Friday, December 08, 2006

Uncle Jay's Pulled Cork

A week or so ago I made a pulled pork that, by popular acclaim, was one of the best I had come up with thus far...

So... By popular demand:

Uncle Jay's Pulled Cork.

(Coca-cola & Pork Shoulder)

Gets:
4-6 lb pork shoulder (butt).
(I used a boned and rolled shoulder, but bone-in is OK, just a little more work when your are shredding the meat.)
1 large yellow onion
2 large cloves of garlic. (don't use the pre-minced stuff here.)
1 packet of McCormick Grill Mates (R) Mesquite Marinade
1/2 to 3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1 20 oz. bottle Coca-Cola (The Real Thing.)
Olive oil. (Whatever you have, regular, virgin, extra virgin...hell, I don't care.)
Salt (kosher, of course)
Black pepper.
Non-stick cooking spray (unless you like scrubbing the sides of your slow cooker)
All-Purpose Flour for dusting the pork prior to browning
yellow mustard (optional)

Dos:

Get your slow cooker out.
Get a large frying pan out.

Quarter and slice the onion.
Peel, crush and coarsly chop the garlic.
Spray the sides of the slow cooker with cooking spray.
Pour a little olive oil in the bottom of the slow cooker.
Add onions and garlic.
Add GrillMates Mesquite Marinade
Pour in Coca-Cola
Turn on "low" heat

Unwrap pork shoulder and dust with flour, salt and pepper.
(put a handful of all purpose flour on a paper plate with a tablespoon of kosher salt and a few grinds of pepper. Roll the pork in the flour/salt/pepper mixture.)

Turn stove on high heat and in the large frying pan add olive oil (a couple tablespoons).
When it is good and hot, add the pork shoulder and brown it on all sides...
You're looking for a little brown crust on all sides and ends...
Should take no more than 10 minutes to do the whole thing.
Once browned, move the meat into the slow cooker.
(Lower it in carefully. A slam-dunk would be inappropriate here.)

Lid the cooker and wash up.

Cook time 8-10 hours.
(I put mine on at 10PM and at 7:00 am I was shredding the meat)

Next steps:

After the cooking time is expired, remove meat from the slow cooker to a cutting board and give it ten minutes to rest.
(It's been swimming for a long time, it going to be tired.)

While the meat rests, start your sauce.

Take all the "pot-likker" for the slow cooker and put it in a large pot over med-hi heat.
Add brown sugar (to taste) as the mixture reduces.
(Also add yellow mustard here if you want just a little zing)
Stir frequently
Reduce sauce to half original volume.

While sauce reduces, pull pork.
With 2 dinner forks, pull the cooked port into long shreds, the meat should just fall apart.

Put the pulled pork back in the pot. When the sauce has reduced to a nice thick sweet sauce, put sauce back in the pot with the pork.
Mix well. Leave heat on LOW.
(Reserve some sauce for dipping or dressing sandwiches)

Serve with cole slaw and soft rolls for making sandwiches.

Famous!

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Man,
these recipes of yours rate a heading of their own, maybe a link on the side or such?

Anonymous said...

Ditto! (please?)