Twelve hours is a long time to do anything.  A twelve hour drive can be painful, twelve hours in the office is no picnic, twelve hours with Charlie Sheen will have you drinking tiger’s blood and acting batshit crazy, and twelve hours cooking pork shoulder is certainly an long time.  The end result of such a long cook is more than worth the hours, but it can be difficult to find enough time in the day.  If there’s no enough time in the day, why not take advantage of the night?  Hapa’s Brewing did just that.

The midnight cook began a full day ahead of time with a trip to Cash & Carry.  Nineteen and a half pounds of pork later, and it was on to prepping the meat.  The first step was to trim off as much fat a possible.  Pork shoulder has enough fat distributed throughout the meat that it will not dry out if all visible fat is removed.

        
Pork shoulder untrimmed…                                                    …and trimmed

Next, the pork was tied to assure even cooking and a rub that included salt, raw sugar, black pepper, garlic and onion powder, paprika, cayenne pepper, oregano, mustard powder, and sage was prepared and added generously to the meat.  With rub applied the meat was wrapped and put in the refrigerator for twelve hours to let the rub soak in.

           
Rubbed and tied                                                                         Wrapped for the refrigerator

At 8:00pm the Weber Smokey Mountain Cooker was fired up using a combination of apple and hickory wood.  By 8:30pm the smoker had reach the desired cooking temperature of 220-250 degrees, the pork was rerubbed, and put on the grilling surface.

        
Firing up the grill.  It’s dark out at 8:00pm!                                One pork shoulder on the top, and the other on the bottom

While the pork started cooking, a beer and vinegar baste was made that included beer, cider vinegar, salt, pepper, onion powder, and left over rub.  The meat was first basted at the three hour mark.  By 2:00am the meat had been cooking for over five hours and it was time to catch a little shut eye.  After a brief nap filled with dreams of twelve hour Charlie Sheen sessions and melt-in-your-mouth pulled pork, the temperature of the grill was checked and the meat basted again.

After another quick nap and a moment to enjoy the sunrise, the temperature of the grill was checked, the internal temperature of the meat was taken, and both shoulders were turned and basted.  by this point the meat was looking and smelling unbelievably good.

        
Basting the pork                                                                         Pork shoulder at 9 hours into the cook

By 10:00am the internal temperature of the meat had reached the target of 190-200 degrees and the meat was taken off the grill.  To keep it warm until it was ready to be served, the pork was wrapped in foil and stored in a cooler.  To kill time while waiting, coleslaw was prepared that would eventually join the pulled pork in sandwich perfect.  The slaw included shredded cabbage, white onion, white wine vinegar, mayonnaise, sugar, salt, and pepper.

As soon as the clock struck noon, the pork was pulled, and all enjoyed an incredibly delicious feast!

        
The spread!                                                                               Pulled pork sandwich with slaw and BBQ sauce