Pulled Pork for a Party: Cook or Buy

[Anonymous]

I am planning my son's first birthday party. We are having friends stay at our house that weekend and we have family from out of town. Therefore, I am trying to outsource a lot of the food as we will be busy enough as it is. DH thinks we should buy the pulled pork from our favorite BBQ place ($11.50/pound). I don't think its that much work to make it so I'm wondering, what does DCUM think? Is it that much cheaper to make myself? We will have 30-40 adults and some kids. Google searches seem to suggest 1/3 lb. per person. I've made it before and believe I just did a spice rub, let it cook overnight and left sauces out for people to choose.

Thoughts?

[Anonymous]

With that many people, I'd suck it up and spend the money and buy it.

[Anonymous]

I would make it.

I just made it for a party this past weekend. I bought marinated pork tenderloin from Sam's club that cost about $6-7 per pound (I think it was around $19 for 2.6 lbs), then tossed it in a crock pot . I started with this recipe: http://addapinch.com/cooking/balsamic-pork-tenderloin-recipe/ but after making it a few times, I've tweaked it. This was the latest and the gang LOVED it. Note that I made a double recipe of the sauce because I make a gravy/barbecue sauce from it afterwards, but you can cut it in half back to the original portions

Ingredients
1 2-3 pound boneless pork tenderloin
1 14.5 can low sodium chicken broth
½ cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
2 tablespoon soy sauce
2 tablespoon honey
a pinch of red pepper flakes
4 tablespoons garlic, chopped or minced

Put all in the crock pot for about 4 hours on HIGH or 6+ hours on low. When done, shred the pork (I just cut it against the grain and it fell apart like pulled pork) and then baste the cut port with a little of the juices from the crock pot to keep them most. If you want a barbecue sauce, like I did, I just make a small butter roux with about 1.5 TBSP butter and 1TBSP flour, browned over low heat to get rid of the raw flour taste, then poured in the basting broth from the crock pot until it reached the consistency that I like. Makes a great barbecue sauce/gravy.

It sounds hard, but it was about 3 minutes work before crock pot and then about 8-10 minutes after crock pot. Very easy. This recipe fed 11 adults and 2 preschoolers and we used about 2/3. The remaining 1/3 was dinner for 2 adults and 2 preschoolers the other night, so I would probably say you can feed about 15 on this. For 30-40, I would do about 6-7 lbs of pork and you should be fine (most people made sandwiches on kaiser and whole wheat rolls so it was fine).

[Anonymous]

I would make it. After it's done cooking, take off the big fat pieces and put chunks in a food processor using the slicing disk. It will shred the meat and save you a ton of time pulling the pork. You can get a good 4-6 lb pork shoulder for a bit more than the price you want to pay PER POUND already made.

[Anonymous]

It's beyond easy to make your own pulled pork - I do it all the time. I really like this recipe: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/soy-cola-braised-pork-shoulder (but I cook it at lower heat and for much longer than it calls for). And you can make ahead and heat it back up for the party. Am sure you'd also save money doing it yourself (and you can often find pork shoulder on sale super cheap - I wouldn't use tenderloin like PP did because it's too expensive for this braising type recipe - cheap cuts are actually better). But also, it's just so easy that I'd almost hate to pay for it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's beyond easy to make your own pulled pork - I do it all the time. I really like this recipe: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/soy-cola-braised-pork-shoulder (but I cook it at lower heat and for much longer than it calls for). And you can make ahead and heat it back up for the party. Am sure you'd also save money doing it yourself (and you can often find pork shoulder on sale super cheap - I wouldn't use tenderloin like PP did because it's too expensive for this braising type recipe - cheap cuts are actually better). But also, it's just so easy that I'd almost hate to pay for it.

OP here. Yeah the price comparison is just crazy, I am realizing. I have a BJs membership...will have to check out their prices on pork butt/shoulder or look at grocery store sales. Thanks for the recipe. I am thinking that for this crowd I may have to do a bit more of a plain jane version. Lots of picky eaters

[Anonymous]

I would absolutely make it vs. buying it. Outside of the fact that it's cheaper, you will probably make one that tastes as good or better than the average pulled pork you can buy around here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It's beyond easy to make your own pulled pork - I do it all the time. I really like this recipe: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/soy-cola-braised-pork-shoulder (but I cook it at lower heat and for much longer than it calls for). And you can make ahead and heat it back up for the party. Am sure you'd also save money doing it yourself (and you can often find pork shoulder on sale super cheap - I wouldn't use tenderloin like PP did because it's too expensive for this braising type recipe - cheap cuts are actually better). But also, it's just so easy that I'd almost hate to pay for it.

The main reason I did the pork tenderloin was that it was pre-seasoned/marinated. If I got a pork butt/shoulder, it was unseasoned and salted. When I used that, the poke was very salty and I didn't want that. Plus I had to make a rub and season it and I went for faster (especially since some of the things in the rub, I don't normally stock). The tenderloin was cheap enough and worked so much better for me.

[Anonymous]

i would definitely make it. the 100days of clean eating site has a good recipe that we really like.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I would make it. After it's done cooking, take off the big fat pieces and put chunks in a food processor using the slicing disk. It will shred the meat and save you a ton of time pulling the pork. You can get a good 4-6 lb pork shoulder for a bit more than the price you want to pay PER POUND already made.

WTF? Don't put it in the food processor. Just pull it apart with a couple forks the way it's supposed to be done. You're making pulled pork, not baby food, right?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would make it. After it's done cooking, take off the big fat pieces and put chunks in a food processor using the slicing disk. It will shred the meat and save you a ton of time pulling the pork. You can get a good 4-6 lb pork shoulder for a bit more than the price you want to pay PER POUND already made.

WTF? Don't put it in the food processor. Just pull it apart with a couple forks the way it's supposed to be done. You're making pulled pork, not baby food, right?

I've heard you can put it in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment to quickly shred it. I don't think that would mush it up.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would make it. After it's done cooking, take off the big fat pieces and put chunks in a food processor using the slicing disk. It will shred the meat and save you a ton of time pulling the pork. You can get a good 4-6 lb pork shoulder for a bit more than the price you want to pay PER POUND already made.

WTF? Don't put it in the food processor. Just pull it apart with a couple forks the way it's supposed to be done. You're making pulled pork, not baby food, right?

If you want fast, just take a regular utility knife and cut it across the grain, in it will fall apart in shreds. And it's a lot easier and faster to clean up than a food processor which will destroy the consistency of the pork.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would make it. After it's done cooking, take off the big fat pieces and put chunks in a food processor using the slicing disk. It will shred the meat and save you a ton of time pulling the pork. You can get a good 4-6 lb pork shoulder for a bit more than the price you want to pay PER POUND already made.

WTF? Don't put it in the food processor. Just pull it apart with a couple forks the way it's supposed to be done. You're making pulled pork, not baby food, right?

I've heard you can put it in a stand mixer with the paddle attachment to quickly shred it. I don't think that would mush it up.

I've used the mixer with the paddle when shredding chicken breasts for soup and it works wonderfully. Haven't tried it with pork yet--the only difference should be having to get rid of the fatty bits if you use shoulder. I would think a food processor would overdo it.

[Anonymous]

I also think you should make it, but not for price or taste reasons. You can do it in advance, it freezes great! That's one less thing for you to worry about while you have company, just get the sauces ready at the last minute and you'll be good to go!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I also think you should make it, but not for price or taste reasons. You can do it in advance, it freezes great! That's one less thing for you to worry about while you have company, just get the sauces ready at the last minute and you'll be good to go!

OP here. So cook, freeze, then defrost in fridge and just pop in the crockpot the day of on low??