Pulled Pork....

Being kept in because of the weather has its advantages. For example, I cook more and I try a few new recipes. Yesterday we had something that could be called Pulled Pork. We told the kids that anyway, so that they would eat it. It was actually just a pork shoulder roast which began on Saturday, like this -

1. I brinned a 2 pound, bone in, pork roast. I now have a large box of Kosher salt which I have to use up and I am short two tablespoons of peppercorns. I hope that the price of peppercorns doesn't spike :)

2. Sunday I poured all the brine along with the peppercorns down the drain. Patted dry the pork. Seared it in a hot oven and then cooked it slowly for 5 hours at 300ºF.

3. When it was done, I took the pork out of the pot. It was a challenge because the roast was falling apart. Next, according to the recipe, we had to "finish it" on the Bar-B-Q. I would have just flaked it onto a plate as it was, however, my husband is a purest and so we lathered the meat with BBQ sauce and worked out a strategy for getting it out of the house and onto the grill in one piece - not easy.

     a. First we had to resurrect a grate that had been hanging around in the garden for several years. I bought it for my husband as a birthday gift to do grilled vegetables on, but since he doesn't like vegetables, he never used it. We will not go into why I bought him the grill in the first place. Did I say that I happened to like grilled vegetables?

     b. Then we had to find a cookie sheet to put under the grill to stop the BBQ sauce from running all over the place. The pork and the sauce, of course, stuck to the grill and now I have it soaking in baking soda to resurrect it again.

We rounded out the pork with herbed navy beans, also soaked the night before and a sweet potato and squash puree with toasted pine nuts. At one point I looked at my plate and realized that there was nothing green on it. I guess I was too busy to do yet another lot of beans, green ones this time!

We knew that the kids wouldn't eat the vegetables, so we bought hamburger buns, cut up onions and tomatoes etc for them to make pulled pork burgers. There was lots gravy for a dipping sauce and lots of leftover beans for soup tonight.

It wasn't especially healthy and it took a lot of time and used too many pots and pans, but it was an adventure. It broke the boredom of snow, snow, snow.....and it made me really appreciate our recipe for BBQ'd ribs. Even though I par boil them, they are simple, not the engineering feat of the pulled pork.

The picture? There is none. I was too exhausted to remember to take one, sorry and there won't be a next time!!!

Have an easy day!!