Seeing that I’m sort of the foodie of the family and my wife just bought me a sweet Traeger Pro Series 34 for our anniversary, I decided to treat my dad and brothers to some scrumptious smoked pork. My local grocery store was running a sale on pork shoulders and I landed a beautiful ten-pounder that already had a good portion of the fat cap removed. Now, I normally leave the fat cap on when I’m smoking a pork shoulder but I wanted to give this gorgeous hunk of swine an extra rich, extra crispy bark. In my experience, the fat cap side of the shoulder generally ends up with an inferior bark because the majority of the rub washes away as the fat renders.
After trimming away most of the fat cap and removing any other nasty bits that wouldn’t render on the smoker, I turned my attention to the fat and silver skin in between the coppa muscle and the blade. Again, you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to. The silver skin and any fat that isn’t rendered are easily removed at the end of the smoking process but I wanted every surface of this shoulder exposed to as much rub and smoke as it could handle. I’m using my favorite knife. I know it may look a bit large for trim work but I was a meat cutter for a while at a steak house and I like a medium chef-style knife unless I’m doing some boning. This knife is the 8″ Chef from Material Kitchen. It’s insanely sharp, perfectly weighted, and easy to maneuver.
After a good trim, I used olive oil as a binder and went with a simple rub from Rib Rack. This rub is made of paprika, salt, sugar, garlic, and onion. With no preservatives and my favorite foundations for a pork rub, this is a really good go-to if making your own rub is a bit intimidating.
10-pound shoulder, trim and smoke
While I let the shoulder rest in order for the rub to adhere and create a sweat, I turned my attention to my Traeger. I loaded the hopper with hickory pellets and made sure the fire pot was clean and ready for an all-night smoke session. After running the smoke mode for a few minutes, I took the dial up to 225 degrees and waited for it to reach temp. Then it was time to let the magic begin. Onto the smoker. I didn’t probe the shoulder. Pork is very forgiving and I knew that when I got up the next morning, this piece of meat would still have three or four hours left in the smoke.
After a quick cup of joe, I headed out to see how things had progressed. I must admit, I was a bit surprised at what I saw. After twelve hours, I expected a much darker bark. I often will wrap pork and it has literally been years since I let one smoke unattended for this long. The good news is, the pork and the Traeger knew exactly what they were doing.
I topped off the pellet hopper and went back inside to have some breakfast and get ready for the cookout. I checked back after two hours and much to my joy, the bark had darkened immensely and my beautiful pork shoulder had taken on a mouth-watering mahogany skin that looked absolutely amazing. As impatient as I was getting, I decided to let the pork ride the full 15 hours and pull it off in time to rest for an hour or so before pulling it apart for the get-together.
My patience was rewarded. After a nice rest, I started to pull the shoulder apart starting with the blade bone. It slid out clean as a whistle. As I anticipated, the meat was extremely tender with a deep, red smoke ring under that perfect bark. The meat was still moist without being mushy which, to me, is not how pork should be served.
At the end of this 16-hour process, I was left with a half-pan full of perfectly smoked pork that could totally stand on its own. That said, I did bring along a bottle of my favorite Kansas City-style BBQ sauce for those that wanted it. Check back tomorrow for the recipe on how to make this sweet, smoky, and slightly spicy BBQ sauce that’s perfect for pulled pork, ribs, wings, and just about anything else you might throw on the smoker.
