Spicy Pulled Pork

Look, I live in the South. Pulled pork is a religion here. Family feuds have been started over barbeque recipes. And I'm not about to step into the BBQ wars, but I recently tried to do spicy pulled pork, and it was phenomenally successful. It was spicy, and tender, and tasty, and everything that good pork should be. This is that recipe.

Look: the pork is great. It will work with burger buns as an almost-sloppy-joe recipe, it will work with (mustard!) BBQ sauces, etc. But I made this for pulled pork tacos, and it works REALLY well for those. For tacos, serve it with a red bell pepper that's been julienned into thin strips of tasty, crunchy, sweet goodness. Add avocado for a bit of fat to cut the spice and add a creamy texture (seriously, the avocado is really good in this. Do not avoid the avocado, it takes the pork to a whole other level). Add sour cream to tie everything together, and wrap it all up in a tortilla to keep your hands clean while you devour the deliciousness.

Pulled pork tacos with this pulled pork are amazing. I'm not kidding. Totally worth it.



Spicy Pulled Pork

1 pork butt (I used a 4 lb pork butt, yours may be heavier or lighter and that's okay. Many grocery stores call this a Boston Butt. In reality, it's a part of the pork shoulder. All "pork butts" are actually shoulder, not butt. You could try this with other cuts, but the pork butt has enough fat to help keep everything moist, and is often on sale in my grocery and is therefore cheap to buy, so I recommend that one)
1/2 sweet onion, finely diced
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 (14 oz) can diced tomatoes with chiles (don't drain the can, add the juice too)
1 cup apple juice
3 tbsp lime juice
3 tbsp diced chipotle peppers in ancho
1/2 tsp Tabasco sauce
1 1/2 tsp ancho chile powder
Salt
Pepper

For Tacos:
1 pkg flour tortillas
1 red bell pepper, julienned
1 avocado, sliced into thin slices
Sour cream (This is almost essential. If you serve spicy pulled pork tacos without sour cream, you are a cruel and unusual cook.)


Preheat the oven to 350F. Yes, I know it seems high. Yes, trust me, it works.

Combine the onion, garlic, tomatoes with chiles, apple juice, lime juice, and the diced chipotle in ancho in a bowl.

Take the pork butt and salt and pepper it thoroughly. Place the pork butt in a 4 1/2 qt pot with lid (or a 4 qt dutch oven, doesn't really matter which), then pour the mixture of tomatoes and stuff over it. Cover the pot (or dutch oven) and stick it in the oven for 3 hrs.

Remove the pot and roast from the oven. Take the pork roast out of the pot and leave it on a plate to cool. Strain the tomato/onion/pepper mix through a strainer into a medium bowl. Reserve the liquids in the bowl, and return the peppers/tomatoes/onions/etc to the pot or dutch oven.

Pull the pork. This will take at least 15 minutes. Plan for time to pull the pork when you plan your meal. Just like you returned the solids from the mix to the pot/dutch oven, return the pulled pork to the pot/dutch oven.

When you're finished pulling the pork, stir the pot to mix the tomatoes/onions/peppers with the pork, then add about 1/4 of the reserved liquid mixture back to the pork. You're looking here to make sure that the pork has enough liquid to reabsorb it and become really soft and tasty. Add the ancho chile powder. Stir. Taste. Add salt, pepper, and Tobasco as appropriate. Stir. Taste. Adjust the salt, pepper, or Tobasco until the pork is as spicy as you want it. Taste again to make sure the salt is right (and because pulled pork is damned tasty, why wouldn't you want to try it?). The pork will likely absorb all of the liquid and needs to be stirred a lot to distribute the spices, that's okay. After the tastings, add more liquid then repeat until you get to the point where you feel like the meat can't possibly absorb more. Usually I add more than 1/2, but less than 3/4 of the liquid back to the pulled pork. Err on the side of more liquid, since you can get pork that's too dry but you can't get pork that's too juicy.

Once you've got the pork to the point that you want it, cover the pot/dutch oven again, and stick it back in the oven for 20 minutes. During those minutes, you can julienne your red pepper, slice your avocado, pull out your sour cream, nuke your flour tortillas, and set the table. When the pot/dutch oven comes out of the oven, stir it to make sure all the juices are incorporated, then serve immediately. These are really tasty.

Serves: 10-14 tacos