Tips please - Hog bbq Update & pics

[aggieterpkatie]

That is awesome!!! Glad it went well, and I can practically smell the pork just looking at those pics! I'm laughing at the tail sticking up in that first pic, too.

 

[daisychick]

Wow that looks great! I'm glad it turned out good and got done in time. I love the last picture, those are gonna be some happy chickens cleaning up the scraps.

 

[Hillsvale]

We had our hog split in half and wrapped in chicken wire to cook. You could still use the
spit, but should take a lot less cooking time with halves. Chicken wire kept the meat
together, not falling off the bones into the fire.

Still took several hours, they started about 6AM for a noonish eating time. Meat was
done all the way thru, not much in dried or burned pieces. We didn't use a spit, had
to manually turn the halves over the bed of coals. They got turned about every 15 minutes.

I can ask husband more roasting details, since that was "manly work, cooking the hog" and I
did the other foods.

Be careful with using wire... galvinized wire will have people producing children with 3 eyes and extra limbs, its heath risk is too high.

 

[redtailgal]

That is one of those things that makes a gal say "MAN! I shoulda been THERE!"

 

[greybeard]

Thanks for the update Royd--glad it went well. Looks delicious and I bet the aroma was to die for.
If I kept up, it was 15 hrs cooking time for 160 lbs?
About the same fire level and temp the whole time or did you cut back toward the 9AM time?
Now that it's done--anything you would/will do different next time?

You have a pic of the business end of the spit? Or one of the spit before you put the carcass on it?

I would be tempted to try this next fall with a couple of little 40-50lb feral piglets, but they are so dang lean i dunno. I'll have to look into that.

 

[SheepGirl]

That must've smelled wonderful

 

[Royd Wood]

Greybeard - the butcher put the spit in and yes about 15 hours to cook through. Roughly the same piles of hardwood 1 under the hams and the other under the shoulders Just spread the piles out under the ribs with an hour to go otherwise the ribs would have been cooked too soon.
Essential is the following - Make sure hog is tied up properly with butcher twine including the legs and steel pins through the pigs ribs and back which you can see on the first pic. Ours wasn't tied up properly so caused probs 3 hours in which is why we used chick wire.
Make sure you have a hoze pipe nozzle set on shower ready at all times to extinguish any flames from the coals as you should hve just a glow not yellow flames from falling fat - just aim a very quick shot at yellow flames close up but dont get too wet Expect to do this lots of times through the cooking time
The hoze comes in useful for grassfires and damping down surrounding areas.
Its good to have a tin sheet on hand to cover coals when doing any emergency work to hog otherwise you cook along with the hog.
160 lb hog was too big for the spit but not too big for a crowd of hungry Canadians so next time I would go for a 100 lb max hog and make sure the butcher ties up the hog properly.

 

[mama24]

Too late for any advice, but if you use a smaller hog next time you could fill the body cavity with more meat. When I was a kid, we went to a hog roast at least once a year. They always had something inside the pig: sausage, ducks, chickens, even a turkey once. LOL. They also had the birds stuffed with bread stuffing, though that might be considered a no-no these days with the salmonella, etc concerns.

 

[bonbean01]

mmmmmmmmmmmmm....now this thread made me wish I'd been there! Glad it went well for you....now I'm craving BBQ pig

 

[Royd Wood]

Too late for any advice, but if you use a smaller hog next time you could fill the body cavity with more meat. When I was a kid, we went to a hog roast at least once a year. They always had something inside the pig: sausage, ducks, chickens, even a turkey once. LOL. They also had the birds stuffed with bread stuffing, though that might be considered a no-no these days with the salmonella, etc concerns.

Sounds wonderful mama great idea but this was a pasture raised heritage pig and the whole idea was to get our customers to taste the fabulous pork that we sell from the store. All the condiments were available but we urged everyone to try the pork on its own first which they did and most didn't bother putting anything on.
Looks like a standard pink pig but trust me this fella was black before the butcher did his number on him. This pic shows the motorised end of the spit