Sweet Bacon Maple Pork Rub

Sweet Bacon Maple Pork Rub

Ingredients:

4 TBS Brown Sugar
2 TBS Torani Maple Syrup
2 TBS Torani Bacon Syrup
1 tsp Black Pepper
½ tsp Sea Salt
¼ tsp Cayanne Pepper

The measurements listed above are applicable for 4 Pork Chops, 3 Sirloin Cuts or 2 Shoulder Steaks. It is the shoulder steaks that are in the photos.

Mix all ingredients in a bowl and spread over one side of the pork. DO NOT put on both side or you will have a fire on the grill. Refrigerate 30 minutes or longer (longer is always better, but not necessary). Grill over low/medium heat until cooked though starting with the rubbed side up. With the sugar and salt mix in the rub it keeps the pork moist even when using frozen chops. Let pork rest about 5 minutes before serving.

I wanted to get this out in time for summer cookouts. Now, I am from the northeast, so I always thought that cookouts were for burgers and dogs. I also thought that pork was either bacon, ham or a roast cooked within an inch of its life. Well, then I moved to the Carolinas for over a decade and really learned about cooking pork. The recipe above is so you can get a great sweetened pork wet rub flavor without having to spend 9 hours standing next to a smoker in 100 degree heat. If you don't count the time it takes to whip up the rub (maybe 3 minutes) this will take you 20 minutes total and that's if you have a long walk to the grill. I will be the first one to tell you that the worst thing you can do is to overcook pork. Those shoulder steaks in the photos were cooked for 7 minutes on each side over quite low heat. That's it.

The rub is so simple that you can increase/decrease the quantities to fit your needs for the day. You can also whip up more in about 45 seconds, so don't sweat it if you run short. You can mix up a large quantity and use it as a wet rub for a pork shoulder roast (or picnic if you're in the south) if you like. I recently took this rub and marinated a loin roast that I then froze. 6 weeks later I put it in the cooler and took it camping with us. I roasted it on a spit over an open fire for about 7 hours. I always try to hit an internal temperature of 130 to 140 degrees when doing a roast. The combination of the long soak time, the open fire (with hickory of course) and the ultra long/low heat cook time yielded the best pork I think I have ever had. Is that what you would do this saturday between mowing the lawn and going to a baseball game? Probably not. But that is why this rub is so great. It is quick, simple, versatile and very very tasty.