Category: Barbecue

All I wanted out of Sunday was baby back ribs and a nap. That’s not asking for much, is it? I had a relatively uneventful day in front of me, and I sure wanted to keep it that way. I didn’t want to do a whole lot of prep work and I really didn’t even want to mess around with much actual cooking, but I did have a serious hankering for some ribs.

So to that end, I did almost nothing to prepare the ribs for the Big Green Egg – just removed the membrane on the bone side of the ribs and rubbed in a generous coating of Dizzy Pig’s Dizzy Dust into both sides of them about an hour before they went on the smoker.

I set up my Big Green Egg for an indirect cook at 225 to 250°F. I filled the firebox with lump charcoal and used an inverted plate setter to diffuse the heat and a drip pan with a little water in it to catch the fat.

I lit the charcoal just in the center, and once the temperature hit 250°F in the dome,  I added a couple of chunks of smoking wood (guava, this time) and arranged the ribs bone side down on the grate.

Then I closed the lid, walked away, and settled in for a nap – it was lovely. When I woke up 45 minutes later,  I stuck my head out and checked to make sure the dome temp was still at 250°F. Yep, perfect. I went back inside and proceeded to ignore the ribs for another 2 hours – I read the paper, had another cup of coffee, hung some curtain rods for my dear wife… typical Sunday afternoon.

When the ribs had been on for 3 hours total, I took a peek at them – looking good. I flipped them meat side down. I let them cook for another hour, and flipped them back meat side up.

After the ribs had been on 4 1/2 hours total,  I started checking for doneness. Ribs are generally done when a full slab will almost fold in half and start to crack when you pick up one end with a pair of tongs. These weren’t quite there yet.

I gave them another 30 minutes and checked again. The meat had started to pull back from the end of the bones and a gentle tug on a couple of adjacent bones showed that they would come apart easily.

I brushed them with a thick coat of  Sticky Pig Barbecue Sauce and let them cook for another 15 minutes. I sauced them lightly again, cooked them for another 15 minutes, then removed them from the smoker and let them sit 10 minutes before serving.

To be honest, these are not the best ribs I’ve ever made. But they were tasty, the nap was great, and it was nice, relaxed day. It’s hard to beat that combination.

I volunteered (at least that’s what they told me I did) to do pulled pork for a crowd of 120 at a graduation party.  As the date approached, I had the following thoughts:

• How much pig? Rub? Sauce?
• How long will it take to cook?
• How am I going to store and serve it?
• Are you nuts?!!!

How Much Pig & Fixin’s?

Many thanks to Celtic Wolf and the rest of the gang at the Big Green Egg Forum for helping  me figure out the quantities.

The first thing I had to figure out was how many pulled pork sandwiches we’d be serving. The host estimated 120 people (50/50 men and women), and she wanted to serve smaller slider-style buns. It’s an afternoon event, there’s plenty of other food, and this isn’t going to be anybody’s main meal of the day.

I figured we’d need 180 sandwiches, as about half the folks will probably take 2. At 3 ounces of meat per sandwich, that meant 33.75 pounds of finished product. Since you lose about 40% of the product in cooking, that meant I needed to start with roughly 58 pounds of raw pork butt. At about 8 pounds a piece, that meant 7 butts, but I did 8 just in case.

For rub, I figured 2 ounces of rub per butt, so I just went ahead and ordered a 2 pound bag of Dizzy Pig Dizzy Dust. We go though a ton of anyway, so I might as well get the bulk price.

For sauce, I gave Sticky Pig a try. At 1-2 tablespoons per sandwich, I ordered 2 quarts of their regular, 1 pint of mustard, and 1 pint of jalapeño. I also made up 1 quart of finishing sauce to use while pulling the pig.

The Cook

The conventional way to do pulled pork is low ‘n’ slow – 250°F for 16-20 hours until the meat hits 210°F internal and starts to fall apart. This is how I’ve usually done my butts and have gotten great results. However, due to scheduling and logistics, I knew in advance that I wasn’t going to have time to do the butts this way.

