I'm trying my hand at slow cooker pulled pork. This is the first time I've done this so we'll have to see how it goes. First off, I referenced these two pulled pork recipes:
Shutterbean's slow cooker pulled pork and the
easy oven pulled pork. I pulled the slow cooker style from shutter bean but went with the flavoring found at serious eats.
It's cooking right now on low. I'm going to check on it in 4 hours, then flip it over and maybe cook it for another 4... overnight.
I made a rub for it. Cumin, garlic powder, paprika, white sugar, fresh ground pepper, kosher salt. I rubbed this on a 2 pound pork shoulder/butte. I bought this cut of meat in a 5 pound version with the bone in it. That was the original size, but it doesn't fit in my slow cooker. So I butchered it down to 2 pounds without the bone. I did that this morning and rubbed it down also with salt and pepper before refrigerating for the afternoon.
So, after I applied the light rub, I decided to sear it just like the serious eats version. I did this on my stovetop in my trusty dutch oven. I only took it to 2-3 minutes a side until they developed some cover.
I prepped the slow cooker. I chopped up an 1 1/2 onions and laid some in the slow cooker. My slow cooker is taller than it is wide. I also chopped up some garlic. I threw it in the slow cooker like the onions and turned the cooker on high to begin the slow, slow heating up.
When the meat was slightly seared, I transferred it to the slow cooker. I poured in about 16 oz of store bought, low sodium chicken broth enough to cover half the meat. I then poured a little more into my dutch oven to deglaze whatever was burnt onto it. I poured this liquid onto the meat in the slow cooker. I then added 1/2 teaspoon of some liquid smoke and 3 bay leaves. The bay leaves I put in because if bay leaves are good enough for pork adobo it should be good enough for pulled pork. I finally covered the rest of the meat with a little more onions and garlic.
Cross your fingers that this turns out edible.
Labels: cooking, step-by-step
