Oh my, I cannot express how excited I was to come across David Chang’s recipe for pulled pork (thanks to The Lucky Peach via Yummy Supper). Pulled pork is one of my favorite carnivorous indulgences – sweet, salty and moist, if done properly – it has a lot going for it, in my book.
Since Chang’s new Sydney restaurant Momofuku Seiobo opened this week to tons upon tons of buzz, it will likely be difficult to get a table for quite some time, so this recipe is the perfect choice to tide us over.
I was further encouraged to make this when I discovered how insanely easy it is. It almost feels like cheating – a delicious and impressive final product with minimal effort? Sign me up.
The catch: you need to prep the pork a day ahead and then cook for 6 hours on a low heat. If you can handle that, all the rewards will be yours.
You’ll need:
- A cut of pork shoulder (I used a 1.2 kilogram/2.65 lb. piece. There are 2 of us and we wanted leftovers – this suited perfectly)
- 2.5 tablespoons of salt per kilogram
- 2.5 tablespoons of sugar per kilogram
- Black pepper
What you have to do:
- Rub salt, sugar and pepper on your pork shoulder
- Let stand in the fridge overnight
——–
- Preheat oven to 120 degrees Celsius/250 degrees Fahrenheit
- Place in a roasting pan
- Cook for 6 hours. I did a tiny bit of basting, nothing serious. I’m pretty sure that’s not necessary – I just did it because I felt like I should be doing something.
- Let it rest for about a half an hour, then pull apart with a fork. Serve in any way you can dream up.
I made a vermicelli noodle salad to go with round 1 of our pulled pork (really looking forward to more options with our leftovers too!) I thought a Vietnamese-inspired salad would really compliment the whole sweet/salty combination and also add a freshness with cool veggies like cucumbers, carrots and coriander. It was great!
Vietnamese Noodle Salad
you can really put anything you’d like in the salad, I used:
- Vermicelli rice noodles, cooked in boiling water for 1 minute, drained
- Carrots, grated
- Cucumber, seeded and cut into thin strips
- Red capsicum, cut into thin strips
- Spring onions, chopped into small pieces
- Fresh coriander
- Fresh mint (Vietnamese, preferably)
- Roasted peanuts, chopped for a garnish
The Dressing:
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 1 tablespoon vinegar
- 2 tablespoons honey
- Juice of a lime
- 3 garlic cloves chopped
- 2 red chili peppers, thinly sliced
