Eastern North Carolina Barbecue Sauce

{{Slow Cooker Pulled Pork}} This eastern North Carolina barbecue pulled pork has the perfect amount of vinegar, heat, and sweetness. It’s especially delicious when piled on top of a homemade hamburger bun, and topped with North Carolina style coleslaw. 

 

 

Before I met Forrest, the only kind of BBQ or pulled pork I had heard of was usually covered in a sweet, tomato based sauce. That’s all I ever had…so that’s all that existed, right?

Wrong. Turns out, there are tons of types of barbecue out there — in fact, Forrest tells me there is three different types in North Carolina alone. Thankfully, Forrest pulled me out of my ethnocentric culinary world, and introduced me to the kind he grew up eating — Eastern North Carolina BBQ style.

When you first look at it, if you are like me and think that BBQ sauce is typically tomato based, you might be a little taken back. Because, well, look at it…no tomato sauce in sight!

It’s a vinegar-based barbecue sauce, that has a little bit of a kick to it. We’ve made it several times, and even had it at one of our wedding receptions (we had one in Colorado, and one in North Carolina. I’ll let you guess where it was served.) Needless to say, I’ve been converted to this Eastern Carolina BBQ pulled pork.

A few weekends ago, we decided to make it. We had a good amount of family over (including Forrest’s sister, Doris, and her boyfriend Corey) and thought it was the perfect time for some good ol’ Carolina pulled pork, cole slaw, hush puppies, and banana pudding — all Southern classics.

The pork took about eight hours to cook (you know, minus that time where I thought it was cooking and the crock pot was unplugged . . .), but it definitely didn’t take that long to disappear. I think I’ve finally perfected the BBQ sauce (for my tastes, as well), to have the right amount of spice, and the vinegar isn’t super overpowering. We usually just use Scott’s Barbecue Sauce, but they really don’t sell that in Colorado or Utah, and we ran out…so homemade it was. Thankfully it turned out great.

Of course, any good BBQ isn’t complete without some delicious coleslaw to pile on top. I put Forrest in charge of this…and he sure did a good job! Personally, I think it looked really pretty…and it was delicious too. And, there’s no mayonnaise in this, so it’s perfect for outdoor get together’s. I personally like vinegar-based coleslaw better, anyways.  Oh…and he was also in charge of shredding the pork. That’s my least favorite job!

 

This was also Jack’s first time trying Carolina Barbecue pork. At first he wasn’t too impressed . . .

 

 

But he eventually warmed up to it!

 

Everyone really enjoyed this BBQ, and it was just nice sitting around and visiting. There’s just something about any kind of BBQ that just makes you want to sit back, relax, and enjoy the company.

 

 

Poor baby Liam didn’t get any pork. He was trying to get to it in the picture below, though!

 

 

 

So, if you are looking to try something new (or just are looking for a delicious Eastern North Carolina barbecue sauce recipe) be sure to try this one. We used about 2 pounds of pork, and cooked it on low for eight hours in the sauce, but the amount listed below could easily be used on at least twice that amount of pork.  I should also note that this kind of barbecue sauce isn’t really for dipping, like tomato based BBQ. We also made homemade hamburger buns, which made this meal even more delicious.

What kind of BBQ is your favorite?

For the North Carolina-style cole slaw, Forrest used this recipe. However, we just used a store-bought coleslaw mix and that cut down prep time significantly. We also omitted the celery seed because we didn’t have any. We only used about half of the dressing from the recipe linked above with one bag of coleslaw mix. 

 

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