I experimented in reducing cooking times by cutting the butts in half. That worked well, but 2 halves take up more room than 1 butt. With 4 butts at a time going on the Big Green Egg, I just didn’t have the room.

Sources on the BGE Forum (who shall remain anonymous) suggested cooking the butts at much higher temp and then finishing them in foil – basically roasting and then braising to shorten the total cooking time. Based on their suggestions, I came up with a method that not only cut my cooking times by two-thirds, but also gave me more control over when things had to be done.

The BGE will hold 4 butts at a time, so I cooked 2 batches. Here’s one batch all seasoned up with rub.

I set up for a 5 hour indirect cook at 350°F. This meant filling the firebox with lump and using a plate setter and drip pan to diffuse the heat. When the cooker was up to temp, I added some chucks of pecan wood for smoke.

I put the 4 butts on, using an extended grid to give me some room and made sure to leave some space between them on the grate so they didn’t act like one big piece of meat.

I cooked them for about 4 hours at 350°F, until the butts had developed a nice dark bark on the outside and hit 160°F on the inside.

I removed the butts from the BGE and loaded them all up into a large roasting pan. I added 2 cups of apple juice, and sealed the pan with a double layer of heavy-duty aluminum foil.

The pan full of butts went into the oven set at 250°F. I baked them for a little over 2 hours, until their internal temperature hit 210°F. I removed the pan from the oven and let them cool for another hour.

After they had cooled a bit, my dear wife helped me pull the pork using a pair of bear paws to remove all the remaining inedible bits and separate the meat into tasty morsels. I added a little finishing sauce mixed with pan drippings as we were working with the meat to help keep it moist.

We portioned the pulled pork off into 4 large zip-top bags and put them in the freezer. The morning of the big event, we loaded 3 of the 4 bags into a portable roaster set to 250°F and let it thaw and come to serving temp.

The Verdict

The party went off without a hitch and the pulled pork was a big hit. It was fun (and a little embarrassing) to have folks hunt me down to tell me how good it was. Obviously cooking the butts hot and fast and then braising them in the oven didn’t do much (if anything) to harm the taste.

We went through about two-thirds of the pulled pork. I think that was mostly due to this being an afternoon event, so most folks had already eaten lunch. The remainder went into our host’s freezer so she won’t have to worry about cooking for a while. If I had to do it again (and it looks like I will in 3 years when the younger brother graduates), I’d do the same amount just because it’s better to have too much than too little and you can always find a home for the leftovers.

The Sticky Pig sauces were VERY tasty – they used 1 quart of the regular,  almost a 1 pint of jalapeño, and just about 1/4 of the mustard. I’ll be ordering more of this sauce soon.

Lessons Learned

Plan on feeding the crew – there were a dozen of us there early to set up the food and tent. Of course everybody had to sample the pork and have a sandwich or 2 before the festivities started.

Not everybody takes a bun –

Smaller is better – I would go with 2 roasters for serving next time as it’s hard to keep the meat evenly hot in one fully-loaded one. I did a lot of stirring to keep things from burning or drying out.  Next time I’ll split the load and start one about 2 hours before the other so I don’t have so much meat sitting out for so long.

Pack extra finishing sauce – some of the meat started to dry out and I moistened it with a little diluted barbecue sauce. I’d bring more finishing sauce next time to do that job.

Spaghetti tongs – these were the best tools for letting guests serve themselves.

Was I Nuts?

Yes and no – it was a bit of work, but the payoff of seeing happy people digging into piles of pig was well worth it.

That being said, this is NOT the start of my catering career. I admire the pitmasters who do this for 500 people on a weekend, but I just couldn’t do that. It’d be like the days when I worked in photography and got so sick and tired of it that I didn’t do any personal work anymore. It’s a great hobby, but I sure don’t ever want it to become a job.

