Labor Day weekend = new season of Dr. Who and slow cooked pulled pork!

This weekend I am channeling my inner geek as the rainy remnants of Hurricane Irene have made their way north to parched Indiana. In preparation for this fantastic weekend (well now that I'm free again from a wide variety of responsibilities for the week), I made myself some slow cooked pulled pork in my slow cooker as I prepare for the new season of Dr. Who on BBCA. If you don't know what Dr. Who is, I'm sorry that you were so neglected in your childhood and you can find all the modern seasons on Netflicks.

WATCH THEM!!!!



With so little original programming on television as media empires focus on finding the most deranged escapees from Willy Wonka's factory and every other musclebound educational dropouts in the USA, having fantastic programming coming from the UK is a pure blessing wrapped in all sorts of wobbly-tobbly greatness that is fantastic writing and intelligent scripting. I also have to give the BBC props where they are due for their new series Copper, which is a police drama set in NYC at the end of the US Civil War. I'm honestly turned off of many "historical" narratives because they sugar-coat the past as some sort of wonderful candy land where gumdrops and butterflies live in unnatural peace. No, Copper is dark, it is gritty, and it is using the science of the day, which makes if VERY interesting to this jaded television watcher.

I know I've done slow cooked pork recipes in this blog before, but they are always well worth doing again. The key with any piece of meat is long, slow cooking over hours; promptly followed by the urge to not pick at the yumminess inside. I'll be using the pork for a variety of recipes this weekend.

Slow Cooked Pulled Pork.

Tools:
2 quart slow cooker or larger (I like my smaller one for this because it keeps all the juices cooked out of the meat on the meat)
Fork

Ingredients:
2-3 lbs of a pork roast (I tend to get mine on sale and then freeze them until I need them).
2-4 tablespoons of chili oil
3-4 tablespoons of white vinegar (I use seasoned rice vinegar mostly because I enjoy the slight flavor difference, but white vinegar works very well)
3-4 tablespoons of "Cajun" seasoning (I have more than a few friends from Louisiana who despise the insanity we call "Cajun" up north. I've been informed that Tony Chachere's Creole Seasoning is acceptable when I am going for that particular flavor.)

Alright, get your slow cooker warming up on low heat. Pour in your chili oil and white vinegar (which will help break down the connective bits on the pork roast so it'll fall apart). Put the pork roast into the slow cooker into the liquid. Sprinkle the seasoning on top of the meat, put the lid on, and walk away for 24 hours or so.

Come back to the slow cooker the next day, wiping the drool off of your chin. Open the lid and resist eating everything inside. Using the fork, stab into the meat, twisting so the meat starts to fall apart. Resist eating the meat. Slowly smell the pure pork juices that are dripping off the fork. You can't help yourself. . .must eat pork!!!!

Alright, I'll be popping up a few of my favorite recipes to use with this slow cooked pork over the next week, hopefully without storms of unforeseen accidents ruining my coming week. Oh, and a simple way to serve this pork right now is getting two slices of bread on a plate, putting some of the pork in the sandwich, followed by a nice mellow mustard, pickles, sliced onion and tomato, and then eating with a fork because the pork has soaked through the bread. Until next time!

Bien Camino!