Porky heaven.

Last week at Schnuck's (a grocery store, I don't think it's national) they had an amazing deal on pork butt.  Let's be clear about something: it's not butt... it's not even near the butt... it's shoulder.  So why don't they call it shoulder?  My husband says that butchers probably started calling it that to dissuade people from buying that cut of the pig and encouraging them to buy another cut.  I say that a 12-year old boy who thinks profanities are funny named it.  But I digress.

I got a great price for a HUGE package of pork shoulder.  That one package was enough for three separate meals and the price was only $6 total.  Jack. Pot.  I've never cooked with pork shoulder before, so I did what any culinary novice would do: I hit the internet.

Evidently, the words 'pork butt' are synonymous with 'pulled pork sandwiches' because every recipe I saw was for that meal.  I enjoy a good pulled pork sandwich though, and at the same grocery store there was an AWESOME sale on barbecue sauce, so it was like the universe wanted me to have these sandwiches for dinner.  I found a recipe that seemed pretty easy and got good reviews from other people, so I gave it a whirl.  Here's the play-by-play:

Season both sides of the meat with your choice of spices.  We are a kosher salt and garlic powder type of family, but I'm sure that there are countless spices that would work with this.

In my mind, there's no such thing as too much garlic.  Next, you need to sear the meat in a cast iron skillet.  Why cast iron?  I have no idea... but I've been assured there is a scientific culinary reason and I should just do it and zip the lip.  So I did:

Pork goodness.  While the meat is searing, cut up an onion and separate the rings.  I admit, due to a very old refrigerator that freezes anything put in the back of it, my onion was a little frozen... interestingly, I did not tear up while cutting it!  Maybe that's the secret to a tear-free onion cutting.  Anyhoo, layer half of the onions in a crockpot.

Put the seared pork on top of the onions and put the other half of the onion on top of that.  Pour 1/4 cup of soy sauce over the top and then add 1/2 cup of water along the side of the crockpot.

Let me tell you, it smelled good at this point and I hadn't even turned the sucker on.  Nice.  Put the crockpot on low for 8-10 hours, or on high for 4-5... I had all day, so I turned it on low and walked away.  After about 9 hours, it looked like this:

Shut. My. Mouth.  This smelled amazing.  Truly.  I stood there and smelled it for a good three minutes.  No judgement until you've tried it, folks.  I took the meat out with a fork and a carving knife and the meat fell apart. Literally.  I had to get a slotted spoon to get the meat out.  I didn't need the knife to cut the meat, the fork pulled it apart with absolutely no effort.  Love it.  The husband and kids put barbecue sauce on it and slapped it on a bun, while I went au natural.  It was delish.  Pork heaven, truly.  I will have dreams about that meal.

Try this.  It's spectacular.  And messy, so make sure there's a package of napkins handy.  Yum.