Mojo Pulled Pork
Pulled pork was something I used to make at least once year, smoking up a couple large pork butts to share with friends and freeze leftovers for other uses. The pandemic put a hold on most of my large format cooking, and included with that was pulled pork, so when I decided to return The Meatwave to its pre-pademic form this past spring, there was no question pulled pork had to be part of the menu. I decided to use a mojo sauce as a base of many of the dishes that day, and my pork shoulder fell into that category to create mojo pulled pork.
It's the Cuban variation of mojo I'm referring to here, whose two primary ingredients of sour oranges and garlic account for the majority of the flavor definition. The sour oranges are what most folks will have the most trouble procuring, but the good news is that you can replicate the bitter orange flavor fairly well by using regular freshly squeezed orange juice and lime juice in a one-to-one ratio. Luckily, one my of local groceries always has a plethora of sour oranges, which not only lets me get them when needed, but allows me to choose the juiciest specimens—it's common for many of the sour oranges to feel either too hard or rather hollow and juiceless.
Garlic in a large quantity is also required, and to get the most intense garlicky flavor, complete pulverization is called for to break down as many cells as possible. A mortar and pestle makes easy work of this, but it can also be accomplished by finely mincing the garlic and then working it into a paste by pressing down on it with the side of a knife. Besides the flavor reasoning to mash the garlic, another important aspect of this particular recipe is be able to inject the mojo sauce into the pork, and larger garlic bits would not work in an injection scenario that utilizes a syringe to do the job.
I actually made two version of mojo sauce for this dish, with the first of them being used as a dressing for coleslaw. For color and extra crunch, I opted for red cabbage as a base here with the standard onion and carrot accompaniments. After drawing out moisture from the veggies via salt and sugar, I rinsed and dried them and then tossed in the mojo sauce which had a couple extra seasonings like cilantro and black pepper. That citrusy and garlicky flavor really stood out in this slaw, which is what I was after since I made a good assumption that the mojo touch of the pork itself would end up being light in the end.
Like with the salad dressing, the injection I put together was not a strictly traditional mojo sauce. For one, I swapped out oil for water and added a bunch of salt, both done to help make this better suited to be an injection as well as have a brining function.
I still had to deal with some garlic bits that did not fit into the needle, but whenever I hit one of those, I merely pushed it aside with my finger to allow the mixture to keep flowing in. I injected the pork all over, adding about a cup of moisture into the meat that wasn't there before. Inevitably some liquid leaks out, so once done, I patted the pork dry with paper towels before applying the rub.
I kept the rub simple, playing off the flavors already in the mojo sauce with oregano, cumin, and garlic all getting representation. The two primary ingredient though were kosher salt and light brown sugar, that later added to provide a touch of sweetness to balance out the bitterness of the orange and temper the garlicky bite a tad.
Once the rub was applied, I brought the pork down to the smoker and set it in to start cooking at 10:00pm in the evening. I kept an eye on the meat and pit temperatures for a bit, but then got a good night of shut eye knowing my BBQ Guru would keep things running well, or alert me if anything went awry. The next morning the pork had developed a dark, crusty bark. At this stage I sometimes wrap the pork in butcher paper or aluminum foil to speed up the remaining cooking and prevent over blackening the exterior, but I was happy with how everything was playing out as it was that day, so I just kept the meat smoking without touching it.
It was around noon that the pork had reached my target temperature of 203°F, at which point I removed it from the smoker, wrapped it in butcher paper, and slide it into the Cambro to rest until my guests arrived at 2:00pm. For me, this rest phase is pretty crucial for getting the juiciest meat and a slightly softened bark, which blends better into the final pulled pork mix.
When it came time to eat, I removed the pork from the now fat soaked butcher paper, easily slide out the shoulder bone, and then went at it with my bear paws, which don't always make the nicest looking pulled pork, but certainly makes quick work of breaking down a giant piece of meat. I took some nibbles as I went, and as I assumed, the pork wasn't heavily mojo-flavored, but I did hit bits here and there with a strong citrus taste, which were the parts that received the injection directly.
The mojo equation really came together once formed into a sandwich, where the dressing of the coleslaw delivered the garlicky, earthy, fruity, and lightly sour flavor of mojo and also introduced a pleasing crunchy and cool contrast to the tender pork. I had smoked up two pork butts this day, one small and one large, and my crew of eaters completely finished the smaller of the two, leaving me with still an entire butt to pull, bag, and freeze. I was all too happy to go from no pulled pork to having a ton after a two-year absence, and you'll be sure that leftover pork will be showing up in recipes coming later this year.
