Pork Recipes & Meal Ideas

Cooking pork, especially today’s leaner versions, can be a bit tricky because you want the pork to be safe to eat but not overcooked and dried out. The color of the meat is not necessarily the best indicator of doneness, so how do you know if the pork is cooked properly? All cuts of pork, with the exception of ground pork, should be cooked to an internal temperature of 145°F, and the temperature should be measured at the thickest part of the meat not touching any bone.

I used to fret over parties with a buffet. The main dish was the trickiest part. Should I cook something or just buy something? Hot or cold entree? Would someone have to be tasked with carving a large piece of meat? But now the buffet entree is the easiest decision to make, since it will probably be a big spiral-sliced ham. Ham is popular for holidays like Easter and Christmas, but it’s also great for any big gathering. Here’s why it’s my favorite party main.

Q: I often make pulled pork in a slow cooker and always have a ton of cooking liquid left over. Do you have any suggestions for what I can do with it? Reduce into a sauce? Perhaps a BBQ sauce? Sent by Todd Editor: Readers, what do you do with the leftover liquid from making pulled pork? Do you have any advice for Todd?

Healthy cooking starting with bacon? Seems counterintuitive, right? But it’s actually one of the best ways to get your new or old wok seasoned so that you can move on to healthy quick cooking instead. We love wok cooking here at The Kitchn because you can use it to cook vegetables and proteins quickly with small amounts of oil, just the sort of cooking we like to do in January after the holidays.

Q: I have some bacon grease that I’ve saved in the hopes of using. Unfortunately, I haven’t really had to use it. I was wondering if the bacon grease (fat) could be used successfully in place of lard, shortening, and butter in recipes for cookies, pies, and biscuits, all of which I hope to make soon? If so, besides reducing or omitting the salt, how would I make the substitution? Would it be an even substitution (e.g., a cup of butter/shortening for a cup of bacon grease)?

Have you ever made the mistake of reading a recipe incorrectly and bringing home a pork tenderloin instead of a pork loin, or vice versa? While these two tasty cuts of pork share a few similarities, you can see from the photo above that they have a bunch of differences too. Read on to learn about these two popular cuts!

For those just starting to learn how to cook, all the various cuts of meat and ways to cook them can be a bit daunting. Sometimes there’s one method that brings out the best in a cut of meat, like slow-cooking a pork shoulder, but more usually a versatile meat like chicken can be poached, seared, grilled, or roasted and still come out delicious. How do you choose which method to use?

Whenever I see chorizo in a recipe, my first thought is, “Yum!” But then my second thought is always, “Wait, what kind? Spanish or Mexican?” While they’re both delicious sausages, they’re both actually quite different, so here’s what you need to know! How it’s made and sold: Mexican chorizo is a spicy ground meat sausage that is most commonly sold fresh and uncooked, either loose or in a casing, although dried versions do exist.

One of my favorite meats to order at a Mexican restaurant is carnitas, hands-down. The meat is rarely dry — instead, it’s juicy, flavorful, tender, and, if I’m lucky, someone took the time to crisp it up a little too. If you’re making carnitas at home, can you use any cut of pork, or is there one that works best? Carnitas is made by braising pork, usually in lard but it’s also done in broth or stock for a lighter end result.

Do you shy away from cooking pork chops for fear of turning a pricey cut of meat into shoe leather? Fear no more! Brine small cuts of meat like pork chops and chicken breasts for just 15 minutes and they will always stay moist and tender. A brine is just a simple mixture of water and salt, though you can add some extra flavor to your pork chops with aromatics like garlic and rosemary.

How do you guarantee a tender, soft moist pork chop? I have a convection oven. Sent by Heidi Editor: One of my favorite ways of guaranteeing tender, juicy pork chops is to quickly brine them before cooking, like in this recipe: How To Cook Tender & Juicy Pork Chops in the Oven Readers, what are your best tips for cooking pork chops?

It’s a zombie invasion! Oh wait, no…just a ham bone. Phew. While this may not be the prettiest of ingredients, it is an inexpensive way to round out a pot of soup and add an enormous boost of rich flavor while you’re at it. Skip the zombies, keep the meat. Ham bones are just the thing for a cozy winter meal.An average ham bone will weigh a few pounds and run you $4 or less. I most often see them smoked, like ham hocks or turkey legs, but you’ll sometimes find them fresh.

Q: I recently purchased half of a pig from my local farmer. I now have many boneless pork loin chops. Do you or your readers have any ideas on what I can make with these boneless chops other than pork chop dinners? I was thinking of cooking them in the crock pot and making shredded pork, but wasn’t sure if a loin would work as well as a shoulder. Any other ideas?

It’s something chefs (and The Kitchn!) have been saying for years: 160 degrees is overdoing it for pork. Today the USDA announced they agreed and set a new benchmark for a safe cooking temperature for the meat. But did they go low enough? Today, the USDA cooled their previous recommended cooking temperature for pork by 15 degrees. They now recommend that pork be cooked to an internal temperature of 145 degrees.

There’s no pretty way to say it: guanciale is cured pork jowl, plain and simple. This might sound like something best left to the Anthony Bourdains of the world, but that would be a mistake. If you like bacon, you’ll love guanciale. Trust us!Like bacon and pancetta, guanciale has a high fat to meat ratio. This translates into a meltingly tender texture with a deep, sweet-savory pork flavor.

Porchetta, noun: A Southern Italian dish of roasted suckling pig stuffed with wild fennel and garlicFriends of ours who have traveled in Italy come back singing praises about this iconic Italian dish – making us grind our teeth in envy. This is one culinary adventure we’d love to have!Porchetta is traditionally made with a whole suckling pig that has been deboned, stuffed, and rolled back into shape. The head, legs, and trotters are also often left on.

The Orion cooker has become a staple in our household. It uses convection, steam and smoke (if desired) to cook and flavor our favorite dishes. You might already have a grill or smoker (so do we), but the Orion has since become our right hand man outdoor cooking apparatus. It cooks bbq staples in record time and turns briskets into a a 60 minute process, instead of dedicating 8 hours of your weekend tending coals and temperatures.

Lardons are really nothing fancier than thinly sliced pieces of salt pork or fatback, and yet they’ve acquired a rather classy reputation through appearances in celebrity chef cookbooks and fancy restaurant menus! Here’s how you can use them at home…Lardons were originally used to add fat and richness to lean cutsAlong the way, someone realized that these little lardons (or lardoons) were quite tasty when cooked until much of the fat is rendered out.

Glance into the meat cases at any grocery store and you’ll see a whole slew of cured meat products, some of which look raw and some of which look like they could survive a cross-country back packing trip. What does “cured” mean for these different products? Let’s take a look.Curing is actually a general term referring to any process that helps preserve meat. It can mean salting, brining, aging, drying or canning.