October is National Pork Month, and I’m always able to buy large pork shoulders at the best prices of the year. I buy at least two of the largest pork shoulders I can and turn them into pulled pork. I then vacuum-seal them in eight-ounce portions and freeze. The vacuum-sealed packages can stay good for years and be reheated with a little chicken stock or microwaved.
My favorite way of serving pulled pork is on top of a baked sweet potato with black beans and sour cream. If I am serving pulled pork on a bun, I only want pickled red onions as a topping. A thick barbecue sauce drowns out the flavor.
Traditional low-and-slow barbecue means you can be looking at 12-hour cook times or longer for pork shoulders. I find that kind of cook time frustrating and had all but given up when a piece of information given to me by a guy who did competition barbecue suddenly clicked for me.
My friend told me that meat only takes on flavor from the smoke until it gets to about 140°F., which is usually somewhere around the four-hour mark for pork shoulders if your smoker temperature is in the 250°- 300°F. range. After that the cook time is about breaking down the proteins so that the meat becomes tender and so that bark builds up on the surface and contributes its own kind of flavor.
I now cook pork shoulder on a smoker for four hours and finish it by steaming in a pressure cooker for 50 minutes. The result is fall-apart tender pulled pork. The pressure cooker has turned a day-long commitment into a reasonable cooking event.
I get pork shoulders that are close to nine pounds and cut them in at least two smaller chunks. I sprinkle them with kosher sea salt and liberally apply the Memphis Dust Rub recipe from the Amazing Ribs website. I steam each chunk in a pressure cooker with about a cup of water. I then add one tablespoon of Stubbs Pork Marinade for each pound of finished pulled pork. Adding this last bit of marinade is like adding finishing salt to a salad; it just gives it a little something extra.
Count on getting about a 55% yield of finished pulled pork for each pound of pork shoulder. A nine pound pork shoulder will yield about 4.5 pounds of pulled pork.
Memphis Dust Rub Recipe
- ¾ cup Brown Sugar
- ¾ cup White Sugar
- ½ cup Paprika
- ¼ cup Garlic Powder
- 2 tbsp. Ground Black Pepper
- 2 tbsp. Ground Ginger Powder
- 2 tbsp. Onion Powder
- 1 tbsp. Ground Rosemary
The Method:
Step 1: Cut down a pork shoulder into two or three chunks, sprinkle with kosher sea salt and coat liberally with the Memphis Dust Rub.
Step 2: Fire up your smoker and put the pork on for a good four hours.
Step 3: Cook the pork in a pressure cooker on high with about one cup of water for 50 minutes. You’re essentially steaming the pork tender.
Step 4: Remove from the liquid and pull apart or chop up the pork. Add Stubb’s Pork Marinade at a rate of one tablespoon per pound of finished pork.
