Saturday, January 8, 2011

Firewood and Pulled Pork

Today's exercise was helping Craig cut and haul some firewood up from our forest.  We knew we would be short this winter, and considered buying some, but as it has turned out we harvested one bunch from the roadside and are supplementing it with wood we are collecting now.

I like to have the winters supply all dried and stacked in the wood shed, with additional wood stacked along the garage, but this summer the painting just took all of our energy and time.

We have had a lot of rain during most of December, but it has been dry again for the last week or so.  Since rain is forecast for Tuesday, this was our chance to do a bit of cutting.

Getting the cut wood from the forest to the back yard is reasonably easy except near the end.  There is a pretty good path, and we have a DR power wagon.  But the rise at the end is about 14 feet in the last 40 feet.  When we get to that place we both have to give our all to push the power cart up the last bit.  We will be cutting again tomorrow and maybe I'll be able to get a few pictures.

PULLED PORK:
Recently I signed onto the allrecipes site to use their recipe "box" feature.

 They have been sending me a daily recipe email ever since and the couple we have tried have been very good.

On Friday they had "the year's Best."  A pulled pork made in a slow cooker. Craig saw the recipe and decided we should try it this weekend.

But he also remembered that our old crock pot hasn't been working right and bought a new one at COSTCO after work.

Not the actual one he bought, but the wine bottle implies the size!

 When I saw the box I made lots of negative noises!  It was a COSTCO size slow cooker.  I think you could have made a 20 pound turkey in it.

"It's too big!"
 "This proves you don't want to go with me!"
 "Yadda, Yadda, Yadda."

So without being opened, the box went back into the car, we went out to dinner and then shopping for a new slow cooker that was a bit more reasonable in size!

After checking Target and Walmart, we found a very niceProgrammable  3 1/2 Quart Cuisinart slow cooker at Macy's.

Craig was happy with the controls (more than just High and Low) and I was satisfied with the size.


The pulled Pork was absolutely delicious, and so easy!

Recipe:

2 pounds pork tenderloin
Root Beer to cover
1 (18 ounce) bottle BBQ sauce
8 hamburger  buns

Put pork and root beer in slow cooker.  Cook on low 7-8 hours.  Check liquid level halfway through and top it
 back up to cover.

Remove pork from slow cooker and discard liquid.
Shred, return to slow cooker, and add BBQ sauce.  Rewarm.

Serve on lightly toasted buns.

I put half away before rewarming it. We each had two sandwiches tonight, and will have a second meal tomorrow.  We had french fries on the side, and would have liked to have had either a coleslaw or a nice salad too.

Root Beer...  who would have thought!

Later, as I put the new slow cooker away, I started thinking about what I might  store inside of it.  I'm sure the space won't go unused for long in an RV cupboard.

11 comments:

  1. HEY!! I tried this recipe before! We had Jonathan's friend over when we lived in our sticks and bricks, and I used DIET DR. PEPPER (I was too cheap to go buy root beer) it was the most disgusting thing we ever ate. Jonathan's friend kept saying, "It tastes like Dr. Pepper" Well, duh! That's because that was the main ingredient :) LOL!

    Nellie
    http://midlifecruiser.blogspot.com

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  2. looks delicious!!..going to have to give this one a try!..can you just do it in the regular oven?..we don't have a crock pot?

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  3. We make pulled pork in our crockpot all the time but we've never tried it with root beer. Maybe I'll give this recipe a try next time!

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  4. I love root beer, so might have to give this recipe a try. Roger hates root beer so maybe I'll have it all to myself.

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  5. Oooh! That sounds terrific! I love my crockpot :)

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  6. We love pulled pork. The root beer sounds very intriguing. I'll definitely try it next time I find a pork roast on sale. Don't work too hard cutting wood :)

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  7. I love pulled pork also, but don't like BBQ sauce. So I just put a tiny roast in the crock pot with chicken broth and lots of garlic. I think I'll do up one of those tomorrow! :)

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  8. Sue and Doug, our slow cooker manual says the Slow setting does 200 F. If your oven can hold 200 and you have a pot with a tight-fitting cover to keep the water in, go for it!

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  9. Sounds great. I wonder if you could use regular beer? That sounds good, too.

    I remember the days I had to haul wood from the back of the house, up the stairs, and load it near the wood stove. Actually I loved it! Miss those days.

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  10. I haven't used my crockpot in ages and pulled it out today to cook a turkey roast. I'm hoping it still works so I can take it with me when I finally get on the road.

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  11. Love that recipe! I also discovered it a couple of years ago on AllRecipes - it's been in our lineup ever since.

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