I don’t know about you but busy times tend to bring out some bad eating habits for me. These bad habits can range from skipping meals during the day to eating too much of one macronutrient like too many nuts (fats) or too many apples (carbs) and not enough of something else like protein. My latest bundle of busy weeks came at the end of my fall semester in December. I had exams to study for, papers to write, and presentations to make. While sleep and eating usually take priority, I found myself allowing these things to take the back seat, thus resulting in the aforementioned bad habits surfacing. After all the dust had settled and I had made up for lost hours of sleep, I realized that these little blunders could have all been prevented by one thing: preparedness.
The semester is now over and a new one is upon me. I just shared what I have let myself do in the past. Now, here is what I WILL do in the future. I will do more than simply stock the fridge. I will have a plan for the food I have bought by creating a meal plan. I will cook multiple meals ahead of time and store them in the fridge. Maybe I will even divide them up by meal and by day. This is my new strategy for dealing with busy days. What is your plan of attack when you know you’ve got a busy week ahead of you?
Sooo I have an easy slow-cooker Pork recipe for you! This has made its way into my arsenal of make-ahead/slow-cooker recipes. Salsa Verde from Trader Joe’s + big hunk of pork shoulder + long hours in the slow-cooker = yummy yummy in my busy tummy.
Here’s what you need:
1 three-pound or so pork shoulder
1 jar of Salsa Verde (Trader Joe’s has one)
Taco Spice Blend (a mix of 1 teaspoon each of cumin, chili peppers, garlic, onion and oregano plus 2 teaspoons salt; you can always add a little extra of something if you find it lacking in flavors you like)
Here’s how:
1. Make your Taco Spice Blend. Rub spices all over the pork. Place pork in slow-cooker on low setting.
2. Let your pork sit in there for about 4-5 hours or until you find that a piece of pork flakes off easily with your fork. If you happen to be home, you might want to consider flipping the meat over. If not, it should be totally fine. I just sometimes get a little paranoid about the meat burning/drying out on top because my machine is a little old.
Shreddin' the Pork!
3. Once you find that the pork is soft and easy to pull apart, pull the piece of meat out onto a plate. It’s shredding time! For instructions on shredding, I’d like to direct you to this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juogbZevCXE. She does a much better job of explaining and demonstrating than I can.
4. Once shredded, place the meat back into the slow cooker. Now, this is where the magic happens. Pour about half the bottle of salsa verde into the pot. If you are not using the same Trader Joe’s bottle, then I would say it’s about 1 to 1.5 cups. Stir the meat around a little bit to make sure that the sauce coats all the meat. Let the meat stew in the sauce for another hour at least.
5. Serve with some veggies of your choosing and you’ve got some meals to last you a few days, depending on how many people you’re serving.
*I seem to have misplace a photo of the finished product! My dog ate it… I will post a photo when I make this dish again!
