Pulled Pork Sandwiches

Every year, across the street from where I live, how convenient, they hold the Mississauga Rotary Ribfest, usually near the end of July, for three days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday). This year, it's far more elaborate, with lots of things to do for kids, rides and performances. Too, there is a stage with performances of music more geared towards adults, and a beer tent. There are stands with fresh lemonade, roasted corn, snacks and things for sale, but the big appeal is the various award-winning restaurants that gather to show off their best grilled pork. Pork ribs mostly, half and full racks. There is something called the Vegetarian's nightmare, which is a full rack of ribs, a half chicken and a pulled pork sandwich. It's the last one that appeals to me the most, pulled pork is very slow roasted pork that is then cooked with barbecue sauce to finish it off. The pulling can be described as shredding the meat, you pull the meat off with a fork, it comes out in strands. The slow cooking makes the meat juicy and tender, it's mostly why I prefer it over the more well-done rack of ribs. This year, on the Friday, I tried two pulled pork sandwiches, one from a restaurant out of Fort Erie, Ontario, called Billy Bones, the other from a restaurant out of London, Ontario, called Crabby's BBQ. The Billy Bones pulled pork sandwich came on a somewhat stale hot dog bun, I ended up throwing that away, it's really the meat I'm interested in. Now, it's the sauce that adds the extra goodness that brings it above the mundane. Every restaurant has its own secret sauce, and usually you can buy it, so you can attempt to duplicate it at home. Billy Bones' sauce was dark and thick, not too sweet, and slightly spicy. Overall, it was pretty good, better than the ones I had last year (there was one, which tasted like cold spicy ketchup). The other pulled pork sandwich, was tastier. Crabby's BBQ's sauce was not as dark as the other, about as sweet, and more spicy. Too, I bought their 1 Lb./$10 special, I'm going to give my brother-in-law a taste of this, he's a meataholic. On Sunday, I'm going by again, so as to see if I can try some more. Often, though, they are out of pulled pork by then, the pickings are often very slim.

One of my food goals, is to try and make my own pulled pork sandwich, that suits my taste. It's not the creation of the pulled pork, again it is the combination of that with the sauce that makes it a good pulled pork sandwich. Probably a life long quest, as are most food goals.