Spent a whole morning trying to get a bone-in pork shoulder to fit a customer's tiny smoker

A guy came in last Tuesday asking for a full picnic shoulder, about 12 pounds. He was super specific about wanting the bone in for flavor. I cut him a beautiful piece, wrapped it up, and thought nothing of it. He calls me three hours later, totally stressed, saying it's way too big for his little backyard smoker. I told him to bring it back. I figured I'd just cut it in half, no big deal. But trying to split that shoulder evenly with the bone structure took forever. My band saw was acting up, and I didn't want to just hack at it and ruin the cut. What should have been a 10 minute job turned into a solid 45 minutes of careful work. Has anyone else had a simple request turn into a major time sink because of a customer's equipment?

3 comments

3 Comments

angela5873d ago

Ever think about just telling people to measure their smoker grates first?

cora5183d ago

What about the grates that are not a perfect rectangle?

ray_martinez823d ago

Right? @angela587 has a point, it's like the most basic step that gets skipped every time. People will buy a whole brisket before they grab a tape measure.