Pork butt question

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medeloach

Knows what a fatty is.
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I'm thinking about doing pulled pork for New Years Eve and am wondering if any of y'all ever smoke 'em in roasting pans. I've always put them right on the grill grate, but I gotta say - it'd be nice to not worry about cleaning that grate afterward (yes, I'm lazy). Would that ruin it - since it'd be swimming in the drippings?
 
If you do decide to pan it - you'll be surprised how much juice/rendered fat will collect in the pan.
 
I use a roasting rack on the grate makes it easy to move around. You clean your grates your joking right??
DSCF0029.jpg
 
I pretty much pan cook my butts all the time right in a pan, no rack. Here is a thread I did today to show what they look like including the juices that collect. Those juices are might tasty :-D. I cook them fat side down, but I trim almost all of the fat cap off. Definitely make cooking less messy. I buy the pans at SAMs and they are cheap.

http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=150301
 
I do it when I am not absolutely interested in my best product. Comes out great, but you miss out on about 20-30% of the bark. For family and friends, nobody will care and you have absolutely zero mess in the cooker. But for comp or really showing off, it's not the best way to go... I'd say the roasting rack idea mentioned above could be the best of both worlds.
 
Ive seen many people cook butts in foil pans and ive done it before myself. Like stated in the above post you just wont get all of the nice chrispy bark when using a pan.
 
Myron's methods always include cooking in foil pans, which adds quite a bit of time in my offset. Last butt I did that way took almost 15 hours and turned out fantastic but I was a zombie for three days from lack of sleep. I have mainly switched to the WSM for butts using the IQUE 110 and get almost as good results with much less stress. If I really want to show off, I go back to the offset, though.
 
I panned the butts I cooked last week and agree with what others say. Still tastes great but you do lose a little bit of bark from it sitting in all those juices.
 
I saw a photo yesterday where a guy was using a foil pan, but had a rack inside of it.
Win-win.

I'll see if I can find the photo.
 
Ok here you go. Check post #12 on THIS PAGE.

If that rack is too close to the bottom, you could half two onions and use the half spheres as "feet" to set the rack on.

BBQ Bob...."At your service". :bow:
 
Ok...I'm not done yet. haha
If you scroll down to post #14, that guy is using a pan and rack that looks identical to the one that's in my toaster oven. Not sure it's deep enough to contain the juice from a butt, but it's a start.
 
4th post in a row.....
Check THIS OUT.
Seemed like good timing to me. haha

And "no"....I'm not going for "post padder" of the month either. :)
 
Ever since I saw this post from Phrasty, I've been doing mine in a pan. I start it on the grate for a few hours first. Then no rack, fat side down in the pan. I don't feel like I'm missing out on all that much bark and I love having the extra juice in the end.
 
Wow - thanks!

Thanks for all the advice, brethren! Love love love this site! I actually have an old toaster oven and think I'll use the grate from it along with a foil pan. I'm also doing a couple slabs of ribs - all on my WSM...so now I've gotta figure out what to use to catch all the drippings from the ribs. I always foil the water pan and leave it empty, so I think I'll look for a round aluminum pan that is roughly the same size as the water pan.

Thanks again for everyone's help. I'll be sure to post pron when I'm done...
 
I like the pan for the drippings also. I also don't have to clean the water pan

Sent from my Galaxy Nexus using Tapatalk 2
 
I prefer the mid-deep aluminum pans. Cooking with fat-cap down has helped reduce the loss of bark.
 
Lake Dogs said:
Cooking with fat-cap down has helped reduce the loss of bark.
Click to expand...
THat's a very good point. I've always done 'cap up', thinking that it's helping to 'juice' the meat as the fat melts off. But I like your way of thinking.
Maybe next time, I'll do the first half with the cap up, then for the remainder, flip it over and do cap side down.
 
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