I’ve made only a handful of dishes in my slow cooker, and mostly that’s because I don’t want to leave it turned on at home whilst I’m at work. Inspired by the Heston recipe my flatmates brought home, I thought I’d make a pulled pork dish with some chipotle paste I had in the cupboard.

Ingredients

• 1 chopped red onion
• 2 pork loins (you can use pretty much anything but I wanted it to be a little bit leaner)
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 1/2 tsp smoked salt
• 2 cloves garlic
• 1 small bottle of chipotle paste
• 1 bottle of tomato passata
• 1/4 cup cider vinegar
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 10 ml Worcestershire sauce
• 25g golden syrup

Method

• Cut the loin into small rounds, and coat with the dry ingredients and the chipotle paste. Add the chopped garlic. Brown the pork off to caramelise some of the flavours
• Brown the onion and add the onion to the slow cooker.
• Add the pork and the rest of the wet ingredients.
• Cook the pork in the slow cooker (I did it for about 4 hours)
• Shred the pork and add it back in

One thing I realised that slow cookers aren’t good for is caramelising and thickening the sauce. The temperature never gets hot enough, so I think next time I would finish the dish off in a saucepan on the pan to really bring the sweetness and thickness to the BBQ sauce at the end.

Still turned out pretty good. I served this in a toasted ciabatta with freshly chopped coriander, salsa and a squeeze of lime juice. This is one dish I’ll definitely be making again.