Learn More About Me

Sunday, October 30, 2011

Easy Pulled Pork

I've never made pork before. I think I've make pork chops once, but we're just not a big pork eating house hold. Bacon doesn't count. I could live on bacon. (Ask my doctor, she'll tell you I probably live on bacon).

I've been trying to be better at planning what we're going to eat all week so that we don't grab something quick on the way home, or splurge every night at the grocery store. I've been doing big grocery shopping once a week, and for the past two weeks it has worked out pretty well.

I typically shop at Wal-Mart, but I couldn't find any pork that I liked there. A new Kroger Marketplace (also known as Grocery Heaven) opened and I got the pork from there.

I used this recipe from My Baking Addiction:

Easy Crockpot Pulled Pork 

Yield: 6-8 servings 

Ingredients:

1 large Vidalia onion, sliced thin
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon paprika
2 teaspoon kosher salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 (4-6 lb) boneless pork butt or shoulder
¾ cup cider vinegar
4 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
1 ½ teaspoons crushed red pepper flakes
1 ½ teaspoons sugar
½ teaspoons dry mustard
½ teaspoon garlic salt
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions:

1. Rinse pork roast under cold water and pat dry with paper towels.
2. Place onions in crock-pot. In a small bowl, combine brown sugar, paprika, kosher salt and pepper; mix thoroughly. Rub mixture all over roast and place the roast on top of the onions.
3. In a medium bowl, combine vinegar, Worcestershire, red pepper flakes, sugar, mustard, garlic salt and cayenne pepper; whisk to combine. Drizzle about 1/3 of vinegar mixture over roast. Cover and refrigerate remaining vinegar mixture.
4. Cover crockpot; cook on low for 10-12 hours. Drizzle about 1/3 of reserved vinegar mixture over roast during last ½ hour of cooking.
5. Remove meat and onions; drain. Chop or shred meat and onions. Serve with remaining vinegar mixture or your favorite barbeque sauce.

I followed the recipe except that I doubled the dry rub because my piece of meat was a little larger than what the recipe called for. I think it was 6.5lbs. It is hard to find a small pork shoulder around here. I cooked it 11 hours on low, and it was fantastic. I thought I was going to shred it with two forks like I've seen people do before, but I pulled this out of the crockpot and used a wooden spoon to get the bone out, and all I had to do was touch the meat with it because it all fell apart. It was delicious.

These pictures suck because I didn't take the time to get my camera out. After 11 hours I was too hungry to.

Try it. F'real.

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Last Vacation Post

You're welcome. When we decided we were going to Florida for vacation we decided we wanted to go to Universal again, and wanted to go to Islands of Adventure since we went to the other side last year. As soon as we figured all that out, we decided that since we would be there, and had heard Harry Potter was so awesome that we wanted to read all the books and watch all the movies before we went. We rock, so we did it. By the time we finished the books I was so excited to go to Universal I couldn't contain myself. Really.
We didn't even get inside the gate before people started commenting about how big Joshua is. This lady asked me if she could touch him.

The entrance to Hogsmeade.
The Hogwarts Express

It is funny to be in bright sunny Florida on a 90° day, and see snow on the rooftops.
"The Constipation Sensation: U No Poo" inside the joke shop.

Joshua (with his eyes closed) and our one mug of $11.25 worth of Butterbeer. It was good...but not that good.

The Three Broomsticks was a sit down restaurant.
Honeydukes candy shop had tons of jellybeans inside.



After Harry Potter World we went on to Jurassic Park World and then Marvel World. Joshua is a pretty big comic fan (he bought his first comic book collection last night. F'real) so he really enjoyed it. I'm not saying I didn't enjoy it. It was pretty awesome. The rides were all pretty impressive. Especially the Hulk, which was my favorite. This is in the line to get on the Spiderman ride. It was a pretty realistic office.
The City Walk or whatever they call it on the way into and out of Universal had a cigar bar, and Joshua loves cigars so we stopped. I thought the humidor was pretty cool. I'd never been in one this large.
That is all for Universal. I didn't take too many pictures there. We definitely had a ton of fun at Universal, and I wouldn't mind going back. The weather was perfect, there were no lines, and we got through the park in about three hours. Unheard of.

If you're going, I recommend going late September, we had a great vacation.

And that is the end of my fairytale. Word.

Friday, October 28, 2011

Glutes, Glutes, Glutes

You're not going to believe this, but this is a post about my arm.

Ask Ingrid and she'll tell you I was being a baby the other night during our workout.

Here is what happened:
(all images courtesy of Google Images)

I was getting off the treadmill after we did our cardio, going to get a drink before we started our circuit. I was walking, paying super amazing attention to what I was doing (like always).

I looked a little something like this:
Except, you know not. My arms weren't in the air, and hopefully my mouth wasn't open. It probably was though. Basically I just wasn't watching what I was doing.

Have you seen this machine before? The glute press? You lean in it like this and press back with your legs. It's technically known as "the butt machine". Supposedly you get hot buns of steel with it, like you can't even get through airport security anymore because your buns are so steel-like.


So I was like this:


And the girl on the butt machine was like this:

And then I was like this:
And that is basically all you need to know.

One other thing you need to know: If you Google anything with the word "Glute" in it, you get hilarious images.

This is a rare naked and skinless photo of my husband. Yes, his hands are bigger than his entire head.


This is my new gym outfit. I'll have to make sure I wash my bike shorts though. How awkward would that be if I forgot?

And, really? Who is The Glute Guy? How do you get to be that guy?
Do you have a funny story from a time you were at the gym and your arm got hurt on the glute machine? No? I didn't think so.

