Pork Shoulder (Butt) Money Muscle

[All Weather Griller]

Whilst out in the States at the American Royal Steve Heyes and I were privileged to have been invited to a beer with our neighbours. Ryan from the Big T'z Q Cru team informed us about the new presentation method that was being used.

Anyway guys & gals. The new method is called the Money Muscle (Yes its a porn term, but the BBQ scene is cleaning that up). So the Muscle on the far end of the butt from the bone is classed as the muscle, this is cut into six pieces for judging with the bark and other lumps of muscle used to dress the box.

[thumbpop]http://www.memphisriversidebbq.com/pork.gif[/thumbpop]

This is a good image of the presentation box (Not one of ours).

[Neil]

Judging by the rule "you can’t smoke with an empty glass" it’s probably a good thing you didn’t take the picture . But some good advice

[joker smoker]

It would be nice to see photos of the turn in boxes from this years comp at Rother Valley. Has anybody got any?

[Spice]

Hopefully your Butcher doesn't trim too much of the Money muscle away. I have had some really good cuts and some really bad cuts. Another problem is that we take the MM to 185 to slice but the rest won't pull untill 195 to 200. There is a new KCBS ( Kansas City BBQ Society ) rule this year about " Parting out" the pork butts which makes it more difficult to prepair.

[musicmanryann]

The only thing I can see with the picture is that it looks as if you only got about half of the MM when it was cut. The muscle is actually tubular in shape and unless you pre-trim it away from the rest of the butt, half of it is covered by the rest of the butt. Most teams don't pre-trim it away, so when it comes time to remove it from the rest of the butt there are two approaches. One is to use an electric knife to carve it out using a big "U" motion. This will leave you with only the MM, but only about a 1/3 will have bark on it. The other way is just cut straight down the butt with a sharp slicing knife, two inches from the edge of the money muscle. This will contain more meat than than the money muscle, but 2/3 of it will have bark. We prefer the latter method. It is more simple and we like bark. Is this about as clear as mud?

Another forum has an in depth tutorial on cooking pork and focuses a lot of attention on the MM. Here is a link:

http://www.thepickledpig.com/forums/bbq-contests/1252-award-winning-competition-pork.html

Not sure what the rules are on this forum so if it is not appropriate to post links to other forums, I apologize.

I would say approximately 95% of what this tutorial does we do with our Pork.

As Spice stated, it can be difficult to find pork with a good MM, but it seems generally larger ones (9-10Lb) have bigger MM that present well. Here in Iowa I am fortunate enough to be able to pick through two or three cases of butts to find a couple to use in comps. For others it may be a lot more work. In cases in which you don't have a MM to present, read what the Pickled Pig has to say about the meat around the bone. We do that as well.

I hope all this helps!

~Ryan

[All Weather Griller]

Cheers Ryan,

I got the pic from a forum which seemed to have the best shot to illustrate what I was trying to say. Your explanation is much more detailed and just what we needed to get the debate on this going.

Can you tell us just how long this presentation method has been used by you guys.

Beerz

Adie

[musicmanryann]

I am sure there have been several teams doing it for years. It has become more mainstream the past couple of years. I will try to dig up one of our pics to show you later this evening when I am at home.

[Steve]

Thanks Ryan, the info you are providing is invaluable to us.

We really appreciate you taking the time to help us out like this.

BTW the blowtorch rocks too

[British BBQ Society]

Further to Ryans (Musicmanryan) question about posting links, the British BBQ Society and its members realise that we are in our infancy. The information on other forums is immense and would potentially take significant time to search, if in the signposting/aiding answering peoples questions, the posting of links to other forums will help, then by all means feel free.

We are in no way deluded or elitist and appreciate all advice, hints & tips

Regards


Toby.