Back home, my favorite BBQ place is, by far, Slow's. Everything there is absolutely delicious. They were featured on Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives, and Man Vs Food. They even came in second place on the Adam Richman's Best Sandwhich in America TV special for their sandwich, The Yardbird. Sadly, I've never had the pleasure of eating a Yardbird despite the frequency with which I used to go to Slow's. Why? Because almost every single time I've been to that fine establishment, I've ordered the pulled pork (with the obligatory two sides of mac and cheese.)
A great feature of Slow's is that they offer several varieties of BBQ sauce that you can use on your food. With these delicious condiments, an order of pulled pork is less like a plate of swine, and more like a plate of divine. For my attempt at pulled pork I only made a single sauce. I chose to go the spicy route. Here's what you'll need for my take on pulled pork:
Pork Shoulder
Salt
Black Pepper
Cayenne Pepper
Red Pepper Flakes
Paprika
Cumin
Dried Parsley
Buns (if you want to make a sandwich)
Chili Paste
Vinegar
BBQ Sauce
Hot Sauce
A nice thing about pork shoulder is that it's pretty cheap. It has a lot of fat throughout the cut, which makes it good for cooking low and slow, which pulled pork requires. Mine had so much fat on it, however, that I decided to cut off just a little bit of it on the outside. This is not required but it will make it slightly healthier. Note: it will by no means make this dish good for you.
To prepare the pork for the dry rub, first pat it dry with some paper towels. We'll be searing the outside of this pork before it goes into the oven, and you'll want it as dry as possible for that. For the rub itself combine fresh ground black pepper, salt, paprika, cumin, cayenne pepper, red pepper flakes, and dried parsley. (Note: course sea salt would be better for this, but I ran out.) Use amounts that you're comfortable with. I rarely measure things out when I cook, I simply add to taste. Do you like cumin a lot? Add a bunch! Want it really hot? Go hog wild with the cayenne! (I did both of these things.)
Here is how it looks after mixing all the aromatic spices together in a bowl.
Now go ahead and get your hands messy and apply your rub to the meat. I read somewhere that it doesn't really matter if you actually massage the rub into the meat. All that really matters is that you cover it in one nice layer. Useful or not, I like to show it some love. I rub it all in there and make sure to get it into the nooks and crannies. Once properly rubbed, your meat will be nice and stimulated. Also, your pork will be ready for the fridge. Here's how it looks:
Looks good enough to eat raw, am I right? But don't do that. Instead, wrap it in some plastic wrap and throw it in the fridge overnight. Twenty-four hours is ideal, but less is probably fine.
The next day, unwrap it and get ready to sear. Put a little bit of oil in your pot to prevent sticking and turn the heat up high. Place the pork in the pot and sear all sides until brown and beautiful. Tongs are useful for this if you have them. I did not, and resorted to two wooden spoons. This process will not take long. Remember that we are just searing the outside of the pork to lock in the juices. We're not trying to cook it. That will come next.
Once all sides are seared, drain any excess oil at the bottom of the pan if there's too much. Inevitably, some fat will drop from the meat and into the bottom of the pan to be used for the sauce later. Place the lid on the pot and toss it into the oven preheated to 300 degrees. The idea is to cook it low and slow. My pork was about 3.3 pounds and took 2 hours. You can use a meat thermometer to check if it's done in the middle if your kitchen is equipped with such a device. Mine is not, and so I had to wing it.
When it's done make sure to let it rest before you start pulling it. If you're uncertain about whether or not it's ready, try pulling it with a fork. If it comes apart fairly easily, you're good to go. However, if you fail to let it rest for awhile, the juices will run out.
Transfer the pork into a big bowl and get to pulling. Just start ripping it apart with two forks. If you cooked it properly, it will come apart no problem. It will take great will power to avoid snacking on some of the delicious pork at this time. Hopefully, you're cooking alone and you can do so freely, but if friends or family are around wait until no one is looking before sneaking some to hide your shame.
Now, remember all that fat and grease from the bottom of the pot? Save some of it for the sauce. Too much, and it will be too rich, so be careful. You can choose how bad for you the sauce will be by how much of the drippings you leave in the pot. Dump out however much you're comfortable with, but make sure to save at least a little for your sauce, as the pork (now pulled) will be making a triumphant return. Add to the drippings some chili paste, vinegar, BBQ sauce, and hot sauce. All four of these ingredients come in a wide array of flavors and balances. I choose habanero hot sauce for the heat, and I only used a little BBQ sauce as I only wanted a little of that flavor. Vinegar is an important part of the sauce as it goes extremely well with pork. I would have chosen apple cider vinegar instead of brown rice vinegar if I had it, but I forgot to get it while shopping. Experiment and find what you like.
Using low heat, mix all the ingredients into the pork drippings to create your sauce. At this point I also added in a bit more red pepper flakes and fresh ground black pepper.
Now it's time to add the meat back into the pot. Make sure you have enough sauce to get all your pork nice and coated.
The pork is already done cooking, so only very low heat is needed. All you're trying to do is get all the pork nicely covered by the sauce. You can also shred some of the bigger chunks if you got ahead of yourself like I did.
A great thing about pulled pork is how versatile it is. You can serve it however you want. At Slow's you can get it on a sandwich or just on a plate all by itself. I chose to throw it on a bun. If you follow suit, make sure you add a sprig of parsley on the plate before serving. It tricks people into thinking you know what you're doing!
A good choice of sides for this is mac and cheese. I've never made it myself, but my brother knows how, so I might have him teach me so I can make it myself. Keep an eye on this blog for a mac and cheese post at some point.
It's also good to have additional sauce to serve on the pulled pork. If you make some sauce separately, you can put it in a squeeze bottle and allow each person to determine how much sauce they want to use on their pork. If you really want to get fancy, you can make several types of sauces and let people pick and choose which one(s) they use. I plan on entering a cooking competition at the end of this week and will be repeating this recipe, but I will be including two different sauces and incorporating mushrooms to make pulled pork that is even more off kilter! Stay tuned!
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