Some details I put on another forum and additional details here too:
A college buddy was coming into his town with his family, so I thought I'd order a suckling pig and cook it on the BGE (XL). I watched enough videos to feel pretty good about what I'm doing and I can Macgyver with the best of 'em if things go south.Anyway, if my suckling pig was still suckling, it was like the equivalent of a 9 year old boy breastfeeding Game of Thrones style. Sure enough, we had to do a little back surgery to get this "baby" to fold over just to fit him in (we removed three vertebrae). In the end, the pig was excellent. We served the meat with legit taco fixings, food-truck style. Limes, cilantro, sour cream, avocado, radishes, etc. No complaints.
I'll tell you, the very tasty parts of the pig were the ribs, although there was very little meat on them, and the bacon (duh).But the tastiest part was where the fold was in the belly because that's where the moisture settled inside the pig, essentially basting whatever was around (beneath). The seasoning, lemongrass, garlic hunks, onion and lemon juices pooled here and basted the hell out of this part. The flavor was nuts, whereas in some other places, it was good, but no better than a pork butt really (not that I'm complaining about that).
I bought this guy at an asian market in the Bay Area. Cost about $230. Ordered a "large" (30 to 35lbs) but I think it was 45lbs. No brine. The market gave me a dry rub that smelled awesome and was probably a bit salty (MSG, I'm betting). We used
It took about 7 hours to get the ham to 195ish. BGE thermometer read about 290 most of the time; grill temp was around 235 to 240. Used plate setter, legs up.