Barbecue

[filkertom]

I didn't make the Cook's Country Dutch-oven-pulled-pork-for-two yesterday. Not feeling well. Today, I made it. The work was the better part of an hour: trimming blade chops off the bone, cooking bacon so that everything else is sauteed in the bacon fat, browning a pound and a quarter of spice-rubbed pork. Read the recipe wrong; the rub wanted a teaspoon each of ground cumin and chili powder instead of a tablespoon. Final result: right at the absolute top of my range for handling spicy food. Fortunately, I had crackers and ice cream at hand.

Also fortunately, the pulled pork tastes amazing.

The barbecue sauce, which it braises in, is as flavorful as any I've ever had. The pork was fall-apart tender, and even with my taste buds screaming enough with the capsaicin already I had to make myself stop and only eat half the batch. The other half is currently in the fridge, where tomorrow it shall make friends with some corn muffins.

This is by far the most ambitious thing I've cooked completely by myself. I've made lots of chili and weeknight ground-beef spaghetti sauce. I've done a holiday party feast with crock pot chili, two meat loaves, and from-scratch green bean casserole, but Leslie was basically my sous-chef. I've made a knock-off of be bim bop a couple of times, but with help from Les (the first time) and Anne (the second). I made from-scratch tacos and fried the corn tortillas for the shells (if you have never done this, it's a revelation).

But never have I made barbecue from scratch. Certainly, I had only hoped it would taste as wonderful as it actually did.

And I've got more for tomorrow.

And how's your Sunday dinner?

Comments

[shinymarigold.livejournal.com]

Sunday dinner was a salmon filet baked with lemon slices and dill from my patio pot, with roasted red potatoes. I meant to toss in some garlic, but I forgot. Also, balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing is the easiest marinade ever! 8-9