Southern Barbecue: Pulled Pork

So I know "barbecue" down here means meat on a grill or over an open flame, but in the South in America, and particularly from my home state of North Carolina, it is a very special and sometimes controversial dish consisting of pork cooked so fine that it falls off the bone. The controversy comes in when you ask people from different parts of the state what type of sauce to apply to this amazing creation. Westerners prefer tomato based barbeque sauce, which I traditionally reserve for barbecue chicken on the grill. Naturally, eastern style, vinegar based barbeque is the way to go, and is what I am demonstrating in the recipe below.

Special Utensils: Slow cooker

Ingredients:
1 onion, chopped
2 tablespoons (37 grams) brown sugar
1 tablespoon (19 grams) paprika
2 teaspoons (9 grams) salt
1/2 teaspoon (2.25 grams) black pepper
1 pork shoulder roast (4 lb, 1.8 kg)
2 cup (450 grams) apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup (80 ml) worchestershire sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons (7 grams) crushed red pepper
2 teaspoons (9 grams) sugar
1/2 teaspoon (2.25 grams) granulated garlic
1/4 teaspoon (1.13 grams) cayenne pepper

Put chopped onions in bottom of slow cooker. If you like, remove some of the excess fat from the top of the roast (I do because you are still going to have plenty of fat even without this promenent strip). Create rub using brown sugar, paprika, salt, and pepper and rub over the whole roast, then place roast in slow cooker. In a separate container, mix vinegar, worchestershire sauce, crushed red pepper, sugar, granulated garlic, and cayenne pepper. Drizzle 1/2 of this mixture over roast and reserve the rest in refridgerator. Cook roast on low 6-10 hours, depending on your slow cooker (you want the meat falling apart when pierced with fork). Remove roast from slow cooker and shred with forks. Discard onions, but use juice from slow cooker combined with remaining vinegar mixture to season pork to your liking. Serve pulled pork on hamburger buns with coleslaw or (my personal preference) alone with baked beans and macaroni and cheese. Freeze any leftovers for use in Brunswick Stew (recipe elsewhere in blog).

picture courtesy of google images
 

** This is all approximate measurements. I usually add a touch more crushed pepper, as I like mine a little spicy.