Cider and clementine braised pork shoulder
- Preparation 20 min
- Cooking 3 h 30 min
- Servings 6 to 8
- Freezing Absolutely
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🎄 A holiday roast, not a barbecue
Let’s clear something up right away: this is not barbecue. Nothing gets smoked, nothing gets shredded into a bun. This is the refined version of a pork shoulder, the one that lands in the middle of the table when there’s company, and it happens to show up right when clementines hit the stores in November.
Three and a half hours in the oven. The whole house smells like cider and citrus.
No clementines? Oranges do the job.
🐖 Ask for a picnic pork shoulder
At the counter, ask for a picnic pork shoulder, sometimes labelled picnic roast. It sits right next to the Boston butt and the two are not the same piece. The butt is the upper part, fattier and more marbled, and that’s the one most smoking recipes call for. The picnic is the lower part, down toward the front leg, and that’s what I use here: boneless, rind off, most of the fat trimmed away. Most, not all. What’s left is where the flavor lives. Same cut as my beer-braised pulled pork.
🍏 Apple cider braised pork shoulder, and what to do with that sauce
Two cans of cider, the juice and zest of five clementines, Dijon, garlic, rosemary and thyme. That’s the whole braising liquid, and after three and a half hours under a lid it turns into something sweet, sharp and glossy. Don’t waste it. A green salad on the side, or mashed potatoes to catch every last spoonful. That’s the whole meal.
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🔥 Why 350°F and not 300
Plenty of pork shoulder recipes will tell you 300°F for six hours. That’s a whole lot of oven time for nothing. At 350°F for three and a half hours it comes out exactly right: the meat gives under a fork, and the sauce has actually had time to reduce instead of staying watery.
The sear is not optional. Those ten to twelve minutes spent browning the pieces in the pot are what build the flavor of the entire dish. The brown crust stuck to the bottom of the pot isn’t a mistake, it’s the whole point. You scrape it up with the cider mixture and it goes straight into the sauce.
🧅 The red onion goes in at the end
Add it at the start and it melts away. You lose the chunks completely. Thirty minutes before the end is the sweet spot.
💧 Half submerged, no more than that
Everyone with a smaller pot asks the same thing: does the meat swim in the liquid? No. The cider and clementine juice come up to about halfway, and the rest cooks in the steam under the lid. If your pot is narrower and the liquid rides higher, no harm done, your sauce will just be a little thinner at the end.
🥓 Trim most of the fat, not all of it
Rind off, most of the fat off. Most, not all. What stays behind renders through those three and a half hours and that’s where the flavor comes from.
🍲 Slow cooker? I haven’t tested it
Straight up: I’ve never made this one in a slow cooker. It absolutely can be done, it’s a shoulder braising in liquid, which is exactly what a slow cooker was built for. But I’m not going to hand you settings I haven’t checked myself.
What I’d do in your place: sear the pieces in a skillet first, because a slow cooker browns nothing at all, then transfer everything with the cider mixture and let it go on low for the day. Add the red onion in the last half hour, same as in the oven. Trust the fork, not the clock.
❄️ Keeps well, freezes well
Four days in the fridge, up to 3 months in the freezer. Reheat it low and covered, with a splash of cider or water to wake the sauce back up.
🍽️ What to serve with my apple cider braised pork shoulder
A green salad, or mashed potatoes. That’s how we eat it here. My Boursin garlic and herb mashed potatoes were made for a sauce like this one, they soak it up without covering it. And if you want a vegetable cooking at the same time, my roasted garlic and maple carrots go in while the shoulder finishes its last half hour.
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Ingredients for the cider and clementine braised pork shoulder
- 3 kg (6 1/2 lb) boneless picnic pork shoulder, rind off and most of the fat trimmed, cut into 4 pieces
- A good drizzle of olive oil, about 2 to 3 tbsp (30 to 45 ml), plus more as needed
- 2 cans (473 ml / 16 oz each) of cider, whichever one you like
- 1 concentrated chicken bouillon cube (or 1 tsp (5 ml) powder)
- 1/4 cup (60 ml) Dijon mustard
- 2 tbsp (30 ml) onion powder
- Juice and zest of 5 clementines
- 1 sprig fresh rosemary
- 5 sprigs fresh thyme
- 4 large garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
- 1 red onion, cut into large chunks
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Preparation
- Preheat oven to 350°F (180°C).
- In a large dutch oven heated over medium heat, add a generous drizzle of olive oil. Brown pork pieces on all sides, a small amount at a time, about 10-12 minutes. Set aside on a plate. Season meat generously with salt and pepper. Add a little olive oil if necessary.
- In a big cup, combine cider, chicken bouillon cube, Dijon mustard, onion powder, clementine juice and zest. Season with salt and pepper.
- Deglaze the casserole with the mixture, scraping the bottom to release the cooking juices.
- Add the meat, rosemary, thyme sprigs and crushed garlic cloves and stir. Bring to a boil.
- Cover the casserole and place in the oven for 3 hours. Stir halfway through cooking and flip the meat over.
- After 3 hours, add the red onion, stir and return the casserole to the oven, still covered, for another 30 minutes.
- Adjust seasoning with salt, if necessary. Serve with mashed potatoes!
You’ll usually find it under two names sitting side by side. Picnic shoulder or picnic roast is the lower part, the one going down toward the front leg, and that’s the cut used here. Boston butt, confusingly, is the upper part of the same shoulder, fattier and more marbled. Ask for the picnic.
Braising, if you want it tender without turning it into pulled pork. Sear it hard first, then let it sit covered in liquid in a moderate oven. The searing builds the flavor, the liquid keeps it from drying out, and the lid does the rest. Smoking is the other route, but that’s a different dish entirely.
Three and a half hours at 350°F (180°C) for a 3 kg boneless picnic shoulder cut into four. Three hours covered, then another thirty minutes once the red onion goes in. The real signal isn’t the timer, it’s when a fork slides in without any effort.
You can. Unsweetened apple juice or a dry white wine both work. You’ll lose some of the sharpness that keeps the sauce from tasting flat, so add a squeeze of extra clementine juice to make up for it. And for the cider itself, use whichever style you like drinking.
A green salad or mashed potatoes, and nothing else. The dish already brings its own sweet-and-sour sauce and plenty of herbs. The rest of the plate is there to catch the sauce, not to compete with it.
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