The tastiest pulled pork ever ever

I am not a fan of pulled pork. I've discovered I'm actually not much of a fan of what's considered "American food". For example, if given American cheese, I will rage to the food gods. Because it's simply not cheese. Your typical casseroles, meatloaf, pot roast, etc etc. Never been a fan. Some say I'm a food snob. They may be correct. But if you're not going to thoroughly enjoy your meal, what's the point of eating it?

What I'm also discovering, is that there are no bad recipes on www.thechew.com. Well, disclaimer. I haven't ever cooked any of the recipes that were put on there by the home chefs, or some of the guest chefs. I'm only talking the host recipes here- Mario, Michael, Clinton, Carla and Daphne.

And, since then, I've stretched my palate to include those American meals that I've up until now dismissed. And I'm finding I really love them. Like, dream about them and eat them cold the next morning love them. And this is definitely one of them.

Mario Batali's Halloween pulled pork sandwich. I happened to have pork shoulder just waiting to be made into carnitas. But I had 5 1/2 pounds of it, so I figured since it was just babygirl and I, we could take a pound or so and try this out. Plus, I had some sort of squash in my fridge that was never going to be eaten by us (it was a default item in our local produce delivery service last week, and we typically are not fans of squash). So this recipe looked perfect.

For the condiment for the sandwich, Mario says to make a pumpkin puree. Well, this kinda looked like pumpkin, right? Whatevs, it totally worked.

Roasted squash, roasted garlic, parmesan, nutmeg, and brown sugar. Works for me!

The brine for this was really interesting (a whole bottle of red wine if you're gonna use 3-4 pounds of pork shoulder). But by a half hour in, the smell in my house was amazing.

I actually followed his recipe (outside of the pumpkin thing) exactly. Because I happened to have all of those ingredients.  And I still had some of my crusty Italian bread left over from Sunday night, so I just used that and made open faced sandwiches.

Voila. Deliciousness. And delicious the next day. Looks like I'm a pulled pork fan after all.

Loves!

Sundried Tomato Sicilian Pesto & a new Foccacia!

Rainy days always make me hungry. Especially dark, cold rainy days. And I always want pasta. So I grabbed Mario Batali's recipe for this pesto, and yup. It's delicious. I tweaked it a bit. I kind of combined his classic pesto with this Sicilian one for the most fabulous pesto ever. In my humble opinion.

The changes I made. Instead of using mint, I used basil, because it's what I had on hand. I didn't bother getting almonds with no skin cause that's annoying, so I used the almonds I had already. And I have no idea what cheese he was talking about, so I just used Parmesan. It's what I had, and it is the undisputed king of cheeses, so I figured Batals would be ok with it. That's right. I totally just nicknamed him what Michael Symon calls him. Cause in my head, we're just that close. And also, he just made pepperoni bread on the show, which is my mom's famous dish and I've never heard anyone else ever call it pepperoni bread, so I feel like we're family. Totally logical.

Anyway, it's amazing. I followed his directions as far as cooking, or not cooking, it. Because I trust he knows exactly what he's talking about. I used fusilli, again because it's what I had. I'm trying to ensure that I only make meals that I don't have to go out and buy special ingredients for unless it's a special occasion, or we just happen to need to go grocery shopping. That whole sticking to a budget thing.

Also, because hubbs just got home from London, I made him some bread. I've done the other foccacia recipe a bunch of times now and I'm bored, so I decided to do another search. And I came across this blog/ recipe. And she's right. Foccacia is so bogus here. So I thought I'd give hers a try. And I'm pretty sure I'm never going back. I still add the rosemary on the top because I just heart it, but her recipe is pretty bad ass. it is literally the best bread I have ever made ever. Ever.

So there you have it. Comfy Italian food for a rainy gloomy day. And pasta face.

Loves!