With a few simple ingredients and patience, you can make the most mouth-watering main dish with this smoked pork butt recipe. Perfect for your summer bbq or winter gathering, this recipe is full of bold flavors and tender, moist meat excellent for feeding a crowd.

I'm a big fan of easy and this smoked pork butt is exactly that, easy. While it does take a little planning and lots of time, it's well worth it. Plus, the time spent making this amazing dish is almost completely hands-off while your smoker does all the work.

What is pork butt?

While you would think that pork butt would come from the hind end of the animal, it, in fact, does not. It is actually the pork shoulder. However, this cut of meat often referred to as Boston butt, a bone-in pork butt, is different from a pork shoulder.

While it is cooked the same as a pork shoulder, they're not exactly the same cut. A pork butt is the meatiest, thickest part of the pork shoulder with a lot of connective tissue and wonderful marbling throughout.

What is pulled pork?

Pulled pork is an American pork recipe consisting of shredded pork from the pork shoulder typically smothered in bbq sauce from the southern United States. Cooked low and slow, it is pull-apart tender and absolutely delicious.

While I think smoked pork butt is the best way to make pulled pork, my crockpot pulled pork is an alternative if you don't have a smoker, or want the ability to leave it to cook all day in a crockpot where you won't have to babysit it quite as much. It will take all day, regardless, so plan ahead, as this particular cut of meat is tough and requires a long cook time at low temperatures to get it tender enough to eat unless you want to be chewing it all day.

Tips for the Best Smoked Pork Butt

This recipe is really simple and turns out absolutely delicious, but there are a few tricks to make the best smoked pork butt.

• Simplicity is key. No marinades, no injections, just a big hunk of meat and a little dry rub will go a long way to making this a fantastic recipe everyone will want again and again.
• Patience. Yes, this recipe will take a long time in the smoker, but it's well worth it and almost all of the time is hands-off. You've got to be patient and wait for the magic to happen. Expect this to take anywhere between 8 and 16 hours to cook.
• Fresh is best. If you have a frozen pork butt in your freezer, use it for something else as using fresh, never frozen pork of the best quality you can afford is going to result in a better finished product.
• Trim the fat. Though not all of the fat. Just trim a good portion of the fat cap off of the end so that the meat will all have a nice bark on it. Leave just enough to help give it flavor.
• Use low heat. Cooking this cut of meat high and fast will result in a pork butt that you'll be chewing for days. Instead, cooking this slowly at a low temperature of around 225°F to 250°F is going to be your best bet for tender, juicy meat.
• Give it time to rest. Taste the pork when you're ready to take it off the smoker. It should have a nice bark and an inner ring referred to as the smoke ring, but it isn't quite finished yet. It needs time to rest for about 30 to 60 minutes.

Smoked Pulled Pork Ingredients

Bone-in pork butt. This is also often referred to as a Boston butt. It is a bone-in pork shoulder ranging in weight from around 6 to 9 pounds. You can use a boneless butt, also called a picnic shoulder or picnic ham, but the flavor won't be as good.

Mustard. Used as a binder to help the dry rub adhere to the meat and help give it that nice, flavorful bark.

Dry rub. I use a homemade sweet rub that consists of brown sugar, salt, white pepper, paprika, garlic powder, and onion powder. You can find the exact measurements in the recipe card below.

How much meat do I need?

You'll need about a half pound per person, planning loss from shrinkage, the bone, and fat of about 30%. So, an 8-pound bone-in Boston butt will serve at least 12 people and up to 16. Always plan for more than you need, you can always freeze it to use in meals later.

How to Smoke Pork Butt

Prepare the meat. Remove the meat from the refrigerator and trim the fat cap back to ¼" thickness, thinner if you prefer. Then, slather on a thin layer of yellow mustard all over the meat.

Mix the dry rub. While you can purchase premade pork rub or similar to put on your meat, I like to just make it myself. It only takes a few minutes and I always have all the ingredients in the spice cabinet. Once it's mixed in a small bowl, rub it all over the pork butt and allow it to sit for a half hour or so while you preheat the smoker. This will help the meat cook quicker as it comes up to room temperature and keep the rub adhered to the meat.

