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A pork shoulder is carved with a criss cross pattern. Then narrow slits are cut in the pork and slivers of garlic are slid into them. The shoulder is seasoned and smoked for hours before being foiled to power through the stall. Finally, to finish this garlic studded pulled pork recipe the meat is pulled to make some epic sandwiches.
During the Covid lockdowns, I ate more pulled pork than I ever had in my life. And while I really enjoy pulled pork, I always felt like it needed something extra. A little, “je ne sais quoi,” which is French for, “I don’t know what.”
Thank you Mrs. Matzker for putting up with me through four years of French class in High School. You were my favorite HS teacher
I’m not looking for something to change the pulled pork drastically. I just want a little extra.
I saw a friend of mine on Instagram stud a pork shoulder with garlic, so I decided to try it.
Low and behold, I found my je ne sais quoi.
Pulled pork is amazing. Garlic pulled pork is even better.
The garlic studs cook inside the pork shoulder and become soft and buttery like roasted garlic. It infuses the the meat with garlic and that soft garlic is amazing mixed into pulled pork sandos.
Also, a GREAT side for those pulled pork sandos is this Cowboy Beans Recipe.
Garlic Studded Pulled Pork Recipe Ingredients:
- 1 Pork shoulder/pork butt (these are the same cuts)
- 8 Cloves of garlic, sliced into slivers
- Duck fat spray
- Salt
- Your favorite BBQ rub
Other Equipment Needed:
- Aluminum foil
Start with the star of this show, the pork shoulder or pork butt:
What’s the difference between a pork shoulder butt and a Boston butt?
There isn’t a difference other than the name. Why would a shoulder be called a butt and vice versa. Because back in the day of wooden sailing ships, pork shoulders were packed in salt in big barrels called butts. The pork was preserved for the long voyages. At the time, Boston was one of our biggest ports and thus often the destination of those barrels or butts. This these cuts of meat are still sometimes called Boston butts. In the end, whether Boston or not, whether shoulder or butt, they are all the same cut. Now that we have that out of the way, let’s get to it.
How to garlic stud a pork shoulder
Start off by carving those garlic cloves into slivers:
Make a bunch of slivers.
You want to load this shoulder up with garlic:
Place the shoulder with the meat side up (fat side down).
Take a slender bladed knife and cut a slit in the pork shoulder.
Leave the knife blade in the meat and slide one of those slivers of garlic down the flat side of that blade:
Then pull the knife blade out, leaving the garlic in the meat.
Repeat this every 1.5″ – 2″ around the entire pork shoulder.
Now for an added twist, flip it over on the fat side and carve a crisscross pattern in the fat, about 1/3 – 1/2 of an inch deep:
That criss cross pattern will increase the amount of the surface area and thus more bark.
More bark means better pulled pork.
Now add more slivers of garlic into the gaps in the grid and then flip over to the meat side to salt and season.
Duck fat as a binder in this pulled pork recipe
A lot of the time I slather the meat with mustard or mayo and then season to have the mustard or mayo act as a binder.
In this case, I gave it a spritz of fat. Duck fat in particular:
Season the Garlic Studded Pulled Pork
Liberally salt the meat side and then hit the shoulder with your favorite BBQ rub:
Don’t season the fat side yet. Let’s get that cooker set up first.
I prepared my pellet cooker by filling it with cherry pellets and cranking it up to 275F:
Set the Pellet cooker, in this case a Green Mountain Grills pellet cooker, to 275F (+/- 25F) and set a pan of water on one side.
Then put the pork shoulder fat side up on the other side:
Now I hit it with that duck fat, then salt and hit with the BBQ rub:
Thus our shoulder is ready for some smoke:
So why didn’t I season it all the way around?
Because whatever side of the meat that sat on the cutting board would leave a ton of the seasoning on that cutting board.
That’s why I seasoned the top last, after it hit the smoker.
How to prepare this garlic studded pulled pork recipe
Once we get that pork shoulder on the smoker, we wait.
And wait and wait and wait.
Here we are an hour or so in:
And another hour or so in this pulled pork recipe:
Three hours plus in:
When to foil a pork shoulder?
When the smoked pork shoulder gets near 160F and we are firmly in the stall, about 4.5 hours in, I break out the Texas Crutch which is aluminum foil
What is the Texas Crutch? It’s foiling meat to allow the protein to cook in its own juices which hyper accelerates the breakdown of connective tissues while keeping the meat juicy.
And here is what happens when I lean into that smoker before the smoke clear after the lid is opened:
Make sure to use heat resistant gloves or tongs to do this.
