Holding Cooked Meats

Are you cooking the meat, cooling it, then reheating in the smoker? You mention "starting to get meat hot" is why I ask. If so all I can say is that I've had better luck reheating pulled meat than whole butts or shoulders. But if trying to reheat a whole butt, I would want it wrapped in foil, and maybe even wrapped in lettuce leaves and foil. That's kind of an old trick to help retain moisture in whole prime rib, so I would think it would work on pork butt as well.

I think ideally, it would be better to try and time your cooks so that meat was done closer to serving time if possible. Even though a cookshack produces moist meat, I wouldn't want to use it to hold meat for an extended period of time. I wouldn't want to use anything to hold meat for an extended period of time. If I understood your situation better, maybe I could be of more help. I'm sure there's a solution.

thats a toughie! i gave up on reheat. thats why i re-heat to order. comes out nice and moist. we portion the meat while its cold, and nuc to order.
only because its the best way in our situation. its nearly impossible to reheat using any other method and not loose the smoke flavor and the juice.

We only have a small window of time to sell our meat at the farmer's market, so don't have a problem with drying. Sometimes I freeze small bags of the pulled pork and sell them to people who want them that way because it's easy to reheat. I freeze them in 1 lb portions, easily fitting in a qt. freezer bag. One guy at work buys a 1 lb. bag, chips off what he wants for lunch and sticks the rest back in the freezer for the next time.
When we cook meat that I want to hold for the next week, we wrap in film, then foil. Jack reheats in the smoker. As long as the film is completely inside the foil, we haven't seen any melting of the plastic.
Try storing it wrapped and cold, then reheating in small amounts. When is your largest crunch of customers? Try putting your meat in several smaller pans. One ready to sell, one warming, one ready to put in. If you know when to expect the largest bunch of people, you could put in a larger size pan or 2 smaller pans to be ready for that group. Just always have a smaller pan as backup. And stir everytime you serve. Before you dip and after. It looks better to the customer if you stir out of sight.
Just hoping to help.
Peggy

Re-heating meat....use a Reynolds Cooking Bag with about 1/2 cup of H2O for brisket & ribs. Pulled pork loose has enough juice to keep it moist. Don't poke holes in the bag it will heat like a small steamer in the smoker, microwave, LP gas cooker, or elec. oven. You can get a whole cooked pulled shoulder in the bag, freeze it, re-heat at the event and serve. Prepare right out of the bag and then toss the bag...neat clean-up

Great idea, Tiki Chef! I like the easy cleanup. We've been using disposable pans, but the bag sounds maybe cheaper. Do you put the bag in a pan, or right on the rack?
Peggy

Instead of water use a small amount of apple juice

I use the Reynolds Cooking bag of meat sitting in a shallow stainless roasting pan. You can also put a little hot water in the bottom of the pan. Just think like a steam table system...cover the pan and bag with foil to keep the heat in. I like Raider's apple juice in the bag vs. the water.

The cooking bag will work right on the rack also it's just easy to handle when it's in a pan.

One day I might share with you how to cook and smoke using the bag....cuts pork shoulder cooking time by 40%. That sucker just sits there slow cooking in it's own juices...talk about a super basting juice. Pop the bag open and smoke for the last hour or more. Shoooh...I am sharing a cooking secret that you should try. No 10hr or 12hr pork for me.