Pork Pulled Pork Butt: To wrap, or not to wrap. That is the question!

Parrothead1809

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I’ve never done a pork butt on the Traeger. I’ve watched a few YouTubes and they vary by technique. Some comments even say it’s unnecessary to wrap since the pork butt is so juicy. I’m leaning towards not wrapping as Malcom did on his Traeger:

So, what’s your favorite technique?
-PH
 
Many folks recommend smoking the meat fat side down to protect the pork from direct heat. I guess arguments can be made for doing fat side on top to baste the meat.

Considering you have a set dinnertime, I would suggest smoking the butt at 225 F (actual cook temperature, not controller temperature) until the internal temperature reaches the stall somewhere between 160-170F. Then remove the butt from the smoker and wrap it in foil or butcher wrap along with some apple cider vinegar, apple juice, water or combination. Then place it back on the smoker or even in the kitchen oven set to a cook temp of 275F. The butt will be fall apart tender somewhere around 203F. Since you have a bone in piece of meat, if the butt is cooked to the proper internal temperature, you should be able to pull the bone right out of the meat.

There are those who never wrap a pork butt. However, since you only have 10 hours of cook time available plus the rest period, trying to cook the butt without wrapping is risky. You might have to pull it off before the fat and connective tissue is completely rendered. Some folks who are cooking to feed a crowd will cook the pork a day or more ahead of time so they do not have to worry about cook time.
 
Since pork butts are cooked to high internal temperature to render the fat and connective tissue, the meat freezes well and reheats well. I cook an entire butt, shred the meat and divide it up into portions sufficient for the two of us. I find that pint size freezer bags or vacuum seal bags are ideal for this.

I have a sous vide circulator and drop the bags into it for reheating. It is not even necessary to thaw out the meat first. If you do not have sous vide, you might want to thaw the meat in the refrigerator first and then reheat it in a pot of water somewhere below boiling. You can also dump the meat out from the bag into a sauce pan and reheat it that way. Either way, it should be just as tasty as it was when first cooked.

You can certainly cook two smaller pieces of pork, but that just ends up being more work overall. So ultimately, it is your option.
I’ve been freezing leftovers in vacuum seals bags for many years. Until a couple years ago I didn’t have a Sous vide circulator, but most of the time I just use a pot for something small. I always put frozen bags directly into a pot of boiling water. Periodically I pull the bag up and pinch it together until it’s soft all the way through. Taste as good as the day I cooked it.
I also do the same for rib’s, steaks, hamburgers, chicken and about any other meat I cook, it taste like it was freshly cooked. If you want to save money and time, then a vacuum sealer is well worth the investment. I buy meats on sale, then cook/smoke and vac seal then freeze. You can also do veggies the same way. It makes cooking dinner through the week so much easier.
 
This brings up my second question: We're empty nesters as well... and I can only find rather large pork butts in the grocery. So should I smoke the smallest roast I can find, and then just freeze the final product, OR should I cut the raw pork butt in half and smoke half for us to to eat that day, and freeze the other other half until "next time"?
-PH
I think the answer to this depends on if you have a vacuum sealer at home. If you don't, then definitely cook the whole thing.

This is why I bought a vacuum sealer! However, I have seen that the meat companies have more powerful sealers and thicker bags, and the meats last a long time in the freezer. Once you break the seal you have to use it up in a few months even if you reseal it in a home vacuum sealer. I now cook the whole butt and use the vacuum sealer for the leftovers.
 
Well - It TURNED OUT FANTASTIC ! Here is what I ended up doing:
  • Started with the smallest shoulder I could find at the store: 7# almost exactly.
  • Night before, I slathered on yellow mustard and then gave it a healthy rub of Meat Church The Gospel. Placed it in a dish and covered it with plastic wrap and left it in the fridge.
  • This morning, woke up ~ 6:45 pulled it out and got the smoker ready to rock with some hickory pellets.
  • 7:15 AM - On the smoker @ 225°F with the meat probe
  • 4:30 PM - IT 162°F; Placed it in a foil pan with 8oz of apple juice and wrapped it. I also bumped the Traeger to 250°F. I wasn't going to wrap it, but started to get nervous. The stall really started closer to 155 and was just creeping.
  • 6:30 PM - Probe alarm for 195°F sounded off. I probed around with my ThermoPen and found 195-202°F depending on probe placement. At this point, I moved it to a cooler for an hour.
  • 7:30 - Pulled & served - AMAZING !!! Almost a real set-and-forget recipe, but I had my eye on the temp app all day.
  • Total cook time: 12:15.

Thanks for everyone's tips and suggestions !!!!
-PH
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Last edited:
Well - It TURNED OUT FANTASTIC ! Here is what I ended up doing:
  • Started with the smallest shoulder I could find at the store: 7# almost exactly.
  • Night before, I slathered on yellow mustard and then gave it a healthy rub of Meat Church The Gospel. Placed it in a dish and covered it with plastic wrap and left it in the fridge.
  • This morning, woke up ~ 6:45 pulled it out and got the smoker ready to rock with some hickory pellets.
  • 7:15 AM - On the smoker @ 225°F with the meat probe
  • 4:30 PM - IT 162°F; Placed it in a foil pan with 8oz of apple juice and wrapped it. I also bumped the Traeger to 250°F. I wasn't going to wrap it, but started to get nervous. The stall really started closer to 155 and was just creeping.
  • 6:30 PM - Probe alarm for 195°F sounded off. I probed around with my ThermoPen and found 195-202°F depending on probe placement. At this point, I moved it to a cooler for an hour.
  • 7:30 - Pulled & served - AMAZING !!! Almost a real set-and-forget recipe, but I had my eye on the temp app all day.
  • Total cook time: 12:15.