Indeed, I have cloth gloves on inside the black nitrile gloves here:
And wrap it up:
Pork shoulder back on the grill
I kicked up the temp on the grill to 350 at this point because I wanted the shoulder to feed my kids before it got too late.
What is the stall?
The stall is when the temperature stops the slow steady clime and levels off for what seems like an eternity. What happens is all the fat and collagen inside the shoulder liquifies and cools everything off. The stall can last multiple hours. Adding the foil, hyper-accelerates the cooking process by steaming the smoked pork shoulder in its own juices while still keeping it moist. Eventually the heat and the aluminum foil will work their magic and the temps will start to climb again and leave us with super tender and juicy pulled pork.
What temp do I pull my pork shoulder off the grill?
The target temp we are looking for here is 203F:
Time to rest the garlic studded pulled pork
Once it hits 203F, pull that probe thermometer out, wrap in another layer of foil to keep any juices from leaking out and wrap in a towel:
Now put the towel wrapped and foiled pork shoulder in an empty cooler or powered off microwave or oven and leave it there for at least an hour.
You could leave it in there for more than 4 hours and it will still be hot as can be.
I did this with a turkey last Thanksgiving for THREE hours and the turkey was hot and amazing!!
For this pulled pork recipe, I put the meat in the smoker at 2:00 pm and it hit 203F at 7:30.
Finally. here we have the shoulder removed from the towel and microwave and ready to pull:
Time to pull the bone
The great thing about smoked pork shoulder is it has a surefire test built into the meat to show if you got it right.
Indeed, the shoulder blade should come out clean like this if it is perfect:
But what if the blade won’t come out clean?
There are two options.
Either chop the pork, as it won’t pull, if dinner needs to be served immediately.
If there’s time, wrap it back up in the foil and place it back on the cooker for a little longer.
If the shoulder blade comes out clean, then the meat looks like this:
How does that smoke ring look?
Now it’s time to make up some garlic studded pulled pork sandos.
Life is too short for mediocre buns
I went with brioche buns here, both regular size and sliders for the kids (in the back):
I’m not a fan of cole slaw at all as a side dish.
But as a condiment it’s AMAZING, particularly on pulled pork.
I ate every bite of this sammich:
Garlic Studded Pulled Pork Recipe Summary:
In fact, I ate that sando, and two sliders. My kids asked for seconds. Indeed, that’s how great this garlic studded pulled pork was. The garlic flavor permeated the meat really well and the roasted garlic in the sandwiches was just out of this world good. Consequently, this is my go-to now. I will never NOT garlic stud a pork shoulder that I smoke. I can’t recommend this method enough.
If you have any questions or comments about this garlic studded pulled pork recipe, feel free to leave them below or send me an email.
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Garlic Studded Pulled Pork Recipe Card:
Garlic Studded Pulled Pork
Equipment
- aluminum foil
Ingredients
- 1 Pork butt/shoulder these are the same cuts
- 8 cloves Garlic sliced into slivers
- Duck fat spray
- Salt
- Your favorite BBQ rub
Instructions
- Slice the garlic cloves into slivers
- Start with the pork butt meat side up/fat side down
- Using a thin bladed knife, cut slits in the pork shoulder every 1.5-2 inches
- Leave the knife in the slit and slide a sliver down the flat side of the knife into the slit and then remove the knife blade
- Cover the meat side of the pork shoulder with slits filled with garlic slivers
- Flip over to the fat side and give the fat a 1/3-1/2 inch criss cross cut
- In the gaps in the criss cross cut, make more slits on the fat side and insert more garlic
- Flip fat side back over to the bottom and apply a binder (I used duck fat but mustard or mayo work too), and then season with salt and the BBQ rub
- Prepare the grill and set at 275F
- Place the pork shoulder fat side up//rubbed side down on the smoker and apply the binder and hit with salt and the BBQ rub
- Insert a heat resistant probe thermometer and close the lid for many hours
- After the shoulder gets to around 160 foil the pork (I foiled at 156), which took about 4 hours
- Leave in the foil until the pork butt hits 203F (this took a total cook time of 5.5 hours)
- Once it hits 203, remove the probe thermometer and wrap in more aluminum foil to keep liquid from leaking out the hole from the probe thermometer
- Wrap in a towel and place in an empty cooler or an unlit oven or microwave for at least an hour
- After an hour of rest (or more), pull back the foil and pull the shoulder blade out. If it comes out clean, it's perfect.
- Pull the pork and put it on buns and top with BBQ sauce and/or cole slaw
Video
More pics from this pulled pork recipe
Indeed, thanks for reading my pulled pork recipe.
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