Smoking Meat Questions and Discussion
- Thread starter Statefan515ISU
- Start date
I have never tried butcher paper. Would love to hear pros and cons on it. I've seen videos of people using it.
This is also a point to remember -- if you wrap these hunks of meat up after smoking to ~200F, even after maybe 4 hours -- they will still be piping hot when you take them out and try to pull them. This is a good thing, btw. Some people will even wrap theirs in towels and throw them in a cooler to rest before pulling.
Usually I can't pull it with my hands right away because it's so hot, and I have to use my bear claw tools to pull the roast.
Usually I can't pull it with my hands right away because it's so hot, and I have to use my bear claw tools to pull the roast.
This is what i do with my pulled pork. I'll plan on having it to temp a few hours before I need to shred it. Wrap it and throw it in a small cooler. Bonus: now my small cooler smells like smoked meat every time I use it.
Butcher paper
I love wrapping in the butcher paper. It both saves most of your wonderful juices (usually I will dump some bag into my bag of pulled pork), helps keep your meat juicy, and helps shorten the stall time (shorter cook). The paper also lets your meat breathe, so the bark doesn't get soggy like it does wrapping in foil.
You can get a great result without wrapping, too, it just takes longer.
I use butcher paper for briskets. Does the job, can get a little soggy, just make sure you don't get the stuff with the wax lining on the one side. I just ask the guys behind the counter at Fareway for some and they offer up a nice section. It was harder to find for purchase than I expected.
When it's to hot, I sometimes pull chunks then throw it in the wife's Kitchenaid mixer with a bread hook. Does a great job of shredding.
I've had good luck finding the butcher paper at Hawkeye BBQ in Ankeny. Lots of good supplies there.
I actually just ran a few places on pretty short notice after deciding I was going to try butcher paper, Theissens, can't remember the other, and didn't find it, so went to Fareway. So I'm sure it's easier to find than I made it out. Will probably just use the Amazon link above so thanks @BACyclone
The only time I will wrap and throw in a cooler is if the cook is done hours before mealtime. Otherwise, I let it rest on the counter for 30 minutes and then pull/slice. The whole purpose of resting is to get the internal temp down in order to keep the meat from leaking all the juices out when sliced, and coolers drastically slow that process.
For high fat cuts like pork shoulder, drying out usually isn't an issue and they don't really need to rest in most instances. But I often let them rest just so I don't get scalded while doing the pulling. LOL
One other trick I do is to use charcoal rather than wood chunks. The flavor is better and you'll get the smoke ring which is absent with electric smokers.
Yep. Because they're not electric smokers.
I didn't think of it that way lol
You bet! When I first learned about the "pink paper" trend I wanted to try it but ended up at the same dead ends. I found some cheap brown "parchment paper" in my local store that works, but not ideal. I spent more time than I like to admit looking for options online and decided to try this one and I'm really happy with it.
This is a picture of a pork butt right before I pulled it that I wrapped in that paper. Great bark, and you can maybe see it's lying in a nice pool of pork fat inside that paper. Some of it still made it through to my baking pan underneath, but that's why it's there.
