I am preparing for my first International Smoke day.
I have a 22" kettle and had a few questions on smoking a pork butt for pulled pork.
1) Should I buy the meat with the bone in or out?
2) Should I have the charcoal piled onto one side or both sides?

Any advise or tips will be appreciated. And looking forward to smoking becoming a great habbit.

Others may differ on the opinion, but I would buy bone in, and coals on both sides. You still may need to rotate it midway through on the kettle.

I've done brisket and butts on my kettle before and used both coal methods. I highly recommend banking on one side only.

I have used both methods also, but prefer the one side fashion. Feel like I can keep my temps lower with the coals banked to one side. Leave top vent open and place over your meat side so that it pulls the heat and smoke around your meat. Adjust temps with lower vents. Even though I use my WSM for most larger cuts, I still like to cook ribs on my kettle on occasion. I also use a scaled down version of
the Minion method for lighting.

Pardon my typo. I was trying to state that I use a scaled down version of the Minion Method in lighting my kettle, just use less coals.

You can hit the little pencil eraser over a folder button in the bottom right hand corner of your post and edit it if need be.

Thanks all for the advise.

I will try this out and let you know how it turns out.

i just put my 1st butt on my craigs list rescued weber. i have done probably 30-40 on my CG smoking-pro. but that uses alot of fuel to be doing just 1 butt.

i am doing minion method banked to left with food on right. all3 vents are closed on the bottom and top vent is open over food. currently at 260 at grate using my maveric et-73.
i am also using a mix of apple and cherry chips.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Tony C.,

turned out very good. took about 10 hours for a 6 lb butt to get to 198. it tasted pretty darn awesome.

Fred, if you don't have one already get a cookgrate with the flip-up sides; it makes adding fuel much easier (and you *will* be adding fuel).

I have a 22" Bar-B-Kettle (3 separate and individual bowl vents) and like to split the coals to 2 sides. But that works for me, and if you have a One Touch bowl it might not necessarily hold true.

I drop a thermometer with a 6" probe through the lid vent and shoot for temps around 240-250, and while time is just an afterthought when smoking I've been averaging 2 hrs/lb minimum for a Farmland All Natural (no "enhancement") bone-in butt.

Brad

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Brad Olson,

I did a 6 lb pork butt this past weekend in my 22in gold. I put a small layer of leftover charcoal on the bottom (about 1/3 of a starter) and used a full chimney of charcoal and char wood - and 3 lumps of misquite for flavor. I was able to maintain temps of 280-340 for just over 6 hours. Cooked indirect and it came out really well...surprised i didnt have to add more charcoal....

I've done a pork butt every few months on my kettle and it works so well, so easy. I use minion method, pile on one side. I can get 7 hours _easily_ without any readding of coals. To keep it simple I use a 3-4 lb butt to avoid the hellish 12 hr cooking times. 3 lb butts are hitting 195 deg in 6 hrs. No doubt one of the keys is that pork butts are so forgiving. If you can hit 185-190 internal temp you are pretty much guaranteed good results.