Thanks for everyone's tips and suggestions !!!!
-PH
The results look wonderful. It is a good thing you decided to wrap the butt when it reached the stall. Otherwise, you would have had some disappointed guests.

Next time, try to do your cook a day ahead of time and cook it without wrapping. It might take a few of hours longer, but without hungry guest waiting, it will be less stressful. The photos look so good, though, I am not sure you need to mess with success.
 
The results look wonderful. It is a good thing you decided to wrap the butt when it reached the stall. Otherwise, you would have had some disappointed guests.

Next time, try to do your cook a day ahead of time and cook it without wrapping. It might take a few of hours longer, but without hungry guest waiting, it will be less stressful. The photos look so good, though, I am not sure you need to mess with success.
Yep - real first timers luck on this one... I've seen YouTubes of guys setting it up before they go to bed - 11:00PM ish. So if that's the case and it needs maybe a total of 14 hours, that still brings me to early PM the next day (1:00PM or 2:00PM) to come out and sit in the cooler. My question, is if it sits in the cooler so long that it becomes cool, how do you warm it up for dinner at 7:00 PM? Possibly pull the pork earlier and follow my Tail Gate idea (see below)...

The other question, since I don't have a vacuum sealer, is can I simply place the left overs in a Zip Top bag for a couple weeks? I want to take it to a tailgate. I figure I'll pull it out the day before and thaw it and take it to the game and put it in a foil pan on the grill maybe with some bbq sauce and/or apple juice and/or apple cider vinegar.... Any tips here?

Thanks for all the advise - This is one of the best communities!!!

-PH
 
If you remove your pork from the smoker, wrap it tightly in foil, then wrap it in a beach towel or blanket before placing it in your "cooler", then it should stay warm for several hours. Remember, it comes off the Traeger somewhere around 205 F, so it will take several hours to cool down if it is properly insulated.

If you think it might get too cool (below 140 F), place the meat still wrapped in foil in your kitchen oven set to its lowest setting to stay warm until dinner.

If you plan to cook large pieces of meat, I highly recommend that you consider getting a vacuum sealer. It would make a great Christmas present. While the freezer Ziplock bags can work, food will keep a lot longer when frozen in the vacuum seal bags. It is easy to reheat the vacuum bags in a sous vide circulator or even in a pot of simmering water on the stove or in a crock pot. Because you cannot get all the air out of Ziplock bags, they tend to float which makes reheating more difficult. When I have used the Ziplock bags, I open them, add a stainless spoon for weight and reseal the bag, removing as much air as possible. The extra weight will counteract the floating tendency.

Meat, whether cooked or uncooked, should not remain in your refrigerator more than a few days. If you need to store it longer, it must be frozen. Because most bacteria are aerobic, they require oxygen to multiply. Vacuum sealers remove most of the oxygen, limiting bacteria growth. That is why they are so much better for food storage. However, some anaerobic bacteria such as the bacteria causing botulism do not require oxygen. Thus, foods need to be kept either cold or hot, even if vacuum sealed.
 
Post Script: Sorry I forgot to post this: The Saturday before Thanksgiving I took the saved pulled pork out of the freezer and thawed it for my Tailgate on Sunday. Just warmed it in a foil pan with some apple juice on my portable grill. Served with Mrs. P's coleslaw and some Traeger Sweet Heat on potato rolls. AMAZING. Real crowd pleaser. Now everyone expects my pulled pork for ALL the future tailgates. At least I know how I'll be spending my Saturdays during football season from now on ;).
 
Post Script: Sorry I forgot to post this: The Saturday before Thanksgiving I took the saved pulled pork out of the freezer and thawed it for my Tailgate on Sunday. Just warmed it in a foil pan with some apple juice on my portable grill. Served with Mrs. P's coleslaw and some Traeger Sweet Heat on potato rolls. AMAZING. Real crowd pleaser. Now everyone expects my pulled pork for ALL the future tailgates. At least I know how I'll be spending my Saturdays during football season from now on ;).

If you would like, I can PM you with my recipe for baked beans. Although they start with canned beans, they are elevated several steps above basic beans. The final step is to smoke/bake them on the Traeger. They make a wonderful accompaniment to pulled pork sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers, etc. It takes quite a while to produce the recipe; but it makes about 24 servings if you are feeding a crowd. If you are only feeding your immediate family, the beans freeze easily and can be thawed and reheated as needed.
 
If you would like, I can PM you with my recipe for baked beans. Although they start with canned beans, they are elevated several steps above basic beans. The final step is to smoke/bake them on the Traeger. They make a wonderful accompaniment to pulled pork sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers, etc. It takes quite a while to produce the recipe; but it makes about 24 servings if you are feeding a crowd. If you are only feeding your immediate family, the beans freeze easily and can be thawed and reheated as needed.
yes. Yes. YES !!! 🤤🤤🤤Please DM or post in the Recipes forum. Can the recipe be halved easily?

Thanks!

-PH
 
If you would like, I can PM you with my recipe for baked beans. Although they start with canned beans, they are elevated several steps above basic beans. The final step is to smoke/bake them on the Traeger. They make a wonderful accompaniment to pulled pork sandwiches, hot dogs, hamburgers, etc. It takes quite a while to produce the recipe; but it makes about 24 servings if you are feeding a crowd. If you are only feeding your immediate family, the beans freeze easily and can be thawed and reheated as needed.
Hey Ray, if ya want you can post the recipe for your beans here. Then everyone could give them a try. I’m always looking for new recipes.
Thread 'Beans'
https://www.traegerforum.com/threads/beans.2230/
 

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