Crockpot Pulled Pork

This recipe ratio turned out tasting very good. There were a few changes to how I did this. The first being the lack of apple juice (one cup). I substituted one cup of unsweetened apple butter (made from winesap apples) plus one cup of water. Also, I didn't toss the cooking liquid from the crockpot, instead I reserved it to a pot and simmered it until it had the consistency of barbecue sauce again. This yielded 2.5 cups of sauce. The cut of pork that was used is called "country pork rib", and you can get this in a large multipack from Costco. It's the same cut style of pork that I use for my kimchi pork soup. The only onions in this batch is what is in the BBQ sauce.

Total prep/cooking time: 8 hours
Yields: 1 quart pulled pork (for 2 lbs of meat)

TheFoodening Blog - pulled pork

Ingredients

2-3 lbs boneless country pork rib

1 c unsweetened apple juice, or 1 c unsweetened apple butter plus 1 c water

4 garlic cloves, minced

1/4 c brown sugar

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

1 c BBQ sauce (I used Trader Joe's Kansas City BBQ sauce)

Directions

In the crockpot, place pork on the bottom. Cover with cloves, apple butter, brown sugar, salt, pepper, and barbecue sauce. Add the water to the bottom (don't wash off the stuff on top of the pork).

Set the crockpot to high for 2 hours. Then, set the crockpot to low for 4 hours. After the 6 hour mark, drain the crockpot of its liquid to a separate pot, leaving a half inch of liquid at the bottom of the crockpot. Cook pork for an additional hour. Turn off heat and use two forks to shred the pork.

In the separate pot with the cooking liquid, simmer the liquid on low heat until it has more than reduced by half of its liquid volume. It should be somewhat runnier than the barbecue sauce that went into it but thick enough that it isn't watery.

Take a half cup of the reduced sauce and pour it over the shredded pork. Stir to combine. 

If you made the hamburger buns from the previous post, split those in half and place a good amount of pulled pork on the bottom bun and cover it with the top bun. Enjoy!

TheFoodening Blog - pulled pork on a homemade bun

Note: If you don't have a crockpot or slow cooker, you can also use a dutch oven and bake the pork until tender for 4 hours at 325 F. 

Quick Hamburger Buns

Made this to go with the pulled pork. Don't let the dough rise. That's all I have to say. Although, it'll rise somewhat after shaping the buns as the oven heats up to temperature. The first batch, I have no idea what happened. It turned into some lumpy, soupy mess. But the second time around, the dough came together just fine. The order of operations certainly is a factor here. Onto the recipe...

From mixing to kneading to forming into buns to baking, the prep takes less than an hour.

TheFoodening Blog - hamburger buns

Makes: 7 buns (at 4 oz to 4.25 oz raw dough)

Ingredients

1 c warm water
2 tbsp active dry yeast
1 large egg
1/3 c olive oil
1 tsp kosher salt
2 tbsp + 1 tsp organic granulated sugar
3 cups all purpose flour + more for kneading
(optional) 1 egg + 2 tbsp water, for brushing tops of buns

Preheat oven to 425 F.

Directions

In a large mixing bowl, add yeast to warm water plus 1 tsp sugar. If the yeast does nothing within 10 minutes (e.g., does not foam or make bubbles), toss it out and try again with fresher yeast.

Add the oil, sugar, and salt. Let the mixture sit for 5 minutes.

Whisk in the egg.

One cup at a time, whisk in three cups of flour. By now the dough should be a little runny but smooth. Turn dough out onto a floured board and knead until it isn't sticky any more.

At this point between flouring the board and kneading, I may have added up to a cup more flour.

If you don't have a kitchen scale, divide the dough into six equal pieces. If you do have a scale, make 4 oz balls of dough. Place buns a couple inches apart on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Brush tops of buns with egg wash.

Bake for 10 minutes. Cool on a rack.

Note: if you divide the dough into 12 pieces, you'll be making buns large enough for sliders

Note2: It would appear this is the second time I've written this recipe up. Although, the buns came out really good and not small like what happened before.. 

Marinade for Mushroom Kabobs

Originally I thought about using this marinade for both the brown (cremini) and white mushrooms, but ended up just using the brown mushrooms with red and green bell peppers. I only have aged balsamic vinegar and it seemed a waste to use a tasting vinegar for a marinade so I used half balsamic and half rice vinegar for the vinegar part.

