Thoughts on Foiling Butts

I say, "Do it Til You're Satisfied."

YouTube - B.T. Express - Do It 'Til You're Satisfied (Long Version)

Actually, it get's the meat through the stall faster. It's a must in competition.

I'm a fan of foiling the butts, It's the way I was taught, Moist and juicy, tender, I do believe in letting the butts rest after cooking.

YokeUp said:

hey, total rookie here and headed to my first KCBS in May, so this was helpful.. I've been taught that more than 4 hours will put a bitter taste into the bark, so in my practice sessions, I always foil and it comes out very tender... I am also planning on re-barking for 30 minutes before pulling to box... we'll see how it all turns out, but thanks for all the input.

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I do have to agre with Cook on this one.
4 hours in BAD SMOKE will sure make the meat taste bitter, but not good smoke. I'm no expert, but WAY too many people doing briskets and butts for 10-12+ hours with no foil and great results to believe this.

Plus, the bitter taste and tenderness (at least to me) don't necessarily have anything to do with one another.


You may have gotten some bad intel.

I foil butts to get the fat and juices to render out so that I can pour it back into the meat after pulling.

FWIW, I never foil them, except once they're done before tossing in the carlisle for a rest. Could your "burnt" bark be cased by the type of sugar in your rub? I like using turbinado, no issues with black, bitter bark. I believe it tolerates a higher temp than white or brown

Perhaps a dumb question, but are you simply foiling or are you placing the butts in an oven bag, and then foiling?

jas25120 said:

Perhaps a dumb question, but are you simply foiling or are you placing the butts in an oven bag, and then foiling?

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When I foil (50/50) I just put the butt in the foil with some AJ & seal it up the best I can. Cheers!!!

I think a lot of the results of no foil has as much to do with the type of smoker you're using, and frankly how well it's being used. Any smoker billowing white smoke would suck ala. grande. Lets assume sweet blue most of the time.

I know from ours, and some of this is personal taste, that in the Lang (reverse flow offset smoker) using hickory and/or oak (which even sweet blue puts a very strong flavor on the meat) we've found that on smoke for more than 5 hours only darkens the meat and it begins to taste over-smoked and a tendency to be bitter. This
would be on beef and pork. For ribs we foil at the 1.5 hour mark not because of darkness of the bark but because of that much hickory smoke, to me, just becomes consuming and you no longer taste the meat flavor (ala. it no longer enhances the meat flavor but becomes the dominant flavor).

Each smoker will vary, the variance can be quite great. So can the type of pellets you use in a pellet smoker, etc.

Some smokers, always sweet blue the whole way, and thinner smoke at that (thinner than you'd get on average with a stick burner [where the logs aren't pre-burned to coals]) can go much longer on straight smoke maintain that nice mahogany color and not get black and/or bitter.

However, I did read somewhere (a few years back) about the science of meat, and smoke, and how much it can "take in". After some time the smoke flavors only accumulate on the outside (per this stuff). I'm not a scientist, but the point I came away with is that after 4-6 hours there's no reason to keep the smoke going....

Groundhog66 said:

I am such a rookie, I have never injected anything I have smoked.

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me either..... oh wait, a ham one time. that was an experience. stuff shooting out all over the place!

on butts.... i don't trim, fat cap down. foil after i pull them off and put them in a cooler for a couple hours. i've always found the meat to be very juicy and full of flavor and have never gotten too much bark or bark that was too hard/unedible.

Q-Dat said:

I foil butts to get the fat and juices to render out so that I can pour it back into the meat after pulling.

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Bingo

Q-Dat said:

I foil butts to get the fat and juices to render out so that I can pour it back into the meat after pulling.

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during or after the cook?

I never foil while the meat is on the smoker and I spritz once every hour. At 190* I pull the butt and spritz one last time before foiling and then into a towel lined cooler. I still get good bark but it is not as crunchy.

The juice left in the foil is one of the main reasons I like to wrap before it goes to rest. I will mix the drippings with a small amount of my spritz and spray the meat as I pull it.

My butt is never dry. Mainly because the bayou floods everytime a cricket takes a leak.:laugh:

I'm pretty happy with my foil less results. I'm also happy not spending a ton of money on foil. I will note though that I cook my butts at 275, I decided that a longer cook time did nothing but dry them out.

