In episode 049 we are making Pulled Pork in the Instant Pot for dinner. Susie shares this amazing recipe with all the tips and tricks to have super flavorful pulled pork that is fall-apart tender. You can do so much with pulled pork: nachos, tacos, pizza, grilled cheese, etc…. It even freezes really well for dinner prep.
Transcript
Click for the full transcript.
Intro: Welcome everybody to another episode of Let’s Make Dinner, your audio library of amazing dinner recipes you can get on the table any night of the week. I’m your host, Susie Weinrich.
Susie Weinrich: All right, calling all of my instant pot lovers. Today we are making some Instant Pot Pulled Pork. It is so delicious and it is so versatile for dinner. I mean, you can do pulled pork tacos, pulled pork pizza, nachos, pulled pork barbecue sandwiches, and pulled pork grilled cheese. Anything is possible with pulled pork. So it’s a great option for dinner. It’s a great meal prep option too because your pulled pork freezes beautifully.
Tips and Tricks: So let’s talk about what you’re going buy when you’re ready to make instant pop pulled pork. You obviously need a large piece of pork. What you’re going to look for in the grocery store is one of three things. It just depends on where you’re at and how they’re labeling. You’re going to look for either a pork butt, a pork shoulder, or a Boston butt. Those are basically all going to come from the same area on the pig and be basically the same thing. The only other thing you’re going to find on the packaging is whether it’s bone-in or boneless. With this one, it’s easier to use if it’s boneless, but you definitely don’t have to buy it that way. If you get a bone in pork shoulder, you can either cut the bone out or cut around it, still put it in the instant pot, and all the meat should come right off of that bone when you’re done with the cooking time.
This is also a great recipe to make if you love barbecue, but maybe you don’t have a smoker, which would be me. We just have a traditional grill. I don’t have a smoker, and so when we have pulled pork, I like to just do it in the instant pot. It’s easy for me. It’s quick, and it’s still super delicious.
A couple of questions that I get when people are making pulled pork. First of all, people will ask, how should I estimate how much pork to make? If I have 10 people coming, how much pork should I make? What I usually say is that you should estimate anywhere from three to four people per pound of pork. So if you’re having 10 people for dinner, then you should estimate probably around four pounds of pork.
Here is another common question that I get when people are making larger cuts of meat in the Instant Pot. If I double the recipe, do I double the time? The answer here is, it depends. With this recipe, we are taking one large pork shoulder and cutting it up into equal sizes, so three-inch pieces. So since we’re cutting it up into those individual pieces, if you double the recipe, there is no need to double the time. Now, in the case of my pork roast, my Instant Pot Pork Roast, that’s going to be cooked as one large piece of meat. So let’s say you were going to try and double the recipe. So instead of a three-pound pork shoulder, you were going to try and find a six-pound pork shoulder, then you would need to increase the time because you’re trying to cook one large piece of meat. So I hope that clears that up for you when you’re using your Instant Pot.
Instant Pot Pulled Pork Recipe: So let’s get on to making this full recipe for Instant Pot Pulled Pork. As I said before, you can use any size pork shoulder you want. This recipe is written for a three to five-pound fresh pork butt. We’re going to start by actually making a dry rub. So if you happen to have a pork barbecue dry rub that you really like, you can absolutely use that and skip this step. But if you are going to make this barbecue dry rub, in a small bowl, you want to combine two tablespoons of brown sugar and one and a half tablespoons of kosher salt. One teaspoon each of onion powder, garlic powder, and black pepper. Half a teaspoon of chili powder and smoked paprika and then a quarter teaspoon of dry mustard. Just give that a really good stir and make sure there are no brown sugar clumps left, and you can set that aside.
Now we’re going to turn our attention back over to the large pork butt. What you want to do is trim away any of the white fat that you can see around the outside, and then cut it into large three-inch chunks.
So a note about the fat. Usually, we love the fat and we want to keep the fat. But since we’re not cooking low and slow as you would on a smoker, the fat renders down and just creates flavor and juiciness. When we’re cooking hot and fast at this high pressure, that fat is not going to render down completely, and it’s just going to turn into these little clumps of gross, jiggly fat. You don’t want that in your pulled pork. So try and trim away as much of that fat as you can.
Now as you’re cutting your pork into three-inch chunks, you may find some more pockets of fat or some connective tissue. Go ahead and cut those away as well. What I like to do at this point is take all of those pieces of pork and put them on a rimmed baking sheet, or you could put them on a large piece of parchment paper and sprinkle them with that dry rub we made in the first step and sprinkle it and press it onto all sides of the pork.
Now it’s time to get your instant pot out. In the bottom of the Instant Pot, you’re going to pour in one cup of water, one tablespoon of Worcestershire sauce, and one tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. Your Instant Pot probably came with a metal trivet. It’s up to you if you want to play set in the pot, or if you just want to put your pork right in the liquid.
But go ahead and pile all of your pork pieces right into the instant pot. Then you want to just pop that lid, turn it, and lock it in place. Turn the pressure valve to seal and set the pot to cook on high pressure, normal heat for 40 minutes. At the end of that 40-minute cook time, you’re going to do something called a 10-minute natural release, and that’s basically where the 40-minute cooking time is up and the instant pot will start to count back up to 10.
So let that happen for 10 minutes and then you’ll finish with a quick release of pressure by turning that valve on top to release. Then go ahead and open up your pot, and with tongs, you can remove all of the pieces of pork. Again, I like to put them on a rimmed baking sheet because it collects any juice that seeps out from the pork.
There will be a good amount of liquid left over in your instant pot. You can use that to pour a little bit over your pork. You can discard it. You can save it for gravy, whatever you like to do with that liquid, but you don’t necessarily need it for the rest of the recipe.
So now you can just shred up your pork. You can do it with two forks and it should fall apart really easily. Or if your pork is still warm, you can actually put it in a stand mixer and take a paddle attachment and run it just on low speed for about mm, like 30 seconds and it will shred it perfectly.
Like we said at the beginning of the episode, you can use this pulled pork in so many different ways. So I’m not going to tell you how to use or serve your pulled pork. But if you are going to do barbecue pulled pork sandwiches, then pour on some of your favorite barbecue sauce and grab some buns and some coleslaw, and some pickles, and make yourself a delicious sandwich.
So that does it for your Instant Pot pulled pork recipe. As always, I will link all of the recipes I talked about in this episode right in the show notes for you. If you’re enjoying these episodes of Let’s Make Dinner, I would love to have you subscribe or follow your preferred podcast player. That will just make it easier for you to find all of our future episodes right in your podcast feed.
Outro: Until next time, I hope this episode of Let’s Make Dinner, makes your dinner time a little easier. Anything is possible with pulled pork.
Tips Shared
When buying a cut of pork to make this recipe you want to look for Pork Shoulder, Pork Butt or Boston Butt. Those will all be appropriate. You may also see bone-in or boneless. Both will work but boneless will be easier to work with.
If you have a pork BBQ rub that you like go ahead and use that and you can skip the homemade rub used in the recipe.
Shred the pork with two forks OR place warm pork in a stand mixer with a paddle attachment and run on low for about 20 seconds.
Recipes Mentioned
Follow Along
Subscribe To Stay Connected
Sign up for Mom’s Dinner Newsletter, delivered every Sunday morning, straight to your inbox. It includes all the new recipes, dinner ideas for the week, and kitchen tips and tricks.
Comments
No Comments