Newbie Question

[Sophia mom]

Good afternoon - quick question - just got my 1400 this week, and going to try smoking a butt this weekend - this will be my first time using an electric smoker. Can you open the smoker after when the butt is almost done and put sauce on the butt or will this mess up the cooking process. Again , I apologize for what might be a dumb question, just have never used an electric smoker
thanks in advance

[ia_james]

No reason at all why you couldn't do that. I don't personally do it as I generally have a few different sauces on hand for when I make pulled pork, and leave it up to the person who is making their plate to pick the sauce (if any). Please don't be shy asking questions, everybody here had a brand new smoker they had never used before, once upon a time.

[Sodaking27]

No reason at all why you couldn't do that. I don't personally do it as I generally have a few different sauces on hand for when I make pulled pork, and leave it up to the person who is making their plate to pick the sauce (if any). Please don't be shy asking questions, everybody here had a brand new smoker they had never used before, once upon a time.

+1 ^
And welcome. You're going to love your 1400.

[Sophia mom]

Thanks for the advice. Happy smoking

[DReeves]

Welcome to the family, Sophia's mom!!!

Can't wait to hear how your cooks go!

[Sophia mom]

So, I bought the Maverick dual probe when I bought the smoker, I need to see if I can return it or exchange it. It does not allow me to change the "alert temp" but the button to change meat types work. Any how, I let it cook for 9 hours at 220, meat only got to internal temp of 155. So I increased to 225 for another hour , but the internal temp never changed. I am not sure if I did anything wrong, so I brought it in and put in the oven wrapped in foil. I used 6 oz of Apple and 2 oz of hickory. The meat was good. We are trying again this weekend. I will keep trying to till I get it correct, we are doing Ribs and Butts for Thanksgiving so I have 2 weeks for practice.

[ia_james]

Ah, the stall. You came upon the point where the meat was cooling due to evaporation of moisture at the same rate you were putting heat into it. You can wait it out, or wrap it in the future to get past it. Wrapping it will play hell with your bark, however.

[bigwalleye]

ia_james is on point. The stall is the meat's ability to drive you crazy and encourage you to have a beer, sit back, and relax.

Re: Ribs and Butts for Thanksgiving, I'd suggest separate cooks, or consider starting the butts early and adding the ribs later. While your mileage may vary, for the average 8 pound butt, I'll start them at 11 pm the night before at 180, a couple ounces of wood and 4 charcoal briquettes, run them all night long, wake up about 7 and crank the smoker up to 225-230, and walk away. I find GENERALLY, that using this method, we're eating around 5 pm. Experience will help, but if I check the smoker at 3:30 or 4 and I'm still only in the high 170's, I'll crank the temp up to 250.

Re: the ribs, I run my ribs for a straight 6 hours. No way to accurately check the temps, so for a meal at 5, 11am would be my "entry" time into the smoker.

On another note, consider a mix of apple and cherry on anything pork. Nice flavor....

And Welcome to the forum!!!

[Sophia mom]

thanks for the tips on smoking both together - I will get some cherry wood ordered and make a plan for Thanksgiving. We are getting up and going hunting that morning so I need just need to time it out to put ribs on when we get back.