Cajun Pulled Pork

This is the final leg of my holiday… And what better way to end this adventure than with New Year’s Eve dinner and New Year’s shenanigans.

On the 31^st December; Nats, Brian, Dad and I took on 3 markets in different areas, Spitalfields Market, Borough Market, and lastly Camden Market. There was a lot of interesting and quirky riff-raff at the first market, if my bag wasn’t already popping at the seams I would have just carried on buying things. My favourite market of the day was Borough; well what do you expect, it was a foodie market, it's actually one of London's oldest food markets. There was all types of cheeses; I even saw drunken cheese, where an ingredient was some sort of alcohol. The veggie stalls were amazing; bright, big and vibrant veggies. We even saw oranges from South Africa! My favourite part of the market was the amazing, and might I add, life-changing doughnuts we had at Bread Ahead. We literally bought the doughnuts, took two steps away from the stall and devoured these jam-packed creamy doughnuts. The minute you took a bite from them, the cream squirted out the edges; kind of like a really full pie. Our faces were cream-covered; well in Dad's case his beard had blotches of cream sprinkled all over, as if he was keeping some for later when he got peckish. I have never in my life had doughnuts so good! After our belly filling experience at Borough, we went off to Camden; where there are really all sorts of people and things to see. Being late in the afternoon, we had to make headway for home; as the New Year’s celebrations and travelling chaos was about to intensify.

Almond & hazelnut praline cream doughnuts

 

Honey Comb & salted caramel cream doughnut

The minute we got home, we went straight to the kitchen and started the pork roast, as it was going to take us some time to cook.  We didn’t bring in the New Year drunk and legless; instead we brought it in with full bellies and family laughs. It was rather nice to have Nans and Brian make it through to the countdown and watch the fireworks in London.

A couple of days later, my uncle Jon had a Day of Doom planned for us. Before you think he has some vindictive agenda of trying to off me, let me explain; we have this ‘thing’ between us. Whenever either one of us visits the other, we have to plan a day or an adventure of excitement. The first one was when he took me to Thorpe Park and led me on some screeching rides. When he came to SA I arranged for us to go for a Shark Cage dive, a taste of a Durban bunny chow and a trip up Moses Mabhida. This time Jon really had me guessing… This time we were to climb the O2! When I saw the view, my heart skipped a beat and I was so ready to take it on. It was such an incredible experience with beautiful views. 

Leaving my family and friends in the UK on such a high note; I can only expect a rad and tasty 2015 year. Now, you don’t have to wait until the end of the year for this moreish meal. It’s perfect to end any week or day with a good group of people by your side. Let’s face it, a great meal is best when shared with family and friends.

Ingredients:

2kg Shoulder of pork, trimmed of fat

4 onions, sliced

9 cloves garlic, sliced

250ml cider

200ml White wine vinegar

1 ½ Tbsp dried red chilli flakes

1 ½ Tbsp Wholegrain mustard

1 ½ Tbsp dried/fresh thyme

Salt & Pepper to taste

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 180®C.

• In a bowl, mix the mustard, chilli flakes & salt & pepper

• Rub the chilli mustard mix on the pork shoulder.

• Place Pork roast in a roasting pan.

• Sprinkle the thyme over the shoulder and pan.

• Pour the white wine vinegar & cider into the roasting pan.

• Cover the pork with the onions and garlic, and even put it into the liquid.

• Cover the entire tray with tinfoil.

• Roast in the oven for 3 hours.

• Take out the oven after three hours, take tinfoil off and put back in the oven for another hour.

• Take the roast out and pull apart with a fork.