Pig in a Pumpkin

Botch

Been wanting to try this one for awhile, another FoodWishes.com recipe.
Cut up a 3.5-lb pork shoulder into lemon-sized pieces.  Mix with the following in a bowl:
1 rounded tblspn salt
2 tsp ground pepper
1.4 tsp cayenne
1/2 tsp dried thyme
1 tsp crushed fennel
1/2 tsp ground sage (my own addition, not in the orig recipe)
1 Tblspn chopped fresh rosemary
1/3 cup minced shallot
Refrigerate overnight to let it get happy.
 

 
Sprinkle with 2 Tblspns flour and mix until everything's coated, then brown on two sides in a hot skillet.  
Cut a lid in the top of a cooking pumpkin, about volleyball-sized, and fill with the browned pork.  Pour in hard cider, as much as will fit:
 

 
(is Apple Ale the same as hard cider? The church-state is raising the "grocery-store" limit of alcoholic beverages from 3.2 to (iirc) 5% on 1 November, any remaining weak stuff will have to be poured/destroyed, and the grocery stores here are in disarray (trying to prepare for the overnight switchover) and they couldn't find their "cider", I thought this might work).  
 
Chef John did his in the oven, 4 hours at 350º; I set my Large at 350, indirect, but when I went out to check on it my Smobot battery had died, and it was up at 450.  I switched to Manual and got it down to 300 by the end of the four hours, but instead of juice/fat in the bottom of the pan, I had charcoal.  
 

 
Emptied the pumpkin and sliced it into wedges.  Cooked some Brussel Sprouts and biscuits (not shown) to go with.  
 

 
The pork was tender, juicy, but otherwise "meh"; no smoke nor crust on it.  I'll probably pull the rest of it for green chile stew.
The Star of this meal was the pumpkin!  The flesh was cooked perfect, is sweeter than squash, and of course soaked in pork juice/fat; what's not to like?  Delicious!  
Don't know if I'll be making this again (a lot of work) but for entertaining, that browned gourd is a stunner (see his video recipe, his looked a lot better than mine).  And, damn, that pumpkin is tasty!  

Photo Egg

Very cool post. Thanks!

Mattman3969

That looks very interesting to say the least. Curiosity makes me wonder if you left the top off the pumpkin and did a lower temp & longer cook if it wouldn’t pick up some smoke like chili/soups do.  Or maybe smoke the pork till 150-160 before goin in the O’L jack o lantern.  

northGAcock

Very nice

TideEggHead

Thanks for posting! Looks like a cool cook, definitely festive. I would have thought the meat would have more flavor. Nonetheless, great work!

wardo

Very "fall" cook.

lkapigian

Thanks for sharing @Botch , watched that video a while back

Botch

Mattman3969 said:

Curiosity makes me wonder if you left the top off the pumpkin and did a lower temp & longer cook if it wouldn’t pick up some smoke like chili/soups do.    

This is something I considered too, but thought I'd follow the recipe the first time.  
I'm almost thinking, cut a pumpkin in half, then fill each "bowl"; you'd have to cook the pork a bit longer as the pumpkin will start to dry out, but if you timed it right, that may work nicely.  (I've done similar with acorn squash halves, but the pumpkin was so much sweeter/nice with pork).  
Had a couple more wedges of the pumpkin for supper, and yeah, I really wanna make this again now...

Canugghead

Haha, reading the title I thought stike carved a pig inside a pumpkin. Great cook idea. 

If I may digress ... roasted a cut up pumpkin recently, started skin side down, half way through the cook each 'cup' was filled with considerable liquid, poured out the liquid and finished cooking flesh side down.
 
I'm wondering what if you cook the filling and pumpkin shell halfway separately, empty liquid from pumpkin and apply some rub, then stuff it with filling that should have picked up some smoke to finish the cook?

nolaegghead

from thekitchn.com

Which pumpkins do I choose?

When shopping for pumpkins, look for the ones usually generically labeled “sugar pumpkins” or “pie pumpkins.” Some specific names are Baby Pam, Autumn Gold, Ghost Rider, New England Pie Pumpkin, Lumina (which are white), Cinderella, and Fairy Tale. Cinderella and Fairy Tale pumpkins have hard, thick skins but still have delicious flesh inside.

Choose pumpkins between four to eight pounds, and don’t worry if the outside looks a little dull — as long as you don’t see any big bruises or soft spots, it’s fine. Pumpkins have a long shelf life and can keep for months at cool room temperature.

Carolina Q

Cool looking punkin! I read some of the comments after Chef John's video. One suggested baking stuffing in the pumpkin for Thanksgiving. Bet that would be good too. Wonder if the pumpkin would taste more like stuffing or the stuffing would taste more like pumpkin. Neither would taste like pork.

SGH

@Botch
Every year at Halloween I want to try the Pig in a Pumpkin but it always works out that I am offshore. I saw the recipe (or a very similar one) in the Old Farmers Almanac years ago. 

On a separate note, great looking grub brother 👍 

caliking

That’s a neat cook! I’ve never seen or heard of this before, but the pumpkin soaked in pig juice already sounds good.