Donal’s pulled pork recipe is perfect for a crowd and easy to make. The pork shoulder braises on the hob and transforms to pork shoulder steak shreds that can be piled into a soft roll. With sweet potato fries and spicy coleslaw, this American classic is complete. Look for cuts that are moist and a healthy deep-pink colour, not grey or red.

Choose neat cuts with a fine-grained texture. Avoid any meat that looks damp or clammy, or that has oily- or chalky-looking fat. Free-range, organic and rare-breed pork will generally be a deeper pink colour than commercial pork. It is not only considered more flavoursome than intensively reared pork, but will also come from older animals that have had a better quality of life. Rare-breed pigs take longer to mature than the breeds selected for modern farming methods and are generally very well cared for in a natural environment.

Although this means the end product is more expensive, the pork and bacon from traditional breeds of pig such as Saddlebacks, Gloucestershire Old Spots and Tamworths is considered especially flavourful because the extra fat these pigs carry helps keep the the meat moist and succulent during cooking. Store meat in the coldest part of the fridge. Cover and store raw and cooked foods separately and store raw foods below cooked foods in the fridge. If it’s already packaged in a cling-filmed tray, leave it like that until you’re ready to use it. If not, put the meat on a plate, loosely wrap in greaseproof paper or aluminium foil and store in the fridge away from cooked meats. Pork will keep for three to five days in the fridge.

Mince, offal and smaller cuts are best eaten on the day you buy them or within one to two days. Joints, chops and steaks will keep for two to three days and large roasting joints for up to five days. Freezing pork quickly reduces the chance of damage to its texture or succulence. Both smaller pieces and large joints freeze successfully.

Use frozen pork within six months. Pork joints can be roasted long and slow at a lower heat, or fast at a higher heat. Braising and pot-roasting can be used for almost every cut of pork including larger joints – the addition of wine, water or stock results in a moist, succulent pork dish every time. Stewing or casseroling pork, either on the hob or in the oven, produces a rich, flavoursome dish with succulent, tender meat. Pork is ideal for frying, stir-frying, grilling or barbecuing.

Grilled pork chops are a simple pleasure, or try an indulgent escalope cut from the pork fillet. This only takes minutes to cook, as you’ll see in Mike Robinson’s video recipe for Pork escalopes with lemon butter sauce. Pork’s ideal for marinating and is popular in oriental and Asian cookery. It’s also ideal for stir-frying – strips of pork cook very quickly. Barbecuing pork gives a fantastic sticky, chargrilled blackness and small joints are good for spit-roasting – most barbecues can be fitted with a spit, either hand-turned or with a battery-operated motor. The key to successful spit-roasting is to keep the coals at an even temperature, adding more coals, little and often, until the joint is cooked.

Sausage meat and minced pork are used in numerous recipes including Thai minced pork, pork burgers, pork terrine, Scotch eggs and pate. The British pig industry has suffered due to the importation of cheap imported pork. If you choose to buy British pork you will support British pig farmers and will usually be buying an animal whose quality of life was better than that of its equivalent on the Continent, because animal welfare standards in the rest of Europe tend to be lower than they are in Britain. However, if animal welfare is a concern, it’s still worth checking the conditions in which the pig was reared with your butcher, because conditions on some British farms are still far from ideal. Pork with the British Quality Standard label meets approved minimum industry standards. These distinctions are worth considering when choosing any cut of pork, including bacon, ham, gammon, sausages and burgers. The BBC is not responsible for the content of external sites.

Read about our approach to external linking. On this Wikipedia the language links are at the top of the page across from the article title. It is the most commonly consumed meat worldwide, with evidence of pig husbandry dating back to 5000 BCE. Ham, gammon, bacon, and sausage are examples of preserved pork. Pork is the most popular meat in the Western world, particularly in Central Europe. Some religions and cultures prohibit pork consumption, notably Islam and Judaism.

Pigs were domesticated in Mesopotamia around 13,000 BC. Pig being prepared in France during the mid-19th century. Before the mass production and re-engineering of pigs in the 20th century, pork in Europe and North America was traditionally an autumn dish—pigs and other livestock coming to the slaughter in the autumn after growing in the spring and fattening during the summer. A traditional Austrian pork dish, served with potato croquettes, vegetables, mushrooms and gravy. Pork vindaloo, spicy pork curry from India. As a result, large numbers of pork recipes have been developed throughout the world. Jamón, made from the hind legs of a pig, is the most well-known Spanish dry-cured ham.