Braden Family Cookbook

Chuck Braden

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OVEN-ROASTED KALUA[1] PIG                     Hawaiian non-traditional

 

4          pounds pork butt (boneless is easier)

1          tablespoons liquid smoke

1          tablespoons Hawaiian salt (reddish/pinkish stuff from the dirt)

4          large ti leaves with ribs removed (no substitute)

 

Score the pork butt by making cuts 1/4 inch deep and one inch apart (optional) .  Rub with the salt and liquid smoke.  Wrap the pork in the ti leaves.  Wrap this bundle with aluminum foil.   Allow the bundle to sit at room temperature for about 30 minutes. 

Preheat the oven to 500 degrees.  Place the bundle on a rack above a shallow roasting pan.  Bake for 45 minutes, then reduce the heat to 400 degrees and cook for 3 1/4 hours more.  When done, cool slightly then shred the pork.  Taste and add more liquid smoke or Hawaiian salt if needed.  You might want to also add a little water if the pork is at all dry. 

Serves 10

I bake 2 4# pieces of pork at a time,  makes about 4 3/4# of cooked meat.  Save all of the juices in the foil, skim off the oil on top and add the juices back to the shredded meat.  Freeze in 1# Ziploc bags.

 


[1]Kalua is a cooking style that usually involves digging a hole in the ground, building a large fire, heating rocks on said fire, adding fragrant leaves, then food to be cooked, more leaves and then covering the whole thing up with dirt.  Zoning restrictions, condominium owner associations, and just not having a yard restrict this traditional methodology.  Thus the oven!