Whole Hog question

[Todd S]

Brethren,
I’m cooking my first hog this weekend on a La Caja China. The hog is about 100lb love weight. It’s already been dressed and hanging in the butchers cooler. I have to pick it up today and will cook on Monday. I will keep him on ice, until then. I plan on firing the cooker up at 8 with piggie being done by 12-1. My question is when should I pull from the ice? The night before or early Monday morning?

[NC Native]

Straight from the ice to the cooker, wipe the extra water off.

[bluegrass smoke]

Monday Morning

[DouG M]

Buy my smoke cook chart a dressed 85 # hog cooked at 225 f - 250 f will take 16 to 18 hours. Yes you can cook at 300 f - 350 f. You may want to recheck your cook time. JMO

[Leftwngr]

That's a great unintentional typo.

I can see this thread going off the rails really quick in discussing 100 lb love weights.

[SonnyE]

That's a great unintentional typo.

I can see this thread going off the rails really quick in discussing 100 lb love weights.

Nope. Haven't seen 100 pound 'Love Weights" for a while. :rolleyes:

I've been to some Whole Hog feasts, and Luau's, but no suggestions on going about it.
I just do parts.
Makes me drool thinking about the Pork! :icon_smile_tongue:

[PatAttack]

Protect the loins. Don't wanna dry 'em out.

Be prepared to flip the pig.

[Todd S]

That's a great unintentional typo.

I can see this thread going off the rails really quick in discussing 100 lb love weights.

Haha, great catch!

[Todd S]

The instruction from the cooker says to have the pig at room temp before putting on the cooker. My plan as of now is to pull it out of the ice at 3 or 4 AM. I just wanted to know if it would be OK to pull him out on Sunday night at 10 or 11. I was going to dry rub at that time.

[Shadowdog500]

Please post pics of your cook! I’ve been toying with getting one of those boxes to do luaus in the future.

Now I’m wondering how long it takes to get to room temp. I always use the “ 40°F to 140°F in 4 hours or less” rule and having the pig sit out for hours would seem to violate that rule. Chris

[NC Native]

The instruction from the cooker says to have the pig at room temp before putting on the cooker. My plan as of now is to pull it out of the ice at 3 or 4 AM. I just wanted to know if it would be OK to pull him out on Sunday night at 10 or 11. I was going to dry rub at that time.

In my eyes you gain nothing from this. Be safe, just cause it's on ice doesn't mean it's frozen. I'd go from ice to cooker and sleep better knowing I wasn't putting a crowd at risk.

Also, letting any meat come up to room temp is a bad idea. Maybe some beef, but I don't chance it.

[SirPorkaLot]

The instruction from the cooker says to have the pig at room temp before putting on the cooker.


No!
For God’s sake (and food safety), please don’t do this

Worse instructions ever!

This is no way for that pig to come to room temp internally before the outer layer is already past the point of being safe.

Take it directly out of ice and onto the smoker

[gtr]

I've never cooked one in a La Caja China, and I do know they are supposed to cook pigs more quickly than other methods, but - am I understanding that the plan is a 4 or 5 hour cook time?

As I said - I don't know about cook times on those boxes, but it seems unlikely to me that a whole pig would be done in that period of time unless it was a suckling pig in the 20# or so range and I'm not even sure about that.

As to getting a whole pig up to room temp - I'd ignore anything said by whoever said that. It makes no sense on a practical as well as food safety level. I'm no expert, but that goes against everything I've read/heard/learned about cooking any whole animal or large cut of meat.

There have been some La Caja China cook threads on here, which should yield some good info:

https://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=107401

http://bbq-brethren.com/forum/showthread.php?t=255458

Make sure you get some cheek meat, and post some pix! :hungry:

[Todd S]

Thanks for all of the feedback. I will take it straight from cooler to cooker. I will be taking pics. When I picked the piggie up they had a screw up. I ordered an 80 lb live weight pig. He dressed to 52 pounds. They accidentally gave it to another person. The butcher made good though. The person who got mine ordered a 90 pound pig dressed. The butcher gave that to me for no extra charge. He was also going to call the other person and refund some money. So I have a whole lot more pork. We only have 25 people coming over.

[gtr]

^^^if you don't already have a vacuum sealer, this'd be a great time to get one!

[food4thot]

Never tried one of those cookers. A friend use to host a pig roast once a summer. Fuel oil drum with a homemade chain-drive rotisserie. Put the pig (usually 110-120#) on around midnight to be ready for late afternoon dinner. Very great memories tending the fire and staying up most of the night.

If that cooker gets the pig done in 4 or 5 hours...?

Yes, take it off the ice Sunday night.

[SOSM]

Good Luck!



