Just got my first smoker

[MileHighGrowler]

(03-22-2021, 01:50 PM)WeezyBengal Wrote: Did a pork butt yesterday and wanted to try something a bit different. I ended up cooking it at 240 and let it go without wrapping it in foil at all. I got the best bark I've ever gotten but damn did it take a long time to finish. I put it on at 11 am and I pulled it at about 10 pm when it hit 196 degrees. I usually let it go until at least 200 degrees but I got sick of waiting. It stalled at 175 for like 2.5 hours. I loved the bark on it but not sure I have the patience to do that again without wrapping. It also turned out a bit dryer than the product I get when I wrap halfway through. I wish there was some kind of happy medium.

That's a beauty!  I've been caught by surprise at how long it takes to smoke a butt without wrapping.  Definitely a longer day than it feels it should be.  I love the idea of bark, but since I usually do pork like that for sammies, and they're going to get doused in sauce anyway I've started to car less about bark.  If I really want to relax, I'll smoke it for 5-6 hours and then pull it and just toss it in the crockpot till it's done.  It braises in its own juice so it stays moist but there's no bark.  Then I can shred right there in the bowl, too, and make it even easier.  If you want the bark and moisture and not as long smoking... well, I'm interested to hear what works to meet in the middle!  Otherwise, you could try wrapping it un butcher paper.  Or you could pan it in the smoker so the top half would get bark but it would sit in its renderings and stay more moist.  

One thing I always do is put a pan under the pork while it smokes and catch all of the drippings.  After I shred, I'll mix at least some of those drippings back in.  That adds fat/moisture back, and since the drippings sat in the smoker, they're really smoky tasting, which helps add smoke flavor to the meat in the middle which certainly never got smoke.  If you had a bark, it will be there for a little bit, but won't last super long since it's now wet.