few I believe he had the same issue of little smoke.   

He knows that  smoker well so wait till he shows up for help

[teesquare]

Mike ( High On Smoke ) may be off-line...He is near the location where Hurricane Matthew made landfall - so high wind and rain may have taken out his power....

Remember Rule #1 - you will be fine. Temps are not critical, and there is a wide range for cooking pork butts. As for smoke...a lot of folks expect to see smoke pouring out of the stack - to "quantify and qualify" the amount and kind of smoke.

Keep in mind - the smoke that you DO NOT want is the thick, whitish smoke that initially appeals to folks new to smoking.

A thin blue wisp of smoke is all you need - or want. It is the "clean" smoke that will prevent you from serving product that tastes like it was basted with creosote and cigarette ash....

Have faith, patience and ...maybe a drink. It will all be o.k. And - give yourself a break here - this *IS* your first one in this cooker. IT and YOU will get even better with some aging and practice ( well...that's what I tell the Mrs. Tee..... )

[smokeasaurus]

Pork Butts are very forgiving and are a great cut of meat for trial runs on new smokers. Pellet Grills produce clean smoke like Tee pointed out. Many new pellet grills owners are not used to clean smoke. I for one, tended to over smoke and pellet smoking really enables the smoke to be another flavor profile instead of the only thing you taste.

You will be just fine 

[mbeutler1203]

Keep in mind - the smoke that you DO NOT want is the thick, whitish smoke that initially appeals to folks new to smoking.

Have faith, patience and ...maybe a drink. It will all be o.k. And - give yourself a break here - this *IS* your first one in this cooker. IT and YOU will get even better with some aging and practice ( well...that's what I tell the Mrs. Tee..... )

I am not worrying as much as making the observation. I literally see nothing, no blue, no white. I can definitely smell it just can't see it.

Update to the smoke:
8:15am
Wrapped second of smallest butt, was at 155-190. Put a 1/4 cup apple juice into foil and double wrapped.

9:00am
Largest butt now also wrapped, same as above.
This time the bone or something poked through the 1st foil layer and some apple juice dropped out.  The 2nd layer was not poked.  I kept it that way hopefully that is ok.







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[Smokin Don]

Looks like you got it under control MB!!! Should turn out good! Don

[teesquare]

If you can smell it - you will be able to see it *IF* you can have a dark background behind the pit - or have helpers hold up your grill cover behind it - ( and at a little distance so as not to burn the cover ) and view the exhaust from the stack that way. In well lit conditions, you may not see the smoke that is desirable. That is why you need a contrast -

But - as long as you smell it - you have smoke. Bear in mind, when you wrap, you get no additional smoke on the meat.

That is why I suggest not wrapping, and beginning to spritz apple juice. The juice loses some water via evaporation - becomes sticky and smoke will adhere to the surface better.

This is a similar principle when we are making bacon - we allow some air drying to occur after removing meat from a wet brine, in order for the surface to form a pellicle - which is that sticky layer - for one reason ( tho there may be others...)- to hold onto a bit more smoke.

And - you can always add some sauce to add flavor to your pork once pulled.

[mbeutler1203]

Tee square great comments.  I was actually today planning on shooting for a lighter smoke flavor as I have most people that are not big on smoke flavor.  I guess I could have done one wrapped and one open with spritzing. I do plan on saucing...one sweet, one hot and some unsauced as well.






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[Hub]

Mike ( High On Smoke ) may be off-line...He is near the location where Hurricane Matthew made landfall - so high wind and rain may have taken out his power....

Remember Rule #1 - you will be fine. Temps are not critical, and there is a wide range for cooking pork butts. As for smoke...a lot of folks expect to see smoke pouring out of the stack - to "quantify and qualify" the amount and kind of smoke.

Keep in mind - the smoke that you DO NOT want is the thick, whitish smoke that initially appeals to folks new to smoking.

A thin blue wisp of smoke is all you need - or want. It is the "clean" smoke that will prevent you from serving product that tastes like it was basted with creosote and cigarette ash....

Have faith, patience and ...maybe a drink. It will all be o.k. And - give yourself a break here - this *IS* your first one in this cooker. IT and YOU will get even better with some aging and practice ( well...that's what I tell the Mrs. Tee..... )

Exactamundo!  Tee speaks wisdom and truth. 

Hub

[teesquare]

Thang you...thang you very very mush ( channeling Elvis in his "fatter years".... )

[mbeutler1203]

Well it is all done and I must say tasted pretty good.

A few things I learned:

1) Need to clean up the butt more prior to smoking.
2) Work on bark. I either wrapped early, didn't have dry enough butts going into the summer, added too much liquid to foil or left too much air in foil. I wrapped around 150-155 and had what I thought was decent bark but maybe it wasn't enough who knows. When I unwrapped the bark was pretty much gone.

Compliments were all good. Made some homemade coleslaw using Big Bob Gibsons homemade white sauce, homemade baked beans with the pork served on Hawaiian roles.

Hopefully I continue to learn and keep improving. Thanks for everyone's help!







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[Pappymn]

Looks good from Minnesota. What do you mean by cleaning up the butt?

[mbeutler1203]

Looks good from Minnesota. What do you mean by cleaning up the butt?

I feel like I left on too much fat, silver skin etc...  before smoking. There was a lot to remove, scrape off, etc... during the pulling process.


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[Pappymn]

Silver skin for sure remove. That stuff will not render. I wouldn't worry too much about the other fat

[mbeutler1203]

Silver skin for sure remove. That stuff will not render. I wouldn't worry too much about the other fat

Ok. It'll be easier with a sharper knife. Didn't realize how poor my knives were until I was trimming the butts.


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