Pulled Pork--Smoker, Take 2

What a better way to keep the smoker going is with a BBQ staple.  Pulled pork.  I know what everyone is thinking, why oh why am I starting with the big stuff.  Well, I guess that it goes with the ole credo of "You cant win if you don't play."  So here we go.

I started off with a beautiful 4 1/2 pound pork butt.  For those of you who don't know, a pork butt has nothing to do with the hind end of the pig.  It is actually the shoulder.  A pork butt (Boston Butt) is the same as a pork shoulder.  The rear end is the ham.  Also, many of you will be saying, 4 1/2 lbs?  That's too small.  Well you are right.  We actually had a pork shoulder blade.  Which is technically only part of the shoulder. 

I started this flavor experience off 2 days early by brining the pork.  Did it actually make a difference?  Honestly who knows.  I understand what it is for (a juicer and more flavorful meat), but did it actually do anything.  All I can say is that next time I am not going to bother.  Then I will know for sure.  And of course I will let you all know.  But for now, I brined.  And here is the recipe.

• 3/4 cup pure maple syrup
• 1/2 cup kosher salt
• 2 tbsp Dijon mustard
• 1 tbsp coarsely ground black pepper
• 1 1/2 tsp hot pepper flakes
• 1 tsp dried rosemary

Take 8 cups of water and all the ingredients and bring to a boil.  After that let it cool (don't want to cook the meat) and then let the pork soak.  I left it in for almost 2 days.


After letting the brine do its business, I brought it out on Sunday to get it ready to smoke.  The first thing that I did was to dry off the pork and get the rub ready.  A good rub is everything.  If you do anything right when smoking meat, you want to get the rub right.  This is what will create that wonderful bark on the outside of the meat.  It gives it the flavor and is in my opinion the most important part of the process.

I put together a wonderful  concoction of spices and trust me it smelled great.

• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup paprika  (I use a sweet Hungarian style)
• 2 tbsp salt
• 2 tbsp black pepper
• 1 tbsp cayenne
• 4 tsp cumin
• 2 tsp dry mustard
• 2 tsp onion powder
• 2 tsp garlic powder
• 2 tsp thyme powder
• 2 tsp sage
• 2 tsp coriander

Mix this all up and you have yourself a great pork rub.  Now that the rub is ready, we need to get it on the pork.  To do this, I first covered the entire thing with French's yellow mustard.  This doesn't add any flavor, but it does give a good base for the rub to hold onto and keeps the meat moist.  Now, I know what some of you are saying.  How can it not add flavor.  Trust me it doesn't.  Its a nice trick.  Try it.  After that, I just sprinkled the rub liberally over the pork.  Make sure that it is covered and in all the nooks and cranny's. 

Now it went back into the fridge for about 6 hours.  Yup, we are still not ready to smoke.  No one ever said that smoking was quick.  Once you have gave the meat time to absorb the rub, we need to bring it back to room temperature before putting it in.

Now we must put our attention into the smoker.  For this meat, I used a combination of both hickory and apple.  Neither are too strong and them compliment each other very well.    I also used a combination of water and apple juice for the water tray.  We got the temperature up to 215 and in went the meat.

This is where once again my mistakes came.  I cooked for 2 hours at this temp and didn't touch it.  This was the smart part.  It allowed me to create a wonderful bark and set the tone of the dish.  After that, I sprayed it down with apple juice every 30 min.  This kept the meat super juicy, but it extended the cooking time by a huge amount.  What should have only taken about 8 hours took over 10.  And guess what, It still wasn't done. 

This is where I am going to end this post, but I will say one important thing.  It will still taste great, it will be moist, but don't mess with it.  Because if you do, it wont  be done all the way and will be tough.  Trust me on this.  I have made this mistake twice  now and will not make it again.