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Smoked Bone-In Pork Shoulder, Smoked Pork Butt

Who likes BBQ pulled pork? One of the easiest cuts to cook and absolutely perfect for low and slow smoking on the Big Green Egg. This recipe focuses on creating incredible bark (aka "crust") without any wrapping! As they say in the BBQ community, ”No Wrapping, No Fussing”. Just simple and delicious barbecue pork with this recipe. 

Servings: 20

Keywords: pulled pork, barbecue pulled pork, bbq pulled pork, barbecued pulled pork, smoked pork shoulder, smoked pork butt, pork brine

  • Prep Time: 45 mins
  • Cook Time: 8 hours 0 mins
  • Total Time: 8 hours 45 mins

Ingredients

Instructions

Ingredients

BRINE

  • 64 oz apple juice
  • 32 oz sweet tea (Milo's, if available)
  • 2 tablespoons Worcestershire
  • 1 cup kosher salt
  • ¼ cup brown sugar
  • 1 tablespoon onion powder
  • 1 tablespoon garlic powder
  • 1 tablespoon ground black pepper
  • 1 orange, sliced
  • 1 lemon, sliced
  • 5 fresh thyme sprigs

MEAT

  • 1 bone-in pork shoulder (8-10 lbs)

RUB

  • yellow mustard (for binding)
  • favorite pork rub

SMOKE

  • lump charcoal
  • 2 chunks apple, cherry and pecan wood

Instructions

BRINING AND PREP

  1. Combine ingredients for the pork brine. Heat enough to dissolve all the ingredients. Cool with ice cubes.
  2. Remove pork shoulder from packaging. Trim any excess hanging fat and score the fat cap in cross grid pattern with your trimming knife.
  3. Place the pork shoulder into food safe bucket or brining bag. Pour the brine that has been slightly heated to dissolve all the ingredients and cooled with ice cubes over the pork shoulder. Place brine bucket into refrigerator for 12-24 hours.

GRILL PREP

  1. After 12-24 hour brine, remove pork shoulder from brine and pat dry with paper towels. Using a meat injector, inject the pork shoulder with the remaining brine solution. Make injections every two inches around the entire pork shoulder.
  2. Once the injection process is complete, slather the pork shoulder with a layer of yellow mustard, followed by an even layer of pork rub. Make sure to evenly coat the pork shoulder with the pork rub. The pork rub needs to adhere to the pork shoulder for 15-25 minutes. This is a process commonly called “Sweating In” the rub.
  3. While the rub is “Sweating In”, its time to set up the Big Green Egg for indirect smoking. Light a full load of lump charcoal in the Big Green Egg and bring the temperature to 225-250 F. This should take approximately 20-25 minutes with the dampers opened fully.
  4. With the Big Green Egg temperature stable between 225-250, place 2 chunks each of apple, cherry, and pecan wood on the coals. Set up the plate setter (legs up) over the coals for indirect cooking. Add an aluminum half sheet pan with water on top of the plate setter (aka "water bath"). Place the grill grate over the place setter and water bath.

SMOKING

  1. Place the pork shoulder on top of the grill grate and water bath fat side up. Maintain a pit temperature between 225-250 throughout the smoke. Should take somewhere between 8-12 hours to reach an internal temperature in the Pork Shoulder of 200-205 degrees.
  2. Tip: If your pork shoulder temperature stalls during the cook, you can wrap/ double wrap with aluminum foil to help power through the stall and reach the final desired temperature of 200-205 degrees. Recommend adding a few ounces of liquid (like apple juice, or beer) in the foil to keep the pork tender.

REST, PULL AND SERVE!

  1. After the internal temperature reaches 200 - 205 degrees, pull the pork shoulder off the grill and wrap tightly in two layers of aluminum foil. Place in dry cooler covered with a dry towel and let rest 1-2 hours.
  2. Once rested a minimum of 1 hour, unwrap the pork shoulder. On a butcher board, pull out the shoulder bone, and pull apart the pork shoulder for serving!