Triple P's - Pulled Pork and Potatoes

This past weekend, we ate dinner at a wonderful BBQ joint up in the Seattle area. I've never actually dined at a designated BBQ place before, and boy was I in for a treat. The smoked pulled pork was outstanding. All that smoky goodness ... not too strong ... was a flavor memory I'll not soon forget. Plus, my family of five ate in almost total silence, which is unheard of, because they were too busy gnawing rib bones to speak.

While I've prepared pork in numerous ways over the years, I've never smoked it ... or anything else for that matter. Smoked pulled pork is such an amazing treat; however, regular old pulled pork is yummy, too. I came across a recipe on the FoodNetwork website compliments of Tyler Florence for an oven roasted version of pulled pork. While I didn't have the cut of meat suggested in the menu, I did have some amazing boneless ribs in the fridge, and thus a new recipe was born.

Tyler's instructions call for dry rubbing the meat and letting it sit overnight, so that's what I did. His rub is very basic: Salt (I used kosher), paprika, brown sugar, garlic powder, dry mustard, and black pepper. After letting the meat marinade (or cure?) overnight, I slow roasted those babies in a 300 degree oven for about 5 hours. Oh. My. Lord. They turned out PERFECT. No smokey goodness, obviously, but tender, juicy, and full of lip smackin' flavor. My fellas devoured theirs stacked high on buns, and we girls ate ours ala unencumbered on our plates. Served alongside a creamy coleslaw and Crash Hot Potatoes, once again, my fabulous five dined in silence. The only words spoken were: "Mom, I'm in heaven", and "Can I please have some more?", and "Mom, isn't there any more?", and "What do you mean there isn't any more?". Ah, words of love.

I started to take step by step photos of my meal prep, but alas got distracted. Offspring #1 actually was interested in helping prepare (smash) the potatoes, and before I knew it, the stampede of cattle, I mean kids and hubby man, herded to the table and I did not have even a spare second to snap some photos prior to eating. However, check out this link for amazing photos and step by step instructions for the Crash Hot Potatoes ... I used 9 regular sized russet potatoes because that's what I had and there were no leftovers. For five people. Zip. Nada. Nothing left. Good eats.