The car is packed – I’ve got just shy of 40 pounds of pulled pork in the cooler, 3 quarts of sauce, 2 roasters, and we’re headed off for the graduation party that I got talked into catering. Wish me luck. Will post the full cook when I get back.

I have a big cook coming up – 8 butts worth of pulled pork for a crowd of 120. I plan on doing them 4 at a time on my Big Green Egg. In preparation, I’ve been playing with ways at cutting down my cooking time without affecting the quality of the end product.

A typical boneless pork shoulder roast (Boston butt) runs 8-10 pounds and takes about 2 hours per pound to cook at 225°F. So I’m looking at 2 x 16-20 hour cooks. For this cook I wanted to try cutting the butt in half. This increases my surface area, meaning more bark (the tasty dark outside, a good thing), greater chance of drying out (a bad thing), and only an 8 hour cook (a very good thing).

The Cook

The night before, I cut the butt in half and dusted it heavily with my basic pig rub. I wrapped in in plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge overnight.

The next morning I set up the BGE  for an indirect cook of at least 10 hours at 225°F. This meant filling the firebox with lump and using a platesetter and drip pan to diffuse the heat. When the cooker was up to temp I added some chucks of guava wood for smoke.

I put the 2 butt halves (cheeks?) on, making sure to leave some space between them on the grate so they didn’t act like one big piece of meat.

6 hours into the cook I started checking for doneness. Pork butts are done when the collagen and connective tissue has melted into tasty gelatin and the meat literally starts to fall apart. I let these get to 190°F internal in the bigger half, then wrapped them together in a double layer of heavy duty aluminum foil and put them back on the cooker for another hour or so until they reached 210°F internal.

I took them off the cooker and let them rest in the foil for an hour. When they had cooled a little,  I pulled the meat apart using a couple of  bear paws to separate the fibers. The idea is to remove all the remaining inedible bits, break the meat down into bite-sized pieces, and ensure an even distribution of the chewy bark. I added a little Lexington finishing sauce as I was working with the meat to help keep it moist.

The Verdict

The end result was very tasty, and (aside from more chewy brown bits of bark) not much different from other batches of pulled pork that I’ve made in the past with whole butts. I got both the shorter cooking time and more bark, so win-win ;).

The only downside was that 2 halves took up more room on the grate than 1 whole butt would. That may end up being a problem when it comes to trying to stuff 4 butts into the Egg. But even if that’s the case, this was still a great way to put pulled pork on the dinner table without having to do an all-night cook.

These “ribs” are really cut from a pork shoulder roast (a.k.a. Boston butt). There’s a lot of meat on them along with enough fat to keep them tender when you cook them low and slow. I like to cut them into 2-3  inch chunks and serve them as appetizers.

3-5 pounds of country-style ribs, boneless if possible
2-3 tablespoons barbecue rub (I used Dizzy Pig’s Dizzy Dust)
Barbecue sauce (I used Carnivore Robust)

Trim the ribs to size and remove any excess fat or gristle. Coat generously with  rub, working it into all sides of the meat.

Set your grill up for an indirect cook that will burn for at least 5 hours at 250°F. Use a drip pan under the ribs to catch the fat. I added some hickory for smoke.

Once the grill is up to temperature,  put the ribs on the grill and close the lid. Give the ribs a flip after they have been on the grill for 1 hour. At 2 hours, give the ribs a flip again and start checking internal temperature. Continue cooking until they reach 160°F internal (about 2-3 hours, depending on thickness). Now it’s time to sauce.

Flip the ribs and baste them with barbecue sauce. Cook for 20 minutes, flip and baste. Cook for another 20 minutes, flip and baste a final time. Check the internal temperature – it should be right around 180°F. If not, flip them again and cook until they reach 180°F.

Serve the ribs as finger food with a couple of dipping sauces.