Adventures in BBQ

With temperatures into the mid 70’s, December in California can still be grilling and smoking time as we prove today by doing Rubbed Pork Loin with Apple Bourbon BBQ Sauce. This will be another new cut of pork for me try try (pigs seem to have plenty of different parts available for the BBQ cook to try out…). The pork loin will be seared off over medium-high heat before being moved to complete the cook on indirect heat.

Pork loin searing on the grill (Apologies for the less than great photo, this was about an 1 hour after sunset and it was almost totally dark)

• Setup: Weber Kettle, without Smokenator. Setup for indirect 2-zone cooking with a Weber water pan on the bottom grate.
• Meat: Boneless pork loin. This came from Ralph’s organic line and the original uncooked weight was about 3.8lb.
• Fuel: Kingsford Blue Bag briquettes with one hickory and a single peach wood chunk.
• Prep:
  1. Made up Apple Bourbon barbecue sauce and left to cool.
  2. Made up dry rub, once again using twice as much as original recipe.
  3. Washed the pork loin and patted it dry. Trimmed off the layer of fat on the bottom and then removed the tough silverskin from the bottom and sides.
  4. Rubbed all over with extra virgin olive oil and then sprinkled with dry rub, patting to try and persuade it to stick properly.
• Dry rub recipe:

Pork loin after trimming

The pork loin after being oiled and covered all over in the dry rub

Cooking Diary

• 3:20pm: Started preparing the Apple Bourbon Barbecue Sauce.
• 4:00pm: Made up dry rub ingredients.
• 4:40pm: Light a full chimney of charcoal.
• 5:10pm: Emptied chimney of coals out into kettle and filled water pan. Added one chunk of hickory wood and one chunk of peach wood.
• 5:20pm: Put rubbed meat directly over coals.
• 5:30pm: Flipped pork loin over to the over side
• 5:45pm: Moved pork loin over to indirect side of the grill over the water pan. Inserted Maverick food probe.
• 6:20pm: Hit 150F internal temperature, much quicker than the expected 70-90 minutes.
• 6:30pm: Basted with the apple bourbon sauce.
• 6:50pm: Removed from grill, left to rest for 10 minutes under tented foil.

Results

Completed pork loin at the end of the cook

As noted above, in the Cooking Diary, this cook went much faster than I was expecting. We reached the target internal temperature of 150F in about half the time that was expected. The color looked good and I was informed by the Veggie SO that it also smelled good (My sense of smell has still not fully returned as I am still fighting off the end of the cold I mentioned here).

Sliced end of the pork loin

Unfortunately the meat itself after slicing was a bit dry and chewy and nowhere as tender and moist as the Pork Tenderloin that I cooked previously. Now I know that’s not a totally fair comparison (tenderloin is called that for a reason, plus it had several hours of marinading to help soften it)  but they are pretty similar types of meat with little fat and connective tissue so should cook similarly.

Arranged slices of the smoked pork loin

One major difference between the cooks, is that this one was seared over high (400F) heat before being moved over to the indirect side. Now I (probably safely) assumed this means 400F at the cooking grate, which I dutifully measured with the barbecue probe of the ET-732 Maverick, but it could mean dome temperature which normally reads 25-50F above the grate temperature. So maybe I got the grill too hot for the searing part if it meant 400F dome temperature. The other possibilities are that the temperature was too high or too unstable during the early stages after the searing over direct heat as we moved the meat over to the indirect cooking zone and this dried things out. Finally, maybe pork loin is something that could benefit from injection to help retain the flavor.

On a more positive note, the rub came out very well with a good spice and bit to it – I shall have to try the original and unmodified version if I try this again to see whether I like my smokier version better. Also the built-from-scratch apple bourbon barbecue sauce was also very tasty and came in handy to add some moisture back to the meat.

Verdict on the pork loin: C-

While this was an interesting experience to try a new cut of meat that I had not tried before, the resulting smoked pork loin did not have the moisture and tenderness I was looking for. The rub and new apple bourbon barbecue sauce, while likely to see future on pork and other things, was not enough to save it by themselves (In the end, it has to be about the meat). Next time, I think I will need to employ one or more of the following alternative cooking tactics:

1. Inject the loin before starting,
2. Try dry brining several hours before cooking,
3. Try the Meathead/Amazing Ribs approach of cooking indirect at 325F without using the direct hear sear first.