Recently, I had the opportunity learn a bit about butchering a pig – how to take it apart and turn it into the various cuts you see in the market (or at the farmer’s market). A friend who has excellent knife skills and some butchering experience led the workshop, and was really great about explaining what the different cuts were.
We lucked out and had half a local pastured pig for the workshop, and I was also fortunate to be able to take home a piece of the shoulder cut, a boneless blade roast. This roast had quite the fat layer on it.
Make that a delicious fat layer. Over the many hours it cooked, the fat basted the meat – and some dripped into the pan, leaving me some wonderful lard for future cooking. Then there was the disintegration of any connective tissue during the long roasting process, making for meat that really just fell apart. It was a truly tasty transformation.
But first, I created a marinade for the meat.
In it was garlic, oregano, salt, ground grains of paradise, citrus juice, apple cider vinegar, and a little bit of bacon fat (for viscosity). I used grains of paradise – a species in the ginger family with a peppery flavor – because I ran out of regular black pepper.
After I created the marinade, I put it on the meat and let it sit for an hour in a glass pan, covered in plastic wrap, in the fridge, and then 30 minutes on the counter, warming up a bit.
Continue reading “Pastured Pulled Pork”
