Bull Pork Butt

[Armadillo59]

I am cooking 5 pork butts for a lacrosse team dinner for tomorrow at 5pm. I will have multiple thermometers to monitor temp and weight ranges from 8lbs to 115lbs per butt. What time should I start my cook to make sure all of them are ready by 5pm tomorrow night?

 

[Pacman]

For what it's worth, I recently did a 9.5 lb pork butt at 250 and it took me 15 hours to get to 203 with no wrapping. It seems to me that it normally takes less than that, but I didn't record the weights on some of my other similar cooks.

 

[Greg Jones]

The fact that you are cooking 5 butts at once is, for practical purposes, irrelevant. You should calculate the total time needed as the time to cook the heaviest butt while you are moving the lighter butts to rest in coolers when they are probe tender. Just this past weekend I smoked a 9.5# butt for ~ 1.6 hours per pound @ 225°. So with those calculations, you will need around 18.5 hours plus rest time to cook the largest butt. These butts will rest fine in coolers for hours, so better get started soon!

 

[Greg Jones]

For what it's worth, I recently did a 9.5 lb pork butt at 250 and it took me 15 hours to get to 203 with no wrapping. It seems to me that it normally takes less than that, but I didn't record the weights on some of my other similar cooks.

You cooked a little hotter than I did, but the math for a 9.5# butt was almost identical.

 

[Greg Jones]

You should calculate the total time needed as the time to cook the heaviest butt while you are moving the lighter butts to rest in coolers when they are probe tender.

Of course, it should be obvious that you could also stagger the start times, so that the heaviest butt goes in the smoker first and the lightest butt goes in last based on the math for cook times.

 

[C. Keeper]

Of course, it should be obvious that you could also stagger the start times, so that the heaviest butt goes in the smoker first and the lightest butt goes in last based on the math for cook times.

Would opening the cover 4 times slow cook?

 

[Greg Jones]

Would opening the cover 4 times slow cook?

Only when standing on one leg!

 

[ghuns]

I would have started them about the same time you started this thread.

When cooking for a hard deadline always get them done EARLY.

Wrap in foil, in a bath towel, place in a cooler. They will stay hot for hours. I've went up to 8 hours that way and they were still too hot to handle barehanded.

Also when cooking multiple butts, I've done 6 on my Bull, I shuffle them around at least once during the cook. Otherwise the ones nearest the stack get done an hour or so before the rest.

 

[orangebiker]

if you ended up waiting until this am to start, you can wrap those rascals, and bump up the heat once they've been on for a few hours. It'll speed things up a bit. The bark might not be quite as good, but if hungry LAX players are anything like hungry rugby players, they won't mind.

 

[Wslayer]

Would opening the cover 4 times slow cook?

That and adding cold meat back to the smoker.

 

[JGW]

Good grief. 115lb pork butt? Pigzilla has been killed!!

 

[C. Keeper]

Good grief. 115lb pork butt? Pigzilla has been killed!!

It will take forever to pull that much pork.

 

[ghuns]

It will take forever to pull that much pork.

I cooked 10, 10 pounders for a birthday party last summer. 6 on my 700, 4 on a borrowed 590.

Pulled all of it in about 5 minutes. Put them in a 5 gallon bucket, two at a time, and hit them for a few seconds with a claw in my Milwaukee drill...

Gotta be careful with that thing. Anything more than a few seconds and you turn them into mush.

 

[C. Keeper]

I cooked 10, 10 pounders for a birthday party last summer. 6 on my 700, 4 on a borrowed 590.

Pulled all of it in about 5 minutes. Put them in a 5 gallon bucket, two at a time, and hit them for a few seconds with a claw in my Milwaukee drill...

Gotta be careful with that thing. Anything more than a few seconds and you turn them into mush.

Yep, gotta be careful when pulling your meat