Thanks to buccaneer for waking me up and letting me know that the Indian TD was going on! :doh: This is my official entry for the Go Indian! Throwdown.
I pondered and thought about what to make, and I must say that I am a little proud of myself. The aim was to cook a regular bbq meat with an Indian twist. I wanted to make raan musallam (leg of lamb/mutton/goat with a wet spice rub), but figured that was entirely Indianish. So pork musallam was a natural extension of that thought... and then it hit me - why not pulled pork musallam! :idea:
I didn't have much time for marinading, injecting etc. Working this weekend so it had to happen Sat evening/night. Got back home at 6pm on Sat and fired up the tandoor.
Started with a small pork butt (3.5 lbs). Cut in 2 pieces to make a boneless piece for the raan musallam roast and one piece (with bone) to pull for the pulled pork musallam. For the marinade: coriander, garam masala, ginger paste, cayenne, turmeric, mint chutney, garlic paste, cumin and yogurt.
Mixed it all up and slathered onto my lil mini-butts.
Tandoors are designed to burn b@lls to the wall hot, so there isn't scope for trying to regulate the temp. I fired the UDT up with a smaller amount of charcoal than I usually would have. After an hour the temp inside it was ~360°F. I placed a half grate as a shelf inside (leftover from an experiment I had planned for doing steaks in the tandoor) and placed the bone-in piece of butt on the shelf. The boneless piece was skewered and placed in the tandoor. Had to criss-cross the skewers to keep the butt from slipping, because i wanted the meat to cook in the middle of the tandoor. The foil shields were to try and keep the meat from burning.
After about 25-30mins the boneless piece was done - about 150ish IT, so it got wrapped and coolered. The bone-in piece (for the pulled pork) got wrapped to cook it faster. It was done (IT 200°F) after another 2 hours. The tandoor was running in the 450°F range when I had taken the first butt piece off.
Filled up the tandoor with more lump and let it rip. Needed to get it HOT for the naans. Mrs. caliking handles the naans, so we just needed the tandoor to ramp up.
Got my naan tools ready
In the meantime, I made a sauce for the pulled pork out of onions, tomato, cumin, and the leftover marinade for the meat. Pulled the pork, added the sauce, and some chopped cilantro.
Sliced off a couple of slices from the pork musallam roast. It tasted awesome! Experiment was a success!
It was about 10:30pm by then. Tandoor was running at about 650°F up top and the floor temp was 1000°F+ (IR therm maxed out). Mrs. caliking shaped and slapped the naans on. They take maybe 2 or so mins to cook. The pics of the naans coming off the wall of the tandoor are dedicated to
chicagokp, because he called me out the last time I posted a tandoor cook, for not including shots of the naans coming off. :grin:
Once the naans were done, it was time to eat. Eaten as a pulled pork sandwich with red onion slaw (onions, lime, and cayenne).
We were starving and I think I was ready to eat my own arm by then. It was well worth the wait though! The pulled pork musallam and the roast both tasted wonderful, so I will be planning on making them again.
I ate this for lunch today, and it tasted even better since the flavors had a chance to get friendly overnight.
Please consider the next pic as my official TD entry for voting purposes.
Thanks for looking!