Sunday, October 23, 2011

Changes

I've got no direction this morning. I just decided to post, without any idea what to say. So, expect rambling.

Joshua and I have been talking a lot lately (always good, right?) and we've decided to make some changes in our lives. If you've been around my blog for a while, you may (or probably don't) remember that when I was 21 we got engaged, decided to get married in May 2009, and then move to Arizona in August 2009 so that I could begin law school at Arizona State. If you've only been around five minutes, you will have realized it didn't happen. The getting married part did, but we never moved, and I never went to law school (thank God). We bought a house in our little corner of Indiana, hunkered down, and braved two or three winters since then (I'm not good at math). I finished school, Joshua started school, I got fired from a job, got a new job, sold a truck, bought a truck, and successfully rid ourselves of two Cadillacs that were older than us.

Joshua finishes school in March. I work. Well, I wouldn't call it work, but I go somewhere from 8 to 4:30 on the weekdays and someone pays me for it. We're 25. We've never been further west than Chicago. Yes, really.

I love pictures, so I made this handy map for you to view.

You can view the map larger if you click on it.
This is how to read it:
Yellow: I've never visited
Blue: I've visited or driven through
Red: Where I've lived

I was going to include Josh's states, but his are identical except that he's been to NY and PA on his way to Canada.

PS. If you want to make your own map, click here. It's kind of cool.

Also, supposedly I've been to OK, but I was less than a year old. If you can't remember being there, it doesn't count, so I didn't add it.

My point here is that we're young, we don't have children, and we're both done (or almost done) with school. Why not see what there is to see out there?


We're discussing a move that would take us pretty far from Indiana. We're talking about Arizona again. We know it will be a big thing, and we have so much to do before we can even go. But we're going to do it. And we're going to kick ass at it. Because, why not?

Have any of you ever made a huge move? Any words of advice?

Saturday, October 15, 2011

Epcot

Again, more vacation photos. If you don't care, do not fret. I only have one more post about vacation after this one.

The dome.
Right when we walked into the World Showcase they had a cranberry bog.
It was pretty cool, in the "first time to a farm" kind of way. I've never seen cranberries in a bog before.
The spread in France.
We got a cheese plate.
My husband is French. Doesn't he look exactly how you would picture a French guy? I thought so, especially in his element like this.
What in the world is it with turkey legs? Every single park in Florida sells steaming hot turkey legs. Really? It's 90°, I would love nothing more than a hot turkey leg, right in the middle of the day. I don't understand.

Japan
Morocco
The Wines of France. (I translated that myself, so I'm probably incorrect). This was a cool shop. I love wine shops.

Beer in Germany.
China
Terracotta army in China. This was pretty cool. These statues guard the burial site of the Chinese Emperor. The statues in real life are six feet tall and contained horses, chariots, and these soldiers. If I am remembering correctly it said that there were approximately 6,000 statues. Just for one Emperor.
This is in Norway. We have a friend named Nate, who calls himself a Viking, and kind of looks like this. So Josh took a picture with Nate.

We got Skolebrod (School Bread) and a cherry danish in Norway. Josh liked the school bread so much that my Norwegian friend Ingrid (pretty handy, huh?) found a recipe for me. Click here if your husband likes it too.


I don't know if they do this in Norway or not, I'm assuming they do since they did it here, but there is a lawn and flowers on this roof top.
Margaritas in Mexico

Joshua called these guys my uncles.
Mexico

We ate a meal in Morocco. I had lamb, couscous, hummus, and some green stuff. Josh had sliders, which were like gyros, a lentil salad, green stuff, and hummus.

On our way out.
We were completely exhausted after Epcot. It took us so long to walk everywhere. I didn't realize it was so big. There was a bunch of stuff in Futureworld we didn't even see. By the time we got around the world to Mexico we decided we were done and going back to the house.

Up next is Universal Islands of Adventure. I know, you can't wait.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Vacation

I know, you don't care about my vacation. Nothing is as interesting to anyone else as it is to you. Especially if you're spending a week on the beach. No one cares unless they're there with you.

This is where you would leave my blog if you're not interested in hearing how much fun I had on my vacation last week.

Last chance.

I mean it.

Ok, here I go.

So on the way down, we were traveling 434mph, which means it took 20 minutes to get to Cincinnati. Amazing, right?

Josh decided to get toasted on the morning flight we took. My purse became a liquor cabinet.
This was the sunset the first night.
I've never gone to Florida this time of year, so I don't know if it was just the city we were in, or that it was fall, but every sunrise and sunset was absolutely beautiful.
Sunrise.


I can honestly say that I was not aware. Mice are fast. As are roaches.
This was a limo we saw on our way to Orlando. It was hideous.
Jellyfish washed up almost every day.

Sunset.

Autumn on the beach.
Sunrise.

This Catholic Church in Kissimmee served Cheese Steaks. Better call ahead.
Another amazing sunset.






Me and Carsyn on the beach.

This is my favorite.
Me and my super happy husband. Doesn't he look like he's having a wonderful time?



Joshua took such good care of me on vacation and made me breakfast every day that I didn't get up and eat before he did. These were my Toaster Strudels.
Banana or plantain? I tried Googling it, but they look the same to me.
Joshua relaxing in the hammock on our last afternoon.
You're gonna have to come back for my pictures of Epcot and Universal. I'm already tired of blogging this one, so they're going to wait.

We did have a fantastic time though. I can't wait for our next vacation. :)

LinkWithin

Related Posts with Thumbnails
 
SITE DESIGN BY DESIGNER BLOGS