Smoked Pork Shoulder

With my southern roots, pulled pork is just a staple of my recipe collection.  There are so many ways, techniques and varieties of making pulled pork but my favorite is to smoke a big ole pork butt and let the flavors of the meat speak for themselves.  Now you can do slow cooker pulled pork or Dutch Oven Pulled Pork, but once you try smoking it, you won’t want to go back.   Now since I received my electric smoker just this last Christmas, I have put it to use making not only smoked pork butts, but so many other smoked items.  Believe it or not, I’ve made my own smoked salt, smoked a cheesecake and even made smoked potato salad.  I am working on getting all these recipes on here as quickly as possible.  Here’s a link to all my smoker recipes.

So now on to my smoked pork butt, which turned into amazing pulled pork sandwiches.  You’re not going to believe how easy this is.  It must takes some time.

Ingredients:

• 5-8 pound pork shoulder/butt (mine was 8.7 lbs.)
• Yellow Mustard (optional, some don’t like doing this)
• 1/4 – 1/2 cup BBQ Pork Rub (see below)

First rub the entire pork shoulder/butt with the yellow mustard.

Now completely coat with the rub…and I mean top, bottom and all around the sides.

Let sit for about 30 minutes before putting in the smoker.

You’ll now want to slow smoke the shoulder at 225° about an hour per pound of meat.  You want an internal temperature around 190°F-195°F.  I used a combination of apple and pecan chips in the smoker.  Adding them about every half hour for the first 3 hours.

Once it reaches internal temperature I like to remove from smoker and wrap in foil, then wrap in a heavy towel and put in a cooler for about an hour or so.  I’ve left in longer, even up to 8 hours and it was still quite warm.  This is mainly to let it rest and allow the juices to redistribute throughout the meat.

You can now shred and use for whatever you like.  Pulled pork sandwiches, burritos, tacos, pulled pork pockets, or even an appetizer with left overs of Pulled Pork Cups.  Let your imagination run wild.  You can not go wrong.

Enjoy….

BBQ Pork Rub

• 1/2 cup paprika
• 1/4 cup garlic powder
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons black pepper
• 2 tablespoons  chili powder
• 2 tablespoons onion powder
• 2 tablespoons salt
• 1 tablespoon dried oregano
• 1 tablespoon cumin
• 2 teaspoons dried thyme
• 2 teaspoons dry mustard
• 2 teaspoons ground coriander
• 1 teaspoon  allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon ginger

Mix all ingredients together and keep in an airtight container/jar till used.