Subscribed

[mchar69]

Yes, take it off the ice Sunday night.
No no no no no Food, look at Amazing Ribs scientific studies
about the "Room Temperature" myth.
Taking your steaks out an hour before doesn't bring them NEARLY to room temp.
It would take 4 or 5 hours for a STEAK to get there.
A pig would take a day. And that is not food safe.

[mchar69]

This from Meathead at Amazing ribs, Meathead and those guys I trust.. they are awesome -



9) We will go straight from the fridge to the cooker. Many recipes tell you to leave the meat out for an hour to come to room temp. To warm a 4" thick log of meat to room temp up will take at least 10 hours, not a good idea from a safety standpoint. Read my article on warming meat to room temp by clicking here (https://amazingribs.com/technique-and-science/myths/let-meat-come-to-room-temp). Besides, smoke sticks better to cold meat (https://amazingribs.com/more-technique-and-science/grill-and-smoker-setup-and-firing/what-you-need-know-about-wood-smoke-and). So go straight from fridge to cooker.


This for serious reading. Awesome stuff.
https://amazingribs.com/tested-recipes/beef-and-bison-recipes/prime-rib-and-other-beef-roasts

[food4thot]

No no no no no Food, look at Amazing Ribs scientific studies
about the "Room Temperature" myth.
Taking your steaks out an hour before doesn't bring them NEARLY to room temp.
It would take 4 or 5 hours for a STEAK to get there.
A pig would take a day. And that is not food safe.It's a massive piece of intact (not ground/exposed to contamination) meat that will be in the cooker for hours. No way an extra 6-8 hours at room temp would be a problem, especially since the exterior will get the brunt of the heat first while the inside will still be cold.

Reason I put the night before out there is because I'm highly skeptical that rig can cook the thing in 5 hours, even if it was out at room temp for a day.

btw...I've left thick steaks and roasts out at room temp for 4-6 hours. Never had an issue. I think people worry too much following what they read. Some freak the hell out when I tell them I drink raw milk and love steak tartare and carpaccio.

[Capt]

These boxes do cook pretty dang fast. However I would personally not bring the swine to room temp. its really not necessary. I do however, reduce the amount of ice on my ice chest. you don't want it too terribly cold but you want it to hold around 40-50 just before putting it on. If you have a good thermometer with probes you will want to use it for this. You can't see the pig on these boxes and its much more efficient to not open if not necessary.

score the fat and at the end I like to bring up the heat or get a torch and make sure I get some good cracklin!

Have fun and share lots of pics!

also I would give myself an hour or two leeway on your cooking time and just try and maintain the coals you will need about 40lbs of charcoal.

[Todd S]

The pig roast was fantastic. It took way longer than it should have. We pulled the pig out of ice and injected with mojo sauce.I put the pig on at 7:50 AM. Charcoal was ashed over at 8:30, which is when time is supposed to start. Every hour we added 10lbs of charcoal. Every other hour we removed ash buildup. We flipped the pig from its back down to up at 3:00PM. It should have been ready to flip by 12:30. The ham internal temp was 175. When we flipped it over, we scored the skin. It looked a little pink to me. I checked with a hand thermometer and it showed temp at 158, near the skin. Uh oh. Normally, the skin ably takes 1/2 hour to crisp. This took 2.25 hours. We finally pulled the pig out to rest for 30-45 minutes. That lasted for 20 minutes because I thought a riot was going to break out. My buddy rick and I started pulling from one half of the pig and let people have at the other half if they wanted. The skin was the best part of the whole thing! It was an amazing day with good friends!

I had some friends that have cooked with this box before try to help troubleshoot the cook time. Ash acts as an insulator. I will remove the ash each time I add more charcoal. They said every time the lid is cracked open, it will add an extra half hour to cook time. That was not a problem, because I didn’t open the lid until we flipped the pig. One last suggestion was that the lid was not making a good seal and heat was escaping. I did have my probes for the thermoworks running under the lid half way down the lid. Obviously there was a slight gap there. I wonder if that could have been a source of heat loss.

[Swine Spectator]

Protect the loins. Don't wanna dry 'em out.

http://www.bbq-brethren.com/forum/picture.php?albumid=847&pictureid=12645

[creek bottom]

Looks FANTASTIC!!! :thumb: Congratulations on a great cook!!! :clap2:

[m-fine]

The problem with cook time was not with how you operated the cooker, ash, temp leaks or anything like that. The problem was your initial estimate was nowhere close to realistic.

[BuffettFan]

Looks Fantastic!

[ArnieTex]

Really nice job, whole hogs are real crowd pleasers and fun to cook.

[frognot]

Looks like a successful cook there!

Only thing I know about cooking times is add some extra because it's done when it's done.