Pulled pork is a great option when you’re cooking for a crowd. It’s easy to prepare, relatively inexpensive, and almost everyone loves it.
But how do you know how much pulled pork to cook?
You never want to be known as the guy who doesn’t cook enough and leaves his guests hungry. But you also don’t want to end up with tons of leftovers.
In this article we’re going to teach you a basic rule of thumb and a simple formula to calculate how much pulled pork you’ll need to feed everything from a small family gathering to a large backyard BBQ party.
We also give you a nifty table with predetermined quantities all mapped out for you based on how many guests you’re cooking for.
Key Takeaways
- Plan to serve about ⅓ pound of cooked pulled pork per adult.
- For kids, plan about ¼ pound of cooked pulled pork per child.
- You’ll lose about half of the pork’s weight during the cooking process, so you’ll need to purchase twice as much
How Much Pulled Pork Per Person
On average, you’ll need about ⅓ pound of cooked pulled pork per adult and about ¼ pound of cooked pulled pork for kids.
These numbers are based on my own personal experiences as well as consulting other pitmasters for their opinion.
Keep in mind these are based on the average person. Some people probably won’t eat any pulled pork at all while others might eat twice as much as you estimate. But as long as you stick to these general estimates you should be fine.
Raw Weight vs Cooked Weight
If you’ve ever slow-cooked a pork shoulder to make pulled pork, you know the amount of meat you have at the end of the process is way less than the number on the supermarket packaging.
This is partly due to the fact that pulled pork is typically made with bone-in pork shoulder. Once it’s cooked and you pull out the bone, it’s going to weigh less. There’s also a good deal of fat that you’ll probably want to pull out and that waste will also reduce the weight considerably.
And then there’s the cooking process itself. As juices escape and water evaporates the meat itself will noticeably shrink. By the time you shred the pulled pork and get it ready for serving it weight as much as 30 to 50 percent less than its starting weight.
To keep things simple, I just assume the final cooked weight will be half the weight I’m starting with.
A Simple Formula For Determining How Much To Buy
So now we know how much pulled pork to cook per person and we also know that after cooking it you’ll only have about half of the starting weight.
That makes it really easy to calculate how much pulled pork you need to purchase,
Just take a look at your guest list and add up the total number of adults and the total number of kids.
Then drop those numbers in the formula below, replacing A with the number of adults and K with the number of kids.
((A / 3) + (K / 4)) x 2 = Pounds of raw pork needed
For example, let’s say you’re expecting four couples (including you and your spouse) and you have 10 kids combined. That means you need enough pulled pork for 8 adults and 10 kids.
Let’s pop those numbers into our formula:
((8 / 3) + (10 / 4) x 2 =
(2.67 + 2.5) x 2 =
5.16 x 2 = 10.32 pounds
And just like that some very quick math tells us we need a little over ten pounds of pulled pork.
Pretty simple, right?
Handy Dandy Cheat Sheets
To make things easy for you and save you from evil math, we put together the cheat sheet below to make determining how much pulled pork you need easy. The first cheat sheet is for adults…
Number of Adults | Pounds of Cooked Pork | Pounds of Raw Pork to Buy |
---|---|---|
2 | 0.67 | 1.33 |
5 | 1.67 | 3.33 |
10 | 3.33 | 6.67 |
20 | 6.67 | 13.33 |
30 | 10.00 | 20.00 |
40 | 13.33 | 26.67 |
50 | 16.67 | 33.33 |
60 | 20.00 | 40.00 |
80 | 26.67 | 53.33 |
100 | 33.33 | 66.67 |
And this one is for the little rugrats…
Number of Adults | Pounds of Cooked Pork | Pounds of Raw Pork to Buy |
---|---|---|
2 | 0.67 | 1.33 |
5 | 1.67 | 3.33 |
10 | 3.33 | 6.67 |
20 | 6.67 | 13.33 |
30 | 10.00 | 20.00 |
40 | 13.33 | 26.67 |
50 | 16.67 | 33.33 |
60 | 20.00 | 40.00 |
80 | 26.67 | 53.33 |
100 | 33.33 | 66.67 |
Things To Consider
All of these numbers are merely estimates and there are some additional considerations you should think about,
Who are you cooking for?
What kind of crowd are you cooking for? Men tend to eat more than women, and kids will eat less than adults. A group of teenage athletes will have a much bigger appetite than a group of senior citizens.
What time of day is it?
Most people eat more for dinner than they do for lunch. If your party is at noon you probably won’t need as much as you would if you were cooking at dinnertime.
What’s the occasion?
If it’s a casual backyard party where guests are walking around and socializing while they eat, they’ll eat less than they would at a sit down dinner where they can load up there plates.
What else is on the menu?
Is pulled pork the only protein on the menu or are you also serving burgers, hot dogs, and grilled chicken? Are you serving a bunch of side dishes too or just the main dish?
Do you want leftovers?
It might sound crazy, but sometimes I make extra pulled pork on purpose. I like to portion it out and store in freezer bags so I always have some pulled pork on hand for tacos, nachos, or mac and cheese.
The Bottom Line
Pulled pork is super popular and you can can bet it will disappear quickly. And it takes hours to cook, so you can’t just throw more on the grill if you realize you underestimated how much pulled pork you need per person.
That’s why it pays to spend some extra time planning and doublechecking your math to make sure you have enough to feed all your guests.
With this knowledge in your hands you can rest assured you won’t run out. So just sit back, relax, and grill on!
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