I've cooked probably 10 pork butts that way. Like you say, it's pretty good for being so quick. The pork shreds well and is pretty tender – you mainly just miss out on the smoky flavor and bark.

I recently got an old Traeger smoker, and I've done one pork butt, and two picnic roasts on it so far. They're definitely in a different league, but it does take much longer.

Since I happened to take a mid-cook photo of the last one I did: https://imgur.com/a/FYyFJ83

I wouldn't really compare pressure cooker pork butt to the smoker version, but it's great compared to the other common non-smoker variant, the crock pot(or slow cooker to be brand generic). For most meats, I don't want to go back to a slow cooker(except for certain sauces/marinades). The pressure cooker version is still tender, but retains more of a meat texture, rather than turning to mush as often happens with a slow cooker.

No hate, just different. I cook my butts in a nat gas powered grill I have. Low heat on one side, butt on the other, with bread pans full of soaked wood chips directly on the burner. BBQ purists would hate me, but it taste great, works with what I have and is relatively easy to do.

I was inspired to figure out a good way to smoke/cook BBQ on equipment I had from an Alton Brown Good Eats episode.

Pressure cookers are magic, everyone who likes to cook should have one. Especially for stuff that normally takes an obscene amount of time to do properly like beef stock.

I’ve done similar with sous vide the difference being of course much lower temps and that it’s over days but it’s basically hands off for the whole cooking time and you can get a fairly decent crust by smoking it for a couple hours before shredding it as smoke only penetrates the surface a little anyway.

https://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2016/07/sous-vide-barbec...

Start in the pressure cooker, glaze, then put under the broiler for 10 min. It gives a nice bark.

Yep, I live in pork BBQ country, totally reasonable way to get a meal on the table. Always prefer smoke, but I'm not gonna turn down a ready made BBQ sandwich, they real kicker is making sure it is a good sauce and there's good slaw for it!

I remember when the instant pot got big and I got one. I gotta say that Pressure Cooking is such a good and underrated technique. Truly easy to make good quality food pretty quickly. Was so nice to have one for part of my time at University...

I know it's sacrilege but I actually prefer the pressure cooker version.

I wonder if you can pressure cook it for some fractional period, and then finish it in a smoker for another fractional period that ends up being 1/2 or less the total time of smoking alone, but would stand up to smoked meat.

When I was a wee goat, I took immense pleasure in an oven we had that combined microwaving and convection baking. The directions on a frozen deep dish apple pie was something like an hour. And microwave+convection was something like 30 minutes. And it was totally passable for a baked-only pie.

A friend started picking the brain if her Indian coworker’s wife on cooking, and as far as I’m aware the best “secret” she got out of her was that a number of traditional dishes can be approximated quite well in a pressure cooker. Nobody living in an apartment in North America has a tandoor, for instance. Or wants to spend all day cooking in a hot kitchen.

On a similar note, sous vide can get exceptional results without all of the hassle.

Sous vide to cook. Chill in the fridge overnight. Smoke for an hour or two.

It's gets you about 90% the same results without needed to keep the smoker perfectly dialed in.

Not the same thing, but if I only have an hour, I'll cut the pork into chunks and make carnitas. I have to believe that it'll taste better than pressure cooked pork.