Brine: overnight, covered in brine (kosher salt, SF's own Hetch Hetchy provided water), 1/2 C molasses
Spices: S and P, obvi. Plus about 1/2 tsp cinnamon, pinch of allspice, after brining, before cooking. One sliced onion.
Cooking time and temp: 9ish hours at 200 F
Pulling time: this shit took me almost 40 minutes to shred this beast
Sauce: 1/2 and 1/3 mix (ran out of the amazing Arthur Bryant's original flavor from KC, had to mix in some Stubb's smokey mesquite flavored sauce).
Taste: This tasted not so great with the addition of 2nd kind of sauce the night of, but the next day everything tasted good.
Questions/Notes: this was my 2nd time making pulled pork. The first time I cooked lower temp for longer and it was more pink and harder to shred. This time it was kinda sticky but shredded pretty easily. I haven't really been trimming any of the approx 1/4" of fat or any of the silverskin that Safeway leaves on the shoulder. So at the end, I leave a lot in and have about enough fat/maybe inedible stuff left over to fill a 12 oz. coffee cup, borrowed from Starbux.
Pre sauce addition, see the onions, shoulder blade, and color/texture of pork partway through shredding:
Rachel's gift of amazing BBQ sauce from KC next to brand X inferior fake smokey sauce from Safeway.
Leftover potentially inedible stuff filled up this cup. I put the gratuitous shoulder bone shot there but it looks better than the gross fat and stuff.
And the happy results the next day:
