Pork Butt (or also known as Pork Shoulder) Oven Roast

I like cooking with the less tender cuts. Quite often they have the best flavour. Traditionally a braise or other moist heat method, such as a slow cooker, is used but I have done this at 400F in the oven.

The recipe comes from a person I met on Chowhound many years ago. He is of Mexican heritage and shared this amazing and simple way to make a beautifully tender and juicy pork butt roast. I questioned placing the meat 'fat side down' but it works. This cut has a lot of fat marbling. When the roast is fully cooked, turn it over and serve it fat side up. Because it was on the bottom of the pan the fat side has nice carmelization. The pan juices and bits stuck to the bottom can be used to make