Pork 'n' Mac 'n' Cheese

When all else fails, make mac'n'cheese and add some smoked pork to it.

The Best Mac 'n' Cheese Ever

1 family size box of Kraft Macaroni and Cheese (the fluorescent powder version, of course)
1/2 stick butter
1/4 c milk
1/2 can pinto beans or chili beans
2 handfuls of smoked pork
something spicy

Cook the pasta and drain. Add it back to the pan with the butter. Sprinkle on the powder cheese and milk and stir it all up. Add the beans and the pork and stir some more over low heat to heat it all through. Add something spicy and you've got yourself a helluva treat.

If you're adventurous with the spice, slice an habanero pepper in half and put it in with the other ingredients. Give it a good stir to warm the spice the whole thing through. In addition to hellacious heat, it has a great citrusy flavor. For god's sake, be careful, though; that sucker is hot. Take a piece in your bowl and rub some pork bits on the pepper every once in a while. That'll wake ya up in the mornin', boy. Don't forget the cold beer(s).

More Pig

Here's another recipe for in case you also have a pile o' smoked pig in the fridge. Sorry about the lack of photos; these dishes go too quickly even for the digital age of photography.

Quesadilla Grande al Puerco Fumado

This is good for those leftover days. I had an Arkansas tomato that tasted like cardboard. This was about the only thing that could save it.

1 flour tortilla
1 handful of shredded cheddar
1 handful of shredded smoked pork
1 handful of crumbled feta cheese
2 big spoonfuls of pinto beans
1 handful diced tomato
1 T finely diced onion
splash of salsa
sliced hot peppers, Chicago style giardiniera, etc.
fresh cilantro
tortilla chips

Lay a tortilla down on a sheet of foil. Sprinkle all the other ingredients around, and top it all with the corn chips. Put it in a 375 toaster oven or regular oven until the cheese is well melted. Dig in!

101 Uses for Pulled Pork

I have a little bit of a problem. Well, to call it a little problem is to do a great disservice to the glorious hunks of pork that I smoked over the weekend. But you just couldn't imagine how much meat would come off of a shoulder and a ham. Untold pounds of smoked-to-perfection pork have already been consumed in pulled pork sandwiches and pork tacos, but I'm still left with at least five pounds of meat, maybe ten. It was a big ham, I tell you.

The meat was rubbed down in a nice blend of spices and then hot-smoked for about 10 hours. The shoulder came out really nice, but the ham had a long way to go, only having reached 160 on the internal temp. Pork doesn't really pull well until all of the connective tissues have broken down, and this happens around 195 F. I finished it off in a slow 250 oven for about 3.5 hours more and popped it in the fridge. The next day I began the task of shredding the beast. At first I used two forks, much like in my recent shredded chicken adventures. About a pound into the behemoth I gave it a rest and saved the rest of the task for the next day, and that's when I discovered the magic of the Chinese cleaver I had picked up for $2 at a Goodwill. The heavy blade made light work of crushing chunks into fibrous mats, and hacking these mats further into bite-sized chunks was quick as can be. If Yan can cook, so can you!

One bonus to come from leaving it in the fridge was the amazing gelatin that formed on the bottom of the ham. It was dark like molasses, chewy like Jell-o jigglers, and smoky with a spicy bite. It seemed like a heart attack waiting to happen, so I didn't eat toooo much...

Several chunks of smoked ham await cooler days and soup making. Until then, I think I'm just about topped up on pulled pork. The barbecue sauce I made is Eastern Carolina style, very tangy and heavy on the vinegar. If you don't dig on the vinegar, use less and add more ketchup.

Eastern Carolina BBQ Sauce for Pulled Pork

2 cups cider vinegar
1 1/2 cups water
1/2 cup ketchup
2 tsp freshly ground pepper
2 tsp salt
1 T honey
1 T molasses
4 tsp hot pepper flakes

Mix it all up and use to dress pulled pork.

Coleslaw for Pulled Pork sandwiches

1 small head cabbage
1 cup of the BBQ sauce

Shred the cabbage with a food processer or chop very fine and mix with the sauce. Serve it up on a slutty white hot dog bun with a good heap of pulled pork and some extra sauce if you like it tangy.