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I was cookign a kind of tex-mex dinner over the weekend for a bunch of people and craved shredded pork. Most recipes appear to be American, required a slow cooker and about 10 hours of cooking, and varied wildly but I garnered enough information to do it much more easily. I bought 3lbs of Pork Butt or closest approximation (one recipes claimed you could do this with boneless, trimmed pork chops). Some recipes claimed this would feed 6 (well, they claimed that 2lbs would feed 4) but if i was doing this again I'd have that amount for 4 people. They're was very little left and there was shedloads of other food on the table. Anyway, so my approximation of an amalgamation of a bunch of recipes. I took 3lbs of pork butt (I think I used lumps of Pork sirloin. It was about 7 quid for 3lbs) and cut it into fist sized peices. In a pan I sweated some onions and quite a lot of garlic. Then added the pork and covered with water. Then I added some lime juice and some cider vinegar bought to the boil and then reduced to a simmer. Then I left it for two hours. As I said, this was an almagamation of several recipes. I ended up blending the remains of this cooking liquor into a sauce but if you weren't doing that the onions are actually fairly optional. The point is to basically poach the pork. Flavouring is enitrely up to you. As for timing - the recipes said anywhere between 45 minutes to an hour and a half. Or 10 hours in a slow cooker. Out of fear of eating at 10pm I stuck mine in about 3:30 and just left it. Every so often I'd prod it with a worried expressions on my face but, after 2 hours, and my guests had arrived I decided to take the plunge and removed it. I used two forks to take it out which actually proved to be a little difficult since it just started falling aprt (in a good way). Next time I'll use tongs. It was pretty good on its own - it would have been fine to serve as is save for a little seasoning. As it was I divided it into two and mixed one batch with lime juice and coriander and then fired the other half with some honey and garlic and sliced onions. If I'm being fair the lime and coriander was nice but the honey one was much better. They're both very tasty in fajitas. Next time I might try mixing it with some barbeque sauce or the pureed cooking liquor (rather than serving it in a jug by the side) or something similar. And I'll definitely do it again - it was surprisingly easy, it was cheap and it has many many variations.
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