Crock pot barbecue Pork

Well the votes are in and it looks like a landslide!! LOL And so it is that I will start adding Crock Pot recipes as well. Now there are some little tricks to the Crock Pot. Contrary to popular belief it is possible to overcook stuff in a crock pot, and there are a few easy tricks to keep it from happening. One of these trick is to delay the start time until about half way through the day. Bet you're wondering how to turn on a crock pot by remote aren't you? A simple device available at any hardware store for less than $15 called a timer. Now pay attention when you shop, you want a heavy duty timer, not just a plain lamp timer which is cheaper. Crocks use a little bit more amps than a lamp and you don't want to end up with a fire, that would over cook your food, and you don't want to blow the circuit, that would under cook your food!! Now I bet your wondering how to keep your stuff safely cool until it's time to start the cooking. Well the truth is that in many cases it really doesn't matter, unless you're cooking something with dairy products or possibly chicken products. In these cases you can simply use some frozen ingredients that will keep this chilled until the cooking starts. The other trick is to use some ice blocks in the place of added water, which will melt during the waiting time and be water when it's time to cook! See? Simple!

There are a few things that you really need to know about your crock pot before you use it, one is the cooking temps on low and high settings. This is very easy to figure out, all you need is an oven thermometer and a couple hours of time. Set your crock pot on "low" and set the thermometer inside it. Leave it empty and dry. It won't hurt it at all. Check the thermometer every 15 minutes for one hour. It should hold a steady temp after the first 30 minutes. That's your low operating temp and is important to know. If it is over 225 you can count on needing extra liquid in anything that you cook for more than three hours. Now switch to "high" and repeat the process. Now you know what you are working with. Generally 300 to 350 is the high setting, so remember that if you are gonna have things cooking on high and you need to figure they will need less time and more liquid. If you don't have an oven thermometer but do have a candy or a frying thermometer, you can do the same test, but you will need to fill the crock pot about 2/3 full of water. There is just no good way to do it with a meat thermometer!

One of the best things for crock pot cooking is meat, because it has the time to simmer and tenderize. Pot roast is great and so is roast pork loin. One of my favorite dishes is Barbecue Pork. There are a couple ways to do it, one is to cook the pork, then prep it and add it to the sauce, the other is to cook the pork in the sauce. This is my favorite way to do it.

Ingredients:

32 Ounces of Your favorite Barbecue Sauce ( personally I like to mix and match, my favorite is to mix a bottle of Open Pit™ and a bottle of Jack Daniel's™ Original No.7 Recipe Barbecue sauce. )
3# Pork Loin
2-3 cloves Garlic slivered
1 large onion Julienned
3 Tbsp Soy sauce
1 cup Honey

Directions:

cut slits in pork loin and insert garlic slivers around the roast, dispersing evenly over meat. Set aside.

Mix barbecue sauce, honey and soy sauce together and dump mixture into crock pot.

Set meat into the pot, the sauce mixture should cover the meat, if it doesn't, add water to bring level up over the meat.

Layer the onions on top of this and place lid on crock pot set to low and simmer for 4 to 6 hours.

When ready to eat, remove lid from crock and gently spoon off excess grease.

Remove the meat from the sauce and slice, then return to sauce for 5 minutes before serving.

EAT IT!!!

After thoughts:

This goes great with rice. White rice, brown rice, wild rice, whatever you prefer, this stuff is good with it!

The perfect side dish is Corn. Corn on the cob, Mexican corn, or even cornbread! Corn and barbecue pork just seem to go great together.

The leftovers are even better the next day, nuked or just cold on a nice hard-roll!!