At the restaurant, we cooked as many as 18 butts at the time...always specified 8 lbers and of course, bone in. Held 225* consistently through out the 8 hr cook time, cooking the 1st 6 hrs nekkid and finishing up double wrapped in HD foil for the last 2 hrs. Prep was cold water rinse, vinegar rub down (we kept spray bottles full of vinegar all the time) and plenty of a special rub we used. We cooked 'em up w/all the fat on for MAX flavor and de-fatted during the pulling/shredding process...like you, Ferm...rewarding to pop that bone out and easily pull the sections apart for shredding.
The pink smoke ring and rich flavor we got consistently fooled a lot of veteran smokers...left them flat footed when I told them our cookers were gas fired...let many of them back to the pit to see, cuz they just didn't believe what they were eating didn't come from wood til they saw it for themselves...
Still do 'em same way, only w/6lbers at home w/same result...
