PULLED PORK

Pulled pork is a slow cooked pork shoulder (or occasionally pork butt) that's cooked low and slow until the meat is so tender it easily falls apart and can be shredded into long, juicy strands, seasoned with a dry rub and finished with barbecue sauce or its own cooking juices (which is what i prefer reduced down). While its techniques draw from a broad tradition of slow roasting pork in various cultures, modern pulled pork as known today, served in sandwiches or with smoky, sweet, tangy sauces, has its roots in Southern United States barbecue, particularly in states like North Carolina, Tennessee and Texas, where European, African and Indigenous cooking practices blended to create the regional barbecue styles that popularised this dish.

The key to my version is the wonderful mix of spices that get seared into into, and then cooked into a chilli forward sauce, that when reduced get’s rolled through the torn apart pork and super smoky, as well a perfect combination of savoury and sweet. The bed of tzatziki adds a cooling element, and just goes so well with the juicy pork.

PULLED PORK

〰️

PULLED PORK 〰️

Time: 5 hours

Serves: 4-5

1kg boneless pork shoulder

1 tbl sp smoked paprika

1 tbl sp gr coriander seed

1 tbl sp onion powder

1 tea sp mustard powder

1 tea sp cracked black pepper

1 tea sp gr cumin

1 tea sp all spice

1 brown onion, quartered

1 shallot, quartered

1 long red chilli, deseeded & halved

1 long green chilli, deseeded & halved

1 long orange capsicum, deseeded & chopped chunky

1 jalapeño, deseeded & chopped chunky

4 tbl sp apple cider vinegar

3 tbl demerara sugar

2 cups chicken bone broth

3 bay leaves

Sea salt, to taste

Neutral Oil

To serve: tzatziki and spring onion greens

Preheat oven to 140 degrees Celsius

Dry your pork shoulder with a paper towel. Place all your spices into a bowl with a big pinch of salt and bring together. Dry rub onto your pork shoulder, covering completely.

Place heavy oven friendly pot on high heat. Drizzle oil and brush along the bottom and when pot begins to steam, brown your pork shoulder on every side until dark and charred. Remove from pot and place to side, before adding in your onion, shallot and chillies. Char the alliums hard, you want burnt ends. Remove from pot and place to side.

Deglaze your pot with apple cider vinegar, sugar, bone broth and bay leaves. Reduce by half.

Add back in your alliums before placing your browned pork shoulder on top. Cover with lid and place in oven and slow cook for 4 hours.

Once cooked, remove pork and place in bowl and cover with glad wrap for 10 mins. Remove bay leaves from pot and then blitz the sauce until homogeneous.

Using two fork pull apart your pork. Pour your sauce in and bring all together.

To serve spoon tzatziki onto plate, top with pulled pork & finish with thinly sliced spring onion greens.