Feeding 250 in 2 weeks need help

Do the pork ahead of time, pull and freeze in aluminum half pans. I am doing five pork legs right now in the FE for a 200 person function next weekend. At the event we will reheat the pork and it will be great.

Your group of 60 did not eat much. Did a block party last night, 6 brisket flats, 12 racks of bbacks, 3 halves of salmon, two boxes of brats, and 13 lbs of chicken thighs. Probably 50-60 people.

Thanks duck. How long and at what temp will you reheat the pork? Thanks!!!

250-300 for a couple of hours. Sometimes we will put it on our Klose running at 225 for two or three hours. Toss with a little fresh sauce and it is as good as new. Could do the same thing with the FE.

Thanks duck. Any idea how many butts I should be doing? I've only done 4 butts and 2 brisket in my FE100 at one time. But someone said they can do 16 butts at a time, 4 per shelf. I wonder do I need to rotate each shelf every hour or 2 to cook evenly. Then the day of the event I can put 8 12# briskets in the FE. Thanks!!!

I am doing a pulled pork cook for sixty people.
Cooking (60) pounds of butts, (30) pounds of potato salad, and 16 quarts of slaw. Every body should get stuffed.

Just finished pulling the five legs. Probably 90 pounds to start, ended up with about 45 lbs. Have ten lbs frozen from last weekend so I am up to 55 lbs of finished product. Will see how many tickets they have sold, they were trying to sell 200. Might need another 20 lbs or so if they hit 200, maybe two more legs.

For a buffet style dinner, we use whole boneless shoulders that weigh about 10-12# each. We figure 1/2 pound/person precooked and 1 1/2 buns. We go with the smaller softey buns that are about 2 3/4". We have never ran out, but that depends on the appetite of guests. Our chuch had an older congregation, so we had plenty and sent leftovers home. If it's young men or a group that does physical labor [we feed a groups of costruction workers and farmers] I'd bump it up some, I prefer being long than short.

Thanks everyone for the info!!!!

Say duck! How early do you pull your pork from the freezer before it goes into the oven or smoker?

Good Q'n

Our event starts at 5:00pm this Saturday. I am taking out the frozen pork in the morning and putting it in an ice chest for transport. Will be at the Vineyard about 1:00pm. Plan on some wine tasting a little lunch etc. I had the organization rent a "hot box" to reheat the pork in. Will set the box 250-300 and get the pork in there about 2:00pm. When I take the pork out I am going to hit it with a little rub and warm apple juice before it goes to the serving line. At this function folks are going to add their own sauce from a selection of four different regional sauces. At our tailgaters we just toss some bbq sauce with the pork before it goes into the chaffers. Don't want to serve any dry pork to the crowd.

Thanks!!! Going to smoke up 12 butts this weekend and 8 briskets next Friday. Thanks for all your help!!!

We're located in Kansas and would like to start up a bbq/smoking catering business. Does anyone know where we could purchase a used or even new bbq smoker on wheels to pull.
Please email us directly at jkdanielson@nckcn.com
Thanks so much!

I am still relatively new at this, but we cooked 30 butts for an event last weekend (never mind if we sold all of it, that is another story best forgotten). I did it in three batches.

Batch 1 was 14 butts. I started putting 2 butts on at a time, two to a shelf until four were filled (over about a 30 minute period). Then I waited about one hour before adding a third butt to each shelf. Finally I added 2 more butts to the bottom 2 shelfs, figuring the smoke had to get through those to exit the smoker, rather than putting them on the top shelfs, where it might prevent the smoke from penetrating to the top shelf. Just a theory. My temp setting was smoke until all the butts were in, then I bumped it up to 225 for 8 hours. I started checking temps, pulling those that had reached 185 degrees, wrapped in foil and cooled down in the fridge for the next day's event. (Next time I will take Duck's advice and pull them fresh and freeze).

The second batch was 8 butts, 4 per shelf on the top as I had to cook a couple briskets and a pan of beans on the bottom shelf. Same timing as first batch.

Third batch was similar to second, except I was cooking two batches of beans on the bottom shelves.

All turned out wonderful. Only lesson is try to limit events where I can cook all I need in 24 hour period. Back to back overnighters can be a killer on body.