TIL my pork butt turned out fine without wrapping

Many say you have to wrap pork butt to keep it soft. I left it open last cook and it was still juicy. What's your take on wrapping?

2 comments

2 Comments

ninap954h ago

Tried both ways for years and honestly it depends on your goal. Leaving it unwrapped gives you that awesome crunchy bark everyone fights over. Wrapping it just speeds things up and makes the meat a bit more tender, but you lose some bark texture. If your butt was juicy uncovered, you probably had good fat content and kept the temperature low and steady. The real key is letting it rest for a good long time after, that's what keeps the juices in.

jordan_owens753h ago

@ninap95, I've actually found wrapping in foil gives me way better results for keeping things moist. The bark might soften a bit, but you can always throw it back on the smoker unwrapped to crisp up at the end. My last unwrapped butt dried out a little, even after a long rest, which was a bummer. Wrapping just locks in all those juices way more reliably in my experience. It still gets plenty tender and saves hours on the cook, lmao. Maybe different smokers play a role, but I'm sticking with the wrap for now.