Serves Eight

Preparation and Cooking Time: 5 hours 30 minutes

Christmas pulled pork, what could be a better alternative to turkey (although if you still fancy turkey check out my guide on getting the perfect bird here).

With subtle warming winter spices infused into the barbecue sauce and into the meat, this really is an incredible mashup of flavours and will leave you wanting more. Think of it as that Christmas barbecue you always wanted.

Ingredient

2kg Pork Shoulder (must be shoulder)

500ml Cider

Barbecue Sauce Marinade (buy or make your own – my own recipe is top secret)

3 Star anise

Teaspoon of cinnamon

Teaspoon nutmeg

15 Cloves

Salt and Pepper

Approximate Cost of Dish -£8

Method

1. Add your spices, minus 10 cloves to your barbecue sauce marinade.
2. Remove the skin from your pork, we will make crackling with it later.
3. Stud your pork with the remaining 10 cloves, and be sure you know how many you have used as you’ll need to find them later!
4. Cover your pork with the bbq sauce and leave to marinade for at least an hour.
5. Add the marinated meat to the casserole dish and season with salt, pepper and add the cider to the bottom of the dish and cook at 150 degrees c. for roughly 4 hours.
6. Remove from the oven, if the pork is not tender enough to be pulled apart using a fork, give it some more time.
7. Pull the meat apart using two forks, making sure you remove the cloves!
8. Add some of the cooking juices and any sauce you may have left to the meat and serve!