Thermapen Recipes

BBQ Pulled Pork Buns with Slaw

Easy, tender BBQ pulled pork, loaded into buns with coleslaw and BBQ sauce.

Ingredients

Bone-in pork shoulder (this one was 5.5kg)
American mustard
1 cup apple juice
Burger buns
Coleslaw
BBQ sauce

For the rub

90g light brown sugar
40g paprika
25g kosher salt
20g black pepper
10g garlic powder,
10g onion powder
5g mustard powder
5g cinnamon

Tender BBQ pulled pork, loaded into buns with coleslaw and BBQ sauce in hand

Method

Set up your BBQ for indirect cooking, add a couple of wood chunks (I used cherry). Preheat to 130 °C.
Add your rub ingredients to a bowl and mix until fully incorporated.
Slather American mustard all over your pork, coating the surface evenly and then generously.
Apply your rub, covering all sides of the pork. You want a heavy application and don’t want to see any meat through the rub.
Put the pork onto your BBQ. After 4 hours, check the internal temperature every 30 minutes, or use a leave-in meat thermometer like RFX to monitor the temperature.
Once it hits 71 °C, put it into a foil tray. Add your apple juice, cover with foil and put it back onto the BBQ.
We want to cook the pork until it’s around 96 °C. That’s the temperature at which it will start to fall apart when pulled. This usually takes 2-4 hours, so start checking after 2 (or use a leave-in meat thermometer).
Once it hits 96 °C and your Thermapen goes into the meat with no resistance, pull it off the BBQ, remove it from its apple juice bath and wrap it in foil.
Give it a nice long rest — this is really important. If you’re worried it’s going cold, just check the internal temperature. You’ll want to pull it when it hits about 75 °C; it won’t be too hot to handle, will have a better texture, and will allow the juices to redistribute around the meat.
Once it hits 75 °C, pull it and mix back in some of the juice you cooked it in.
Add it to a bun, with some slaw and BBQ sauce and enjoy!

Don’t worry if you have leftovers, there are loads you can do with them! Think baked potatoes, quesadillas, chilli, jalapeno poppers — get creative.

BBQ Jake

Outdoor Cooking Content Creator

@bbqwithjake

Jake Meads, AKA BBQ Jake, is a UK BBQ content creator who makes achieving classic barbecue dishes easy — but always outstanding. He’s a proud member of the Kamado Joe Firesquad, a Traeger Grills content creator, and an Angus & Oink ambassador.