Pulled Barbeque Pork with Spicy Slaw and Flatbread

I never thought clearing out my university fridge and freezer before the end of term could be so delicious. With the ever amazing help of Jamie Oliver’s barbeque sauce (see here), this slow cooked pulled pork shoulder was a greasily delicious end to a tiring term and brought a stomachful of summer hope to a cold March that has well and truly outstayed its welcome. A crunchy homemade coleslaw is a great and simple side without the sickly addition of buckets of mayo you often find your ‘healthy’ cabbage swimming in in the supermarket. Wrapped protectively in a snug wholemeal flatbread…….if only my dissertation had been on food….

  • 500g pork shoulder
  • 1 quantity of marinade (recipe here)
  • 2 carrots
  • 1 parsnip
  • 3 small raw beetroot
  • 500g yoghurt
  • 1 lime
  • 5 spring onions, finely chopped
  • 1 heaped tsp of the following mix of ground spices (toast 1tsp of each fennel, cumin, coriander and fenugreek seed with 1 cinnamon stick, 3 cardamon pods and 1 star anise in a dry frying pan until hot, fragrant and beginning to pop, remove and grind in a pestle and mortar until fine).
  • Bunch mint, chopped
  • Bunch coriander, chopped
  • Punnet of cress
  • 250g wholemeal flour
  • 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tsp cumin seeds
  1. Begin with the pork. Cover the pork in the marinade in a large heavy based casserole dish and leave in the fridge overnight to infuse the flavours. The next day, preheat the oven to 170.
  2. Place a lid on the dish and slowly cook for 3 hours, basting in the sauce about 3 times.
  3. Meanwhile, make the coleslaw. This is easiest shredded in a food processor with the appropriate blade attachment or you can grate by hand.Grate the carrot, parsnip and beetroot into a large dish
  4. Add the chopped herbs.
  5. Combine the zest of the lime and the juice to the yoghurt with some seasoning and a tbsp of mayonnaise and the spice mix to make the dressing.
  6. Only before serving, dress the coleslaw in the dressing and scatter over the cress.
  7. For the flatbreads, mix the flour, cumin seeds, oil and 150ml warm water in a bowl and mix to form a ball of dough. Divide into about 6 pieces and roll thinly into discs. Before serving, fry each for a few minutes each side in a really hot  dry frying pan until beginning to char and puff up. Keep warm wrapped in a teatowel while you fry them all and finish the pork.
  8. After 3 hours, the pork should be nicely cooked and tender. Remove from the oven, spoon off the liquid fat that has melted from the pork and discard, leaving the remaining marinade.
  9. Leave to rest for about 20 minutes. Then, cut off any of the skin and fat and discard. Next shred using a couple of forks and mix int he remaining marinade left in the dish.
  10. Serve with the coleslaw and flatbreads and come extra yoghurt if you like!

For some light amusement, here is a picture of the first cut of pork from our first attempt at keeping pigs last year. Yes they were accidently overfed….yes that is 50% fat to 50% meat….and yes the butcher could not make sausages with those pigs because they were so obese. We have since refined our animal handling and will be dining on a model piece of pork this Easter, thankfully for our arteries (and theirs…RIP).

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