One word - WOW! The Cookshack has been one of the best purchases I have ever made.
This weekend I decided to break in my new SM025 (after seasoning of course) by smokin' a pork butt. Thanks in advance to everyone who has posted their experiences because the forums helped me a lot in preparation.
First of all, I purchased a pack of 2 IBP bone-in pork butts from Sam's Club - I smoked 1 and froze the other.
Being my first smoke, I decided to keep it simple (and I may continue to keep it simple because this thing was amazing):
The butt I smoked weighed 8 pounds/14 ounces.
2 hours prior to the smoke, I trimmed a few exposed vessels and the lymph node (that's the "gland" everyone talks about - it's actually a lymph node). I then rinsed the butt under cold water and patted it down a little with paper towels.
I applied a light coating of yellow mustard over the entire butt and thoroughly coated it with Cookshack Rib Rub. I wrapped it in heavy duty plastic wrap and put it in the fridge for 2 hours. After removing the plastic, I applied another light coat of rub just because I wanted to.
I used Cookshack's hickory chunks - 3 small pieces totaling 4 1/2 oz to be exact.
I placed the cold butt into the smoker, inserted the Maverick and Cookshack temp probes, and set the smoker to 225.
The butt temp stalled at around 183 on the Maverick (174 on the Cookshack) but I just let it go. Why? Because I read the forums first. 2 hours later, when the temp reached 189 on the Maverick (only 177 on CS probe)I bumped up the smoker temp to 240, only because we had to be somewhere soon. In another hour the Maverick read 194 and the CS read 187. Not sure why the temp discrepancy. I decided to remove the butt and check it for doneness and that sucker was done! It had a beautiful black bark, the bone wiggled easily, and I could sink a probe in the meat like butter. When I transferred the butt to aluminum foil, the thing about fell apart. We had to sneak a taste and it was perfect - the pork was juicy and had a nice smokey flavor.
I wrapped the butt in 2 layers of heavy duty foil, then in a large towel, and placed it in a cooler.
5 hours later, we were eating shredded pork sandwiches with Smokin' Okie's Baste and Serving Sauce (nice sauce, by the way - it's a keeper). Since it only fed 3 people, we froze the rest with the aforementioned sauce in our Foodsaver bags and now we have plenty for next week's games.
Oh, the pork was to die for. My wife, who isn't a fan of pulled pork, raved about it.
I'll post pics in subsequent posts.
Original Post
Nice Job!!