Kalua Pork is a must in a typical Hawaiian dish. I always buy them at the store or at fundraising events but never did make them thinking it would be too consuming. But I finally got to attempt it for Easter Sunday and it turned out GREAT!
The ingredients are simple, Pork Shoulder, Hawaiian Salt, Liquid Smoke, and Ti Leaves. Pork shoulders are also called pork butt and NO, pork butt is NOT at all the meat at the butt...I got that confused a long time ago and I'm always wondering why the heck they use that term...argh.
Traditionally they would put the entire pig in an Imu (underground oven), but they still exists today! My neighbor has an Imu in his backyard and Christmas morning he brings us fresh hot lau laus!! I'm doing it crock pot style...
Here are the measurements of the ingredients and direction:
4-5 lbs of pork shoulder** (aka pork butt *sigh*)
2 tbs Hawaiian Salt
1 1/2 tbs Liquid Smoke
3-4 Ti Leaves
1) Wash the pork shoulder and pat dry.
2) Brush liquid smoke all over pork.
3) Rub Hawaiian Salt all over pork.
4) Wrap it up in ti leaves.
5) Place in crockpot on low for 12 hours, or high for 6-8 hours.
6) Remove pork from crockpot and place in a bowl, discard ti leaves but keep drippings in crockpot.
7) Use two forks and shred the pork completely (you can remove fat as desire).
8) Place shreded pork back inside the crockpot and mix with dripping.
9) Taste and add more salt if desire.
10) Serve hot!
*Note: If your pork shoulder is frozen, you will need to defrost it COMPLETELY before cooking, otherwise you won't have the fall off the bone affect and you will be very frustrated trying to pull the pork apart. I've done that with my pull pork. :(
Leftovers can be made into kalua pork sliders, kalua pork with cabbage, and kalua pork quesadillas. Or you can freeze them to save them for another day!
Another MUST when visiting Oahu is to get shrimp scampi at a shrimp truck. I LOVE Giovanni's Shrimp Truck! They're located in North Shore and Kahuku, about $12/dozen with rice topped with garlic sauce. I have attempted to make it several times but haven't mastered it yet. A friend brought it for me when he visited out there so I was able to place it in a bento and brought it to work. The garlic infused my entire cubical and boy I could hear people sniffing the aroma. It was delicious even if it wasn't fresh. Mr. P used to take me there every Mother's Day. What a sweetie because he is allergic to shrimp so he was still willing to take me there and he orders...a hot dog for himself. But we stopped doing this for the last 2 years due to Lil P's sports. Who on Earth have games on Mother's Day?! This year will be no different. Anyway here is my delicious bento below with some apples and strawberries. D-licious!
Great post about the kalua pork in the crock pot! I've made slow cooked kalua pork in the oven too, cause for me here in Seattle there aren't a lot of places to get goooood hawaiian kalua pig. One change in ingredients though, I use banana leaves instead of ti leaves. It can be found at asian food stores in the mainland, but if that is hard to find then a few banana can be laid on top of the meat instead. It just adds to the flavoring.
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