Oven-Roasted Pulled Pork Sandwiches

4/12/2010: This is a recipe I found on the foodnetwork (a Tyler Florence recipe), which I adapted. I made this for lunch for 11 people yesterday.

What I did or didn’t do:

- I didn’t marinate the pork at all and found it unnecessary.
- I placed the pork in the oven (covered tightly with tin foil) just as I turned it on.
- Roasted for 5 hours 45 minutes (came out perfect!)
- Removed the excess fat before shredding with two forks.
- Used store bought BBQ sauce and docker-ed it up with a spicy marinade (Sweet Baby Ryan's BBQ sauce and Stubb's pork marinade
- Cooked the day before
- Added to a crock pot the morning of the luncheon and heated on low for 2 hours. Added some of the pork liquid from the pan (previously placed in a pot in the refrigerator, skimmed the fat off the top).
- I added the BBQ sauce just enough to coat the meat and had extra sauce on the side for people to add to their taste.
- Served with my favorite Claussen Kosher dill pickle spears.
- 8 pounds serves 14-15 people.


Oven-Roasted Pulled Pork Sandwiches

Serves 12

Dry Rub:
3 tablespoons paprika
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon brown sugar
1 tablespoon dry mustard
3 tablespoons coarse salt (I used 2 T.)
I added: 1 t. onion powder (I actually had dried onions and placed in a food processor to mince), 1 T. thyme, 1 t. cayenne pepper

1 (5 to 7 pound) pork roast, preferably shoulder or Boston butt (I used 8 pounds shoulder)

Cider Vinegar Barbecue Sauce:

1 1/2 cups cider vinegar
1 cup yellow or brown mustard
1/2 cup ketchup
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 garlic cloves, smashed
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cayenne
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

12 hamburger buns (I used Martin's potato buns)
1 recipe Spicy Slaw (didn’t make)
Pickle spears

Mix the paprika, garlic power, brown sugar, dry mustard, and salt together in a small bowl. Rub the spice blend all over the pork and marinate for as long as you have time for, as little as 1 hour or up to overnight, covered, in the refrigerator.

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F.

Put the pork in a roasting pan and bake for about 6 hours. Basically, roast the pork until it's falling apart and an instant-read thermometer inserted into the thickest part registers 170 degrees F.

To make the barbecue sauce: combine the vinegar, mustard, ketchup, brown sugar, garlic, salt, cayenne, and black pepper in a saucepan over medium heat. Simmer gently, stirring, for 10 minutes until the sugar dissolves.

Remove the pork roast from the oven and transfer to a large platter. Allow the meat to rest for about 10 minutes.

While still warm, take 2 forks and "pull" the meat to form shreds. Using 2 forks, shred the pork by steadying the meat with 1 fork and pulling it away with the other.



Put the shredded pork in a bowl.



Pour 1/2 of the sauce on the shredded pork and mix well to coat.

To serve, spoon the pulled pork mixture onto the bottom 1/2 of the hamburger bun, and top with the spicy slaw. Serve with pickle spears and the remaining sauce on the side.

8/2/10: I made this again, but used my crock pot.