The Foodening Blog - grilled mushroom and vegetable kabobs

Makes: 9 skewers (using 10" bamboo skewers)

Ingredients

8 oz brown cremini mushrooms, stems trimmed
8 oz grape or cherry tomatoes
1 large red bell pepper, sliced into 1" pieces
1 large green bell pepper, sliced into 1" pieces
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, pressed
2 tbsp fresh parsley leaves, chopped
1/2 tsp dried oregano
1/2 tsp dried basil
Kosher salt and fresh ground black pepper, to taste

Directions

Combine all items in a resealable container. Shake to coat everything with the marinade. Refrigerate for an hour or until ready to use.

To grill:

Stab vegetables and mushrooms in an alternating order (for variety!). Grill vegetables for 10-15 minutes, rotating at the half way mark until the mushrooms are done. The bell peppers can be slightly charred.

Asian BBQ Pork Spare Ribs

This recipe tasted OK. How the pork gets cooked probably needs some work and/or tweaking as they came out a little tough to eat. Overall, from an aesthetic perspective, they looked great and social media post-worthy. I was looking to do something different than how pork spare ribs are traditionally served up, e.g., as dim sum small plate (steamed with black beans) or as grilled ribs with an Asian-flavored sauce slathered onto it.

The Foodening Blog: Asian BBQ Short Ribs

While I had a jar of hoisin sauce in the pantry, for once, I made hoisin sauce from scratch for this dish. You can get these short ribs at any Asian grocery store butcher counter. These were already cut to 1" - 1.5" size, and if you were going to make the dim sum short ribs recipe, you'd need these cut to the 1" size. Onward.

Ingredients

2-3 lbs pork short ribs

1/4 c white vinegar

2 tsp sea salt

Marinade Ingredients
1 tbsp hoisin sauce
1/2 c light soy sauce
1/2 c unbleached cane sugar
1/2 c ketchup
1/4 c lemon juice, or fresh juice from 1 lemon plus its zest
3 tbsp raw honey
1 tbsp fresh ginger, minced
1 tbsp fresh garlic, finely chopped

Garnish

2 tbsp white sesame seeds, toasted
green onion, white part (optional)

Directions

Start by bringing a large pot of water to boil with salt and vinegar. Add pork ribs, bring to a boil and cook for 20 minutes. Drain and set aside.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine hoisin sauce, soy sauce, sugar, ketchup, lemon juice, honey, ginger, and garlic. Whisk to combine.

Place cooked ribs in a large ziplock bag (or food storage container with a lid). Pour on the marinade and marinate for up to 6 hours or overnight.

Grill ribs until the ribs are slightly charred. -or- if using an oven broiler, broil meat until slightly charred

Hoisin Sauce (gluten free)

The secret to a good hoisin sauce is to use fermented black beans as one of the main flavor ingredients. Simply using peanut butter and other savory ingredients isn't going to cut it. While you can use a starch (potato starch, cornstarch, or wheat flour) to thicken it up, substituting the starch with peanut butter and using a tamari-based soy sauce makes this sauce gluten free. Also, you should probably use a smooth peanut butter, but alas, all I had on hand was chunky. I've read that if you have a peanut butter allergy, you can also substitute dried prunes (2 prunes per 1 tbsp peanut butter). If you do end up using peanut butter as a thickener, your sauce won't be pasty black at all. It'll be a brown-ish color, like peanut butter.

Hoisin sauce is a sweet and savory sauce, with neither element overpowering the other. And, it certainly does not use Chinese five spice powder. But, you could add it if you like that flavor in your sauce and the accompaniment is a meat-based dish.

At some point I reverse engineered Trader Joe's light soy sauce by experimenting with tamari soy sauce, rice vinegar and water until I got a sodium content that was close to Trader Joe's. You can also find that recipe here.

Makes: ~1/2 cup

Ingredients

1/4 c light soy sauce
2 tbsp organic peanut butter
1 tbsp raw honey
2 tsp rice vinegar
2 tsp sesame oil
1 garlic clove, minced
fresh ground black pepper, a few grinds
1 tbsp black fermented soybeans, rinsed and prepared
1 tsp chili sauce, or more to taste (e.g., Trader Joe's Sriracha or a sweet chili paste)

Directions

In a small bowl, soak fermented soybeans with hot water for about 5 minutes. Drain and then crush the beans with the tines of a fork. Voila. Now you have prepared fermented soy beans.

Whirl all the ingredients in a food processor until smooth. Put it into a lidded jar and refrigerate until ready to use.