Indoor Pulled Pork

My Valentine chose this recipe as his Valentine’s day dinner… too bad this time consuming and complicated recipe wasn’t ready until lunchtime on the 15^th. According to him it was worth the wait: in fact he thinks I should make a batch every week.

I will never flinch at the cost of a pulled pork sandwich. Whatever they want, it is worth it. This recipe was the most work of any recipe I have done so far. First of all, finding a pork butt (which is actually a shoulder) is not as easy and you might think. Then the brining and the rubbing and the more rubbing then the wrapping and the covering and the cooking for 3 hours… then cook another hour and a half… this recipe was a major PITA.

That being said, the end result was amazing. Both delicious and copious, it was one of those things, and it has only happened to me a few times, that when you taste it you can’t believe you made something that tastes so damn good. Shockingly authentic, I would never have believed this pulled pork could have been made in a Manhattan apartment kitchen (and it did push the limits of my kitchen at moments during the preparation).

I paired this recipe with Cook’s creamy coleslaw recipe and it was a great compliment. Having grown up on KFC coleslaw I had to add a tablespoon of sugar to the mix to take the bite out.

Take away

• Liquid smoke=liquid magic

• Sweet and hot go together for perfection again this week. The barbeque sauce combines molasses and hot sauce to create a similar balance to the sugar and chili combination in the Thai Basil Chicken a couple of weeks ago. Yum.

• Whole Foods came through for me this week with almost every ingredient (they were out of smoked paprika). I am in the love phase of the love-hate relationship I have with them.