Had Emeril's essence seasoning. There is a recipe for "meat rub" that is basically 1 part brown sugar to 1 part Essence. I started with regular brown sugar, but found it too "pasty". I added turbinado, then I wanted to add some kosher to make it coarser and ground black pepper. It was a little spicy, so I "cut it" with some ground mustard seed and garlic powder.
Butt's rubbed. My wife done good because these butts were both right at 8 lbs.
Cleaned the egg.
...and I mean clean. Used a blower.
Drip pans rigged. I try to form little legs in the foil pans to prevent the drippings from burnings (allow some air flow under the pans). yes- they just look like a crumpled mess but there is a method to my madness.
Kroger lump. They were skimpy on big pieces, this is the best I could do. One fist sided chunk of hickory, and some cherry chips.
Layer it up- a couple of small chunks and chips
Finished off- hard to tell but it is about 1/2 up the ring.
Grate temp
Lots of wires for a charcoal smoker, huh?
Dome temp (about 25 deg difference). Interesting side note- after a while these temps come closer together. An hour or so later they were only 10-15 degrees apart.
Once it hit 180 I kicked up the temp to about 300 dome. Pulled at 195. 12.5 hours.
Finished cooking. Note that I only measured the internal temp of one butt during the cook. Checked the left butt with an instant read and it was 200. I got lucky.
Quick rest- notice the little foil on the right. That was a piece that stuck to the grid that I almost left.
Pullin
This was that rogue piece...it was sooo good, glad I didn't leave it behind.
Bark had an interesting texture- kinda chewy, but very tasty.
Helper
All pulled (1 butt). The other looked about the same.
plug for thse little buns. I know....wheat?...they have white too.
Sammie. This is a carolina style sauce (Williamson bros). Mustard based, but I added some cider vin, cayenne, black pepper.
