May is National Barbecue Month, which means that this already great style of food/cooking gets the attention it deserves! May could not be a better month to have National Barbecue Month. Think about it: the weather is warming up, but it's not gross-sticky-hot yet (can you tell I live in the South?), so people enjoy spending a long afternoon-into-evening at a BBQ, the days are starting to get longer, mosquito's haven't infested the area, and people are itching to get out after a long winter parked inside! It really is the best time of year. If I weren't going to be at NRA this weekend, I would definitely be at a barbecue. I hope you have plans for the Month o' BBQ, you can indulge your wildest barbecue cravings ("Yes, I am smoking brisket, and sausage, and pork butt, and ribs, I have to, it's in celebration of National Barbecue Month" - see how that works? You're no longer certifiable, you're festive!)

If I were a little more organized, I would have had a "Happy National Barbecue Month" Barbecue - because I love a theme party. If you enjoy a theme party, feel free to borrow that idea. Your friends will love it. You could supply the smoked meat, and everyone could bring a side dish and their favorite (un-opened or homemade) sauce, and you could do a sauce swap at the end, kind of like dirty Santa. The person with the messiest fingers/face at the end could win some sort of prize (because let's be honest, if you're serving ribs or wings, that's the only way to make people (girls) not embarrassed about digging in)! This is also the easiest kind of party to throw, because if you've got a Cookshack, you can just toss everything in with some rub on it, and when the thermometer tells you it's ready, take the meat out, and you look like the hero. It's stress free entertaining, especially since you can keep everyone outside and won't have to clean up a ton afterwards.

However, since I'll be in Chicago this weekend, I'm going to start planning for the Memorial Day Weekend (which still falls within the National BBQ Month time frame), which is a prime time for me to smoke some fabulous meats on my Cookshack. I've been doing a lot of untraditional smoked foods lately, so I think I'm going to do something decidedly barbecue, and easily packable/transportable that will hold well. I think we'll be going to the lake, so a pork butt would be perfect. If I put it in the smoker in the early evening the night before, it should be ready that next morning. I can just wrap it is some cling wrap, then a few layers of heavy duty foil, then in a towel, and pop it in a warm cooler, and it will still be too hot to handle when it comes time for lunch. I can just bring a pan and some tongs with me, so people can pull it themselves as they serve. I think that's what I'll do.

I'm a little torn on the prep of the butt, though. I always do Eddy's "Pickle" on pork butts, which is amazing, but Stuart did a butt here the other day that was incredible. Now usually, if I come in to work at 8 in the morning and smell barbecue it makes me a little queasy (as much as I love it, it's not the best breakfast smell to me), but when I came in that morning, the smell was enough to make a person drool! I had to taste some, and it was some of the best pork I've ever had. Stuart is supposed to be writing a blog about it (who could imagine he might be busy, though?), I know he took 5 million pictures, but, *spoiler alert* he injected it with some of Butcher BBQ's pork marinade, which really enhanced the pork flavor without overwhelming it, which I think is important, and then he used brown sugar and our Spicy Barbecue Sauce Mix as the rub. Ingenious! I've never used the sauce mix as a rub before, but it's incredible (and I'm not just saying that because we make it, really). It's a good thing that it was so early, or I probably would have eaten half of the butt standing over it in the kitchen, that's how good it was. Which do you think I should do, the tried and true, or the new and exciting? Here's Eddy's "Pickle" to help you decide. I highly recommend it, you should try it for your National Barbecue Month Celebration! Leave a comment about which of the two you think I should prepare, and the one that has the most votes I'll make and post about!

Fast Eddy's Pork Butt (Pickle Portion)
From the Fast Eddy's Championship Cooking Class
1/2 cup kosher salt
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup apple cider vinegar
2 quarts water


Remove the fat cap and make sure the gland is not left in the butt
Trim fat from the outside muscle of the butt
Mix together salt, sugar, vinegar, and water. Blend until clear.
4-8 hours before cooking, place pork in a large pan and shoot with an injector until butt is leaking injection everywhere
Let sit refrigerated in the pan until ready to season
Season pork butt immediately before cooking with the rub of your choice