If you’re looking for a way to spoil Dad this Father’s Day without spending your entire day in the kitchen, we’ve got you covered! BBQ for Dad, and the ease of the slow cooker for you, make for the perfect celebration. This delicious meal is so simple, you might even have time to make a special dessert or cocktail. Bonus points! (You can thank us later.)
This is a recipe I posted back in 2012 but it’s so good I had to share it with you again (or for all my new friends!).
When Freezers and Slow Cookers Collide
I love when I find other food nerds out there. It is a title I use – and embrace – lovingly. It’s very different than food snobs who want to tell you that you are using the wrong knife or look down their nose at you if your cheese isn’t aged properly. Food snobs can get away with cooking once a week and call themselves a gourmet, but a food nerd is always looking for new ways to make food better and easier – we are the ones who trade recipes at MOPS meetings and steal (with permission) each other’s freezer tips for getting dinner on the table.
Let me introduce you to fellow food nerd Kelly Rankin. Kelly and I met at an event I was speaking at, and we became friends through my blog. Kelly has taken the concept of freezer meals and slow cooking and done a mash up – freezer/slow cooking.
I am also a freezer/slow cooker, but Kelly’s ingenuity of stretching her meals and leaving no leftover left behind is admirable. I asked Kelley to share her plan for using her freezer and slow cooker for maximum savings of time, energy and stress: Some of her favorite slow cooker to freezer recipes are things like soups, stews, and chili. You can double or – in a 6-quart slow cooker – triple a soup-like recipe and, after it cools, bag it up into gallon bags to be re-heated another time.
Slow cooker Smoked Pulled Pork BBQ
By Kelly Rakin
Four Simple ingredients and a day of slow cooking lead to an amazingly simple, economical, and delicious pork BBQ. No smoker needed, and the leftovers freeze beautifully for a later meal. The liquid smoke and beef bouillon are the essential keys to this simple recipe, giving the pork a great flavor with minimal BBQ sauce. Perfect for a large gathering!
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 7-9 hours
Yields: 10 servings
Ingredients:
5-lb. pork sirloin tip roast
2 T. liquid smoke (typically found with condiments)
2 T. beef bouillon (not Broth)
1/3 cup water
Serve with your favorite BBQ Sauce, to taste
Directions:
Place pork roast in a large slow cooker. Pour water, liquid smoke, and bouillon on top of pork roast. Cook on high for 7-9 hours, flipping roasts once during cooking, if possible, to allow the juices to simmer all sides of the meat. Meat is finished cooking when it easily pulls apart with a fork. Remove roasts from slow cooker and pull pork apart. Return pork to slow cooker and add BBQ sauce to taste, or serve BBQ sauce on the side. Great on sandwiches or by itself.
To freeze: Place cooked BBQ in 1-quart freezer bags, removing air. Thaw, rewarm, and serve. Keeps in freezer up to 6 months.