Preheat the smoker. I recommend setting the smoker temperature to 225°F, you can bump it up to 235°F to 250°F if you're wanting a little quicker cook time, but I wouldn't go any higher than that.

Smoke. Place the prepared pork butt directly on the grates of the pellet smoker, place a digital meat thermometer into the thickest part of the meat to keep an eye on the temperature as it cooks, and close the lid. It will take a long time, so just be patient. If you don't have the ability to plug a probe meat thermometer into your smoker, just using a digital instant-read thermometer throughout the day will work, too.

The stall. When smoking pork, everything will seem like it's going along swimmingly as the temp steadily rises to around 150°F, and then it will sit there for what seems like forever. This is due to the moisture moving to the surface and slowly evaporating. The time a stall takes depends on the thickness of your meat and the cooking temperature. The stall on a pork butt can take up to 6 hours, so just be patient and let it do its thing, it will eventually pull out of it and continue cooking.

Wrap. Once your meat hits 160°F, remove it from the smoker and wrap it in non-coated butcher paper to really get a good smoke flavor. An alternative is aluminum foil, but I much prefer butcher paper to it for various reasons, namely the smoke can't penetrate the foil. You can spritz it with a little apple juice or apple cider if you prefer, but it's not necessary.

Rest. After the internal temperature of the meat reaches 195°F and 205°F, it's done, but you need to let the meat rest for the best results. You'll want it to rest somewhere between 30 minutes and an hour. Lining a small cooler with towels and placing the meat inside can help it stay warm while you cook everything else.

Shred and serve (leave off the sauce). While a good barbecue sauce is great on pulled pork, don't shred it and put your favorite barbecue sauce all over it. Instead, let your guests put the sauce on themselves. Besides, the leftover pulled pork can be used for something other than bbq such as in carnitas. So sauce it when you serve it, don't let it sit in the sauce.

To shred, just use two forks or gloved hands to pull the meat apart, don't use a knife.

Store any leftovers in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to four days. You can store it in the freezer for up to six months.

How Long to Smoke Pork Butt

The smoking process is going to take some time, but it is going to depend on the size and thickness of your pork butt. However, a rule of thumb is to expect it to take about 2 hours for every pound of meat. So, a 5-pound pork butt will take approximately 10 hours to smoke while an 8-pound pork butt is going to take closer to 16 hours to smoke.

So, word to the wise, get started early and give yourself plenty of time. It's well worth the time it takes to make it. You could also smoke it the day before if you're afraid you won't have time. It reheats just fine the next day.

Best wood for smoked pork shoulder

Pork is pretty versatile when it comes to choosing wood to smoke, but you don't want anything too overpowering, in my opinion. oak is a great choice, while mesquite and hickory give too strong of a flavor in my opinion.

Apple wood, cherry, or pecan are all good choices. Another option is to use a bbq blend, which will have just enough of several different hardwoods to give it a good, versatile flavor without being too overpowering. The choice is really your own, though.

How to Reheat The Best Pulled Pork

In the smoker. Preheat smoker to 225°F and place the pulled pork in a pan with a little chicken broth. Cover the pan with aluminum foil and place the pan in the smoker and heat for about 2 hours or until the meat reaches 165°F.

In the oven. Preheat the oven to 325°F and place the shredded pork in a pan with a little chicken broth. Cover the pan with aluminum foil and place the pan in the oven for about 30 minutes to 45 minutes or until the meat reaches 165°F.

In the slow cooker. Place the pork in the crockpot with a little chicken broth. Put the slow cooker on the warm setting and let it heat through for about an hour, or until the meat is hot.

How to Use Smoked Pork Butt

This recipe is super versatile and can be used in a lot of ways.

• As is. You don't have to do anything but put a little bbq sauce on this and it's amazingly delicious all on its own.
• Pulled pork sandwiches or sliders
• Carnitas
• Pulled pork bbq pizza
• Loaded potatoes topped with pulled pork

Other Smoker Recipes to Try:

• Smoked Pork Ribs
• Smoked Chicken Legs
• Smoked Turkey
• Smoked Lobster Tails