This spread can be eaten for breakfast, lunch or added to your cheese platter as a holiday appetizer! This recipe will give you quite a significant quantity in order to freeze some of it for later use. Perfect for a large family! Don't be afraid of a long cooking time - most of it is boiling, and the result is really worth it!
Ingredients
2pork shoulders(with bones, but skinned)
3big yellow onions
6garlic cloves
1tbspcrushed peppercorn(pepper)
2tbspsalt
2tbspdry basil
2tbspdry oregano
5-8cupswater(depending on your pot)
2tbspbutter
Instructions
Preparation
Remove, if not already done, the skin of the pork shoulder, but keep the fat under the skin.
Cut the meat in large cubes (about 2 by 2 inches), and set it aside for now. Important: Do not remove the bones from the pork: these bones will give extra flavor to the spread!
Dice the onions and chop the garlic cloves finely.
On a medium fire, fry the onions and garlic in a large cast iron or stainless steel pot, big enough to contain all the meat and the bones.
After the onions have changed their color, add the cut meat, all the spices, and mix well.
Cooking process
Cover all the meat with water, and put the lid on. Don't cover the pot completely, leave the lid ajar a little bit.
Let the pot simmer slowly until you can detach the meat from the bone with a fork. Depending how much meat you have, this should take between 3 to 5 hours. I know it is a long cooking time, but it is necessary in order to get all the flavor from the bones and have a great meat texture.
When the meat is well cooked, and some of the water has evaporated, it's time to turn off the fire. Wait about 1 hour for the meat to cool down.
Important: Before transferring the meat into the food processor, make sure to remove all the bones, otherwise you will break the blades of your food processor!
Put the meat mixture into the food processor with the big blades installed, and give it a big spin! Keep it on until you get the texture that you like. Continue like this until all the meat is processed.
Put all the processed meat into the big pot and mix very well for one last taste test, to verify if there is enough spices and salt.
If you are satisfied with the taste, you can put the spread into smaller containers. I usually keep them in the fridge overnight to completely cool down, and the next morning I put the containers that I don't immediately need into the freezer!
Notes
If you make this recipe ..... tag me @mel4skilletsandgames on Instagram and hashtag it #skilletsandpots.