"Nonnymus" > wrote in message
...
> Brick wrote:
>
>> I don't think you're doing it on purpose, but you're confusing me with
>> you terminology of butts, boston butts and shoulders. I read it three
>> times
>> and I can't figure out what you're talking about. I understand about the
>> deboning part. A butt is a butt is a butt. A Boston butt is a butt in
>> Boston.
>> Sometimes a Boston Butt is just a piece of a butt, like three or four
>> pounds.
>> A shoulder is the combination of the butt and the picnic. A shoulder
>> ALWAYS
>> includes a joint. Otherwise it is not a shoulder. The picnic is the upper
>> portion
>> of the front leg of a hog. The Butt is the part of the shoulder that the
>> picnic
>> connects to. To put it into better perspective; a shoulder will weigh in
>> the
>> neighborhood of 14 to 18 pounds. A butt or a picnic will weigh between
>> 7 and 9 pounds with the bone in. That assumes that the portion is still
>> whole. All bets are off if the butcher kept some for himself or you found
>> a
>> pygamy hog or a big old hampshire in the 450 lb range.
>
> OK, what I thought was
>
> Butt = front shoulder, including humorous and scapula of pit. It's what I
> almost always cook and call a butt. It would be equivalent to the upper
> arm and shoulder meat of a pig.
>
> Boston Butt= same thing, less humorous. It's about like a butt, but less
> bone.
>
> Shoulder = butt, without any scapula or humorous = unboned shoulder.
>
> I'm probably wrong in my terminology. What I got was the upper arm and
> shoulder meat of the pig, less any bone. It was labeled as a "shoulder."
> Two weighed in at just under 17 or so pounds and looked like a butt with
> the bone removed.
>
> Brick, help me out here. <seriously>


I'm not Brick, but I've been to his house and I do know my way around a hog.

A butt and a boston butt are the same thing. A boneless butt is obviously
different.

The butt contains the shoulder blade. (doesn't that make sense?)

The picnic ham as it was classically called is the lower foreleg.
Otherwise known as a picnic. Same limb, but the picnic has skin, more fat,
and a big round bone instead of a shoulder blade.

If you leave the picnic attached to the butt, you have a pork shoulder.
They weigh about 15 to 18 pounds *each*. They're about 20 inches long and
as big around as a normal man's thigh at the butt end. They taper down on
the picnic end to about the size of a hamhock. (picture a pig foot just
inches below that point)


Having cooked a bunch of all 3 (butt, picnic, shoulder) the shoulder is my
favorite simply by virtue of price.

If a butt is $1.39 at a given store, the picnic will be $1.09. The shoulder
will be the same price as the picnic, but you get the butt included.


If I can't get a whole shoulder I'll generally go for 2 picnics. The skin
and fat, when cooked properly make a great addition chopped into the rest of
the meat.

Addendum:
It appears it matters what part of the country you come from.
In Tennessee, the Motherland of BBQ, it is as I've said. Other places may
call a butt a shoulder.


TFM®