Will a pork shoulder be dry after 16 hours at 110C

cooking-timepork-shoulderslow-cookingtemperature

I'm intending to do the following recipe with an 8lb (3.6kg) bone in shoulder (Essentially 30mins @230C/450F, 16hours @ 110C/230F, 45mins@230C/450F).

I'm concerned that such a long cooking time will dry out the meat and my shoulder is below the 5-8kg range that the recipe suggests. I've looked around on the web for advice and I haven't found anything conclusive

Most of the posts on this site use a slightly higher cooking temperature for much less time (250F for 6-8 hours seems to be the consensus).

There seems to be two concerns:

  1. Safe meat, this seems pretty easy to achieve (140F+)
  2. Tasty, melty, delicious meat (195F to melt the collagen)

I'm inclined to just give it a try but a decent pork shoulder runs at least $70 in Canada and I don't want to blow thanksgiving.

Any thoughts on how/if I should adjust he cooking time/temperature?

Best Answer

Pork shoulder is extremely forgiving.

You are looking for an outcome, not a time, and not an absolute temperature. Cook it until it is tender, which indicates the collagen is sufficiently converted to gelatin. That may or may not have happened at a particular temperature, because the conversion process is time dependent, and the rate is temperature sensitive.

Meathead describes testing for this in his comprehensive recipe for smoking pork shoulders:

If there is a bone, use a glove or paper towel to protect your fingers and wiggle the bone. If it turns easily and comes out of the meat, the collagens have melted and you are done. If there is no bone, use the "stick a fork in it method". Insert a fork and try to rotate it 90 degrees. If it turns with only a little torque, you're done. If it's not done, close the lid and go drink a mint julep for 30 minutes. If the internal temp hits 195°F but the meat is still not tender, push on up to 203°F, my new favorite target.

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