First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

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First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby essarem » 04 May 2012, 17:07

I'm new to smoking and would appreciate some advice folks. I have a shoulder of pork that I want to eat on Sunday evening. I like the idea of getting it to the pulled pork stage.

My set up is an Outdoor Chef gas Ascona with a Weber rotisserie. I have the cast iron flavouring pan that goes in the small funnel that they tell me can be used for smoking. The shoulder weighs 3.5kg

I was thinking of preparing it with a Memphis rub and then cooking it long and slow. A few questions though:

-Is that the best way to do it?
-What temperature should I be using and for how long? I was thinking of about 180-200C for 5-6 hours.
-Is it best to remove the skin and leave a layer of fat or cook it just as it is.
-Will wood dust in the cast iron pan (soaked first of course) work for smoking at those temperatures or does it need to be higher?

Any suggestions gratefully received :)
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby philnewts » 04 May 2012, 18:36

Hi

Firstly you are right on with a dry rub, but remove the skin if you can and if has been boned you might want to retie the joint.

You want to cook between 225-250 F and should be right with 5/6 hours but it is best to use a meat thermometer rather than times, if you can. Pulled pork should reach around an internal temp 190F and to assist this consider wrapping once it reaches 165-170 F and has had a good smoking.

For the smoke, on a as grill, I would advise chips in a smoker box or wrapped in a foil pouch and put them onto the burners in an offset setup, or if you only have dust you could make up some foil pouches with a mix of wet and dry and add them directly to the grates during the cook, on the lit side.

Although the smoke generator you describe might be better but I am unfamiliar with your grill, but mixing wet and dry wood dust might help .

Good luck buddy, pics welcome of course!!! :D
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby keith157 » 04 May 2012, 19:10

The flavour pan is dubious at best for smoking although on a different thread there is a method of using a foil smoking tube/snake whatever you want to call it.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=2014&p=16618&hilit=ascona#p16618

For those not familier the Ascona is a gas fired kettle BBQ so it's darn difficult getting traditional smoker boxes to work.
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby BBQFanatic » 04 May 2012, 19:26

Its entirely possible to do, you need to put a heat deflector between the gas fire and pork as is spins on the rotiserrie, either a steel tray / tinfoil + bricks. Get some woodchips, soak them for an hour, and create a 3"x3" tinfoil parcel, put the handful of chips into the tinfoil parcel, seal it up and put some holes in the top of the parcel. Place the wood chip parcel so it can be heated by the gas and as a result, the chips should smoulder not burst into flames. Replace the parcel when they are no longer smoking and repeat the process, only do this for the first 2-3 hours. Good luck
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby essarem » 05 May 2012, 00:25

Thanks for all the advice folks - much appreciated. I'll let you know how I get on, will take some pics and try to work out how to post them :? :lol:
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby keith157 » 05 May 2012, 09:06

BBQFanatic, the Venturi system used by Outdoorchef acts as a baffle, the idea being the fats drip onto it, they vapourise and the resultant smoke rises to flavour the meat which stops flare-ups. Why they are selling a flavouring pan which won't genmerate enough heat to smoulder wood is beyond me. It's been discussed on the other thread about using sawdust instead.
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby essarem » 05 May 2012, 12:01

Well, this morning was experiment time ready for cooking tomorrow.

Keith is absolutely right - there is no way that the flavouring pan can be used for low and slow smoking despite the fact that the folks at OutdoorChef UK said:

"In answer to your question, yes you can use the cast iron flavouring pan for smoker chips. Soak them in water first, as you would in a smoker box and then just place the pan inside the funnel"

There just isn't enough heat with the Ascona design to cause even wood dust to smoulder let alone chips. The doughnut shaped tube of dust filled foil works a treat though so thanks for that Keith :D

I've taken pics to show the problem and the solution if anyone is interested. Tomorrow I'll take pics of the cooking.

I see that sometimes pics are embedded in the post and sometimes there are links to external sites. What do the moderators prefer?
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby eater of food » 05 May 2012, 12:17

[ThumbPop]PUT IMAGE URL HERE[/ThumbPop]

Will be a thumbnail with inbuilt hyperlink to the full-sized image.

Personally I upload using tinypic, but if you have flickr or similar that'd work too. Just need the image url and you're good to go.

Example:

Image
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby keith157 » 05 May 2012, 13:05

Ahh a picture of your holiday home Ed :D
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Re: First attempt at Shoulder of Pork

Postby essarem » 06 May 2012, 15:22

Sunday morning and off we go! ;)

This was the problem. With the flavouring pan placed on the bottom funnel the wood dust didn't smoke even on a high heat.

Image

This shows the two burners with the funnels removed:

Image


So, a 60cm piece of double thickness foil with a mixture of Hickory chips and dust:

Image

Formed into a doughnut shape:

Image

In place - need to be careful not to short the ignition mechanism by the way: :?

Image

Joint as bought - on offer in Morrisons at the moment for £2.22/kg: :D

Image


Rind off and Memphis rub on:

Image

Ready to go!

Image


Now for the 6-7 hour wait: ;)

Image


I'll let you know how it turns out.
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