Injected vs non-injected, backyard butt battle live.

So I've been wanting to improve my pork butts a and have been researching injected vs non-injected versions but there doesn't seem to be a clear consensus. I wanted to know the following?
Is injecting worth in on the average 8-10 pound butts I'm buying?
Is the flavor different, better, etc.
Is there a difference in smoking time with the additional moisture. The butt got about 10-12 ounces of injection.
Is there a measurable difference in tenderness, or even a noticeable difference.
Is injecting a complete waste of time?


So I'm doing my own little throwdown on the smokemaster.
2 8# butts toe to toe... or butt to butt, one injected and one not. To sweeten my test my neighbor, who's from Texas, loves bbq, and is regularly seen licking my windows when my pit is fired up brought me a butt to smoke.

He's had my cue plenty of times and loves it, so he'll also get an injected butt in a "your taste buds are blind" taste test.

I injected the butts last night while still in their packages and rubbed them up this morning.

The butts hit the pit at 0800, I'll update hourly as I push through the hunny do list.

Using apple oak and some hickory for my offset.

If this doesn't turn out to be an epic fail I'll let you know the exact concoction.

1 hour in and the texas college butt is at 117 degrees. The pits running 275 +/- 20.

I'll the temp probe into one of those cheesehead butts when the college butt gets wrapped, it's a bit smaller and firmer than the others.

Fwismoker said:

If I wasn't using a finishing sauce I'd be curious if an injection could really add some favor.

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Hopefully I can answer that question.

10:00 am and the small butt is in the fast lane. 150 degrees and cruising right along.

11:00 am and the small but is at 154 degrees and doing good.

12:00 pm and the small butt is at 160, be foiling that sweet butt soon.

1pm pm and all the butts are wrapped, they all hit 165 or better.

Fire Flinger said:

If you want to add salt to the interior of the meat would you ever consider brining with a relatively strong brine solution or do you think the meat is just too thick for that method to work?

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From my research there are theories that the salt is a carrier of the flavor, and then then the vinegar opens the pores on the meat so that it can absorb more flavor. So a injection with vinegar and salt seems to be what I see in injection recipes.

I have Marvin's book that he uses a ton of MSG (accent, etc) in his injection.

We used to use that in my culinary art classes in the 80's when doing production cooking, by the handful. I haven't used it in years do to health problems and issues people say it creates.

MSG, as I learned back in the day, works to open up the pores on your tongue so you supposedly taste more, at least that's what our instructor chef told us as he throws hand fulls of msg into a pile of steamed vegies.

Picture at 1pm foiling.

I always think that these butts are getting done way too fast, that I'm missing the 8+ hour "low and slow", but 4~5 hours is my normal foiling time frame.

2:15 pm. The small butt came off and is resting.

The bigger buts are in the 170's a moving along nicely.

3:30 pm buts at 190, they are both foiled in a separate pan with a little apple juice.

4:30 pm, one butt hit 200 and came off and is resting in the cooler. I didn't peek so I done know if it's the injected butt.

My neighbor picked up his college butt and I'm waiting for his report. He has twin teenagers who spend the summer in Texas and they have bbq tastebuds....so I have a mini panel of judges.

Injected butt finished first.

Non injected took another 45 minutes.

Here's the rub I used.

1 cup brown sugar
2 tablespoons chili powder
2 tablespoons dry mustard
2 tablespoons onion powder
2 tablespoons garlic powder
2 tablespoons kosher salt
2 tablespoons course ground pepper.

This is Myron Mixons's basic rub WITHOUT the cayenne. There is just enough kick without it. I also put a nice coating (not heavy) of very course ground pepper on the butts before the rub and slathered them with mustard before doing anything.

The injection the night before was...

1 cup apple juice
1 cup apple cider vinegar
1/2 brown sugar
1/4 cup salt
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoons worchestershire sauce.

My panel of judges.

My wife
My daughters male "friend" (I clean my glock and polish my badge when he's around)
3 proud Texan's living next door.

Texans.
9.5 to 8.5. injected wins
8.7 to 8.1 injected wins
9.8 to 9.0 injected wins

the dumb kid.....8.7 to 8.5 injected wins

wife.....injected wins, " I aint got time for your stupid point system".

myself. I actually liked the injected.

The injected cooked faster, but there are several factors that could skew that.
You could definitely taste the flavor from the injection.
The meat did seem to be moister but they were both tender. (I did have a water pan in the smoker)

Smoked with oak, apple, and a few hickory chunks.
275ish, fat cap down, foiled in pan at 165 with 1 cup apple juice.

With THIS rub and THIS injection, the injected butt won hands down.

Thanks for the comments and posts.