Lake Dogs said:

Yep. That's why i foil. I know others dont, and that's certainly their choice, and they're happy with their results. I/we foil because:

1. Moisture retention. We compete and we cook for ourselves. For competitions especially it needs to be as moist as possible.

2. Bark (appearance as well as taste). Need it to be more reddish brown (described as a mahogany) than towards the black. Also the
blacker the bark the more bitter the taste.

3. Whole shoulder must be great; not just pieces. When we compete it's more likely to be MBN; judges will be right there in our campsite.
The shoulder must be perfect in every way, not just a few select pieces. Also, we can't separate the money muscle from it. None
of the hard bark / outside stuff is acceptable. None.

We get less loss due to burn, or over-smoke, or dryness, etc.

I'm not saying others dont get great results without having to foil. We dont.

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totally agree

Babin2k said:

I never foil while the meat is on the smoker and I spritz once every hour. At 190* I pull the butt and spritz one last time before foiling and then into a towel lined cooler. I still get good bark but it is not as crunchy.

The juice left in the foil is one of the main reasons I like to wrap before it goes to rest. I will mix the drippings with a small amount of my spritz and spray the meat as I pull it.

My butt is never dry. Mainly because the bayou floods everytime a cricket takes a leak.:laugh:

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I hear ya. I never had a dry butt either.

Also it according what you cooking with. If you cooking with all wood you going to get a good bark and the flavor will be there . I have been using alum pan best of both worl they have the juice plus a good color and bark on time and not as much waste.

NorthwestBBQ said:

Actually, it get's the meat through the stall faster. It's a must in competition.

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So what are those idiot judges looking for that makes foil a must in comp? Just like having to scrape chicken fat from the skin...or form a chick thigh into some abnormal shape to get good scores...how trains these lain brains?

Cook said:

So what are those idiot judges looking for that makes foil a must in comp? Just like having to scrape chicken fat from the skin...or form a chick thigh into some abnormal shape to get good scores...how trains these lain brains?

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Depends on sanctioning body.

Like in MBN, they come in your camp; on-site. We have to provide/supply a whole pork shoulder. They sample different pieces from different regions of the shoulder. No pre-pulling, pre-separation, etc. Black outside dont cut it. Hard crusty crust dont cut it. Slightly dry dont cut it. Sauced, generally dont cut it.

Chicken would be a KCBS thing. Almost all sanctioning bodies have rules and judges are instructed that if it's in the box it's to be sampled/eaten. Therefore rubbery skin must be tried/eaten. That's why if you're going to do skin on a chicken, you'd better scrape it. As to the abnormal shape; that's simply a beauty in the eye of the beholder thing, and what's appetizing to one person may not be appetizing to another... Damned people.

LOTS of variables contribute to the final product:

kind of smoker, water/sand pan or magic saucer in pan (if wsm), the actual meat itself, how full the smoker is, temp spikes, the rub, amount thereof, basting/spritzing/leavin' it the hell alone, flipping/rotation/leavin' it the hell alone, dry/drowned wood, age of wood, kind of wood, amount of wood, method of using the wood, placement of wood, charcoal used, appetite of cook, mood of cook, sobriety of cook, time meat rested, temp rested at, time cook rested......:-D Blah, blah, blah

With all that, it's hard to definitively say that foiling helps in EVERY situation, but it might work for YOU.

It definately makes the meat cook faster and more predictably, and obviously protects the bark from excessive smoke, so I'm not surprised it's used by competitors. It's also a way to add some a little more flavor, and yes, you can always open the foil to firm up the bark on the final product. Blah, blah, blah...sorry

Funny when you think about it, but it's probably the best route for the novice and pro competitor alike. However, I usually get just as good a product on my wsm by not foiling until resting. The wsm water pan makes for a very moist environment (think softer/less bark) and I cook around 250*...butts on the bottom (more forgiving) and brisket on the top grate.

Lake Dogs said:

Therefore rubbery skin must be tried/eaten. That's why if you're going to do skin on a chicken, you'd better scrape it.

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I never have been able to figure out what the problem is with getting bite-thru skin. I've never really had a problem with it, but then I don't comp. cook so I don't overly complicate things. Not knocking anything, please keep that in mind. I think watching what comp. cooks do is intriguing...just glad I don't have to worry about the same things...I just cook.