Saturday Night Special

A pair of four pound butts injected with Smokin Okie’s basting sauce, rubbed down with Worcestershire sauce, and then followed up with a liberal coating of  Old No. 2 - Brisket Blend Texas BBQ Rub - http://www.texasbbqrub.com/no2.htm. I like to use smaller butts, it decreases the cooking time and increases the surface area to create bark on the butts.
 

 
Smokin Okie's Pulled Pork Baste & Serving Sauce (Modified}
 
2 cups apple juice
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
1 cup cider vinegar
1 tablespoon dry mustard
2 tablespoon brown sugar
2 bay leaf
4 cloves of garlic
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon cayenne
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
 
Heat all of the ingredients in a non reactive pan (the acid in the vinegar will react with some pans be careful) Bring it to a boil, reduce and simmer for 15 min.
 
Into the smoker at 225º and wired with digital thermometers to monitor the meats internal temperatures. After reaching my desired 195º - 200º I will double check with a Thermapen - http://www.thermoworks.com/products/thermapen/tpen_home.html - before wrapping in foil and newspapers then putting into a cooler for a couple of hours.
 

 
Close the door and do not open it until done, be patient as it will take 8 – 10 hours.
 

 
In the meantime I put the sides together. Usually I will do my own beans but did not feel like it so I opened three cans of Bush’s Grilling Beans - http://www.bushbeans.com/products/grillinbeans/ - and added bacon. Next was the Cole Slaw and Pasta Salad.
 

 

 
For the Cole Slaw I used one of Danny Gaulden’s recipes.
 
It is an unusual, but very good, recipe - http://www.dannysbbq.com/recipes.asp. Naturally I’ve modified it to suit our taste, as I’m sure you will also as time goes bye.
 
Danny Gaulden’s Old South Slaw Dressing
 
1 tablespoons salad oil
6 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
3 tablespoons sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon crushed garlic
 
Greek Pasta Salad
 
Boil two cups mixed Rotini pasta, rinse with cold water, and bring to room temperature.
Squeeze one fresh lemon, mix thoroughly, refrigerate for one hour.
Add chopped celery, rough chopped red onion, sliced green olives, chopped green pepper, finely chopped jalapeno pepper, ground black pepper, and basil to your liking. I wanted to add sliced black olives as well but did not have any.
Add a little more lemon juice and 1/2 cup of Greek dressing, mix thoroughly, cover and refrigerate for a couple of hours. Add feta cheese when serving.
 
Ten hours later, time to wrap and put into the cooler.
 

 
Two hours after that we pulled the butts and turned the gang loose. I add more of the rub and basting sauce while pulling.
 
 

 

 
And of course dessert was my wife’s Banana Pudding
 

Another winner John!Your meals are incredibly eye appealing.

That's some good lookin' BBQ John.

What kind of wood are you using?

John, that looks fabulous!  You make it look so easy!

Wow, those colors are beautiful! Your salads are always so good looking!

That all looks, fearsome good!

One of your most fabulous offerings yet!  I'm sure everything was delicious!

Wonderful job.  It all looks great and no doubt tastes just as good or better.  Thanks for sharing with us.

He's at it again!  Great pictures.  I like the looks of that banana pudding!  Nice!

We have a winner. Ten out of Ten... Two sauce covered thumbs up...

mark

Great pics!

The meal you put together looks terrific too!

What kind of wood did you use?

I like to smoke too and I made a couple of pastrami's this past Sunday. I smoked a turkey for Thanksgiving and a ham for Christmas. It's always a toss-up between smoking and deep frying the turkey for me.

You do good work.

Thanks all. My favorites are a combination of hickory and apple wood.

Excellent.  Please tell me the affect of cooling the butts?  Do you reheat later?

susanll


Excellent.  Please tell me the affect of cooling the butts?  Do you reheat later?

He's not actually cooling the butts...he's simply letting them rest.  He put them in a cooler, but with no ice.  The cooler simply acts as insulation (as well as the towel he wrapped them in) to keep them from cooling too much.  This is a good method if you need to hold the butts for a while before service.

If you're eating right away, there's no need to rest the butts.

susanll


Excellent.  Please tell me the affect of cooling the butts?  Do you reheat later?

 
Over the years I've found that letting the butts rest in a cooler for at least an hour allows the juices to redistribute nicely. Other than that, as JayL pointed out, the only other benefit is to hold until ready to serve.  Wrapped in heavy duty foil and newspapers or a towel they will stay hot for a couple of hours.


 

not being a pork eater ( except for bacon ) I shouldn't comment butt;
I would never eat anything called butt
if I did but wouldn't
it would have to be coated lierally with old No. 7 not No.2
I would have to be coated inside with old No. 7.
keep it up John.

John A:

That looks like a Smokin' Tex unit - is that correct?  If so, great piece of hardware!  I've had mine for 5 years now and use the thing to death!  What I was told regarding wrapping the meats after they come out of the smoker (I wrap in a couple sheets of foil first, then a bath towel, then into the cooler for 2 -3 hours) is that this process helps melt the collagen between the muscle fibers, releasing more moisture into the meat, while increasing it's "pullability" (just made that word up!)...

One of the best things I ever made in my smoker was a boneless turkey breast, pounded flat into a rectangle, then covered with oyster stuffing.  We rolled it up, covered it with the turkey skin and tied that together.  Smoked over apple and cherry, cut into pinwheel slices - was fantastic!  I also cure my own canadian bacon (boneless pork loin, Tenderquick and Turbinado sugar) and smoke that over hickory in the 'Tex' - great stuff for late night BLTs...

mr_melvis

Yes sir, it's a Smokin Tex. I've had it for 6-7 years and have used it a lot. I'ts great for butts and some beef but not for poultry with skin on, ribs, or steak. I have not done bacon for a while now - Have you tried Hi Mountain Seasonings Buckboard Bacon mix?

For poultry, anything with the skin we just put under the broiler for a few sec after smoking, to crisp it up, but you are right - just straight slow cook smoking in one leaves the skin rubbery.  As far as ribs are concerned, it took about 10 trys before I got them to cook the way I wanted them to, but we get great ribs out of it now every time (currently have a cryo-vac of two full racks in the freezer, waiting for "duty" in 2 weeks).  For brisket or pork shoulder, nothing but rave reviews every time.  I have a deli slicer that I purchased at an auction - we smoke top rounds and rump roasts over hickory and cherry, and slice and vacuum seal them into 1lb packages for lunch meat, thats good stuff...

We smoke steaks and hamburgers in ours - just start the unit at lowest temp with wood in the box, when it starts to smoke - turn it off and put your hamburgers or steaks in the unit, close the door and let it sit for 15 -20 min (could use the cold smoker tray if you wanted, but we never have).  Then take em out and grill em on the grill - tastes great! 

I've seen that seasoning mix mentioned many times, but have never used it.  I found an organic pork producer about 20 miles form the house, and he is going to sell me pork bellies at $2.00lb.  I have not done standard bacon yet, so this will be a cool experiment.

Last thing, check this out, we made it in the smoker last weekend - this was TASTY:
http://www.bbqaddicts.com/blog/recipes/bacon-explosion/

Have fun!

mr_melvis