Sunday, August 9, 2009

pork picnic.

If you read this title and are confused, you're like me. If you read that and are like, oh yeah, pork picnic, whatev... then enlighten me. If you read that and imagined pigs lounging around eating potato salad and watermelon at a summertime picnic, then you've got a good imagination.

I've been trying out every grocery store in town, and the local farmer's markets. Carrboro farmer's market is amazing. I got a huge bag of basil for $2.00 and made homemade pesto. We got 4 different kinds of tomatoes, and okra, which I've never cooked before. And locally made andouille sausage - Gabriel made an amazing jambalaya. The grocery stores are mostly whole-foods-ish, except they have a beer and wine aisle. (Beer is on sale everywhere, and in Carrboro people drink on the lawn right outside the store and play music.)

To continue my meandering story, yesterday I needed some basics and went to the cheapest food store in town. It was not as well lit, had 70's colors and no chalkboards with colorful designs announcing the local organic special. But there was all this food that was new to me, and you could get every type of pepper in bulk. People actually talked to each other in there, and I talked to a total stranger for 10 minutes (my northeastern blood did not know how to deal with this at all, but i got through it ok). The above-mentioned pork picnic was on sale and I'd never seen it before so I had to get it. It's 8 lbs! It's like a pork picnic baby.

I've purposely not googled or looked it up in a cookbook yet. I like the mystery. I bet if I throw it in the crock pot with some bbq sauce and vinegar it'll be good (pulled pork?). If you have any suggestions let me know !

2 comments:

  1. You're a transplant to the south. I love it.

    You have exactly divined the purpose of a pork picnics -- they're to get pulled after crocking or smoking (really, just smoking). I prefer the smoker, and it can take 8-10 hours of water smoking to get it just right. If you want to crock it, you'll have to cut it up or just use part of it, cause I don't think the whole thing usually fits in a crock, does it?

    Now, I don't really like NC BBQ. It's vinegar based, and I prefer the molasses-based sauces. But now that you're in NC you've gotta try cooking your shoulder "Lexington" style, and making a ketchup & vinegar based BBQ sauce.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Thanks! I guess my intuition was right. Unfortunately I have no smoker, but I think I can manage with the crock pot. I was excited to have just made it over the border in NC where there's vinegar-based BBQ - I love it! Which reminds me I haven't had any yet here...

    ReplyDelete

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails