Pulled Pork and Teriyaki Chicken for Church picnic

Last weekend I was asked to provide the meat for the Loveland Nazarene Church. I was told to plan for serving 200 people which is more than I have ever cooked for in my life. I was nervous that something would go wrong.

So my wife and I set out on a mission to provide the most amazing meat we could.

The first problem I had to tackle was with my smoker. I only had one rack in my drum which is clearly not enough space to do all the pork in one shot. I needed to add another rack. The problem was that meant I needed to find a new lid in order to have the space for the meat on the top rack. I was able to obtain an old weber 22" kettle grill so I took that and pounded out the rim so that it would sit on the smoker barrel.

Now I have 2 racks in the smoker with enough rack space for at least 6 pork butts.

My wife and I headed down to Restaurant Depot in Denver on Saturday morning to pick up the pork and chicken and a few other items needed. We got 60 lbs of pork butt and 80 lbs of chicken thighs.

When we got home we got to work prepping the pork as I needed to get that in the smoker by 7pm in order to give them enough time to finish before the picnic the next day. I worked on trimming the fat while Mary Lou prepared the injection and injected the butts as I finished trimming them. Once that was complete, I spread some yellow mustard over the pork while Mary Lou sprinkled the dry rub all over them.

In the meantime I had started my smoker. I used a full bag of Stubbs charcoal, I really like how this brand burns for smoking. I added some hickory and applewood chunks to the fire for my smoke.

The smoker was ready, the pork was ready so it was time to put them in the smoker. I loaded all 6 butts in the smoker, 3 on each rack and inserted a remote thermometer into each butt to monitor the internal temps. My goal was to reach a temp of 200 before taking them out of the smoker.

I set my watch to check in on the pork every 3-4 hours or so just to make sure all was well. I also wanted to rotate upper and lower racks to make sure they all cooked evenly if I needed to. I did rotate them at about 5am based on the difference between the top and bottom rack temps.

While the pork was smoking, Mary Lou and I prepared the teriyaki marinade for the chicken. The marinade had a mixture of vinegar, molasses, garlic, soy sauce and some other ingredients. The marinade is Mary Lou's creation. We put the chicken in some iced coolers and let them marinade overnight. We planned on grilling the chicken at the picnic site.

When I checked on the meat at 7am I was worried. The fog had rolled in, it was dreary outside and the temperature in the pork was not where I wanted it. I stocked the fire just a little bit  and hoped for the best. At about 9am they finally reached the 200 mark and I pulled the butts off the smoker and wrapped each one in tin foil, and placed them in a heated cooler wrapped in towels. I wanted to let the pork rest and let the juices redistribute.

We packed up our equipment and headed off to the picnic site. We got the grills going and started grilling the chicken. About 15 minutes before serving, I started pulling the pork...it literally fell apart in my hands it was so tender. It smelled awesome and tasted great.

The chicken turned out really good as well. Thanks to those helpers who helped grill the chicken while Mary Lou and I chopped and pulled the meat for serving.

All in all it turned out great. Everyone was served and appeared to enjoy it. It was really nice to hear the positive feedback.

Thank you Loveland Nazarene Church for asking Mary Lou and I to help out with the picnic. It was an honor and we were glad to help out.

Until next time,
Koopdaddy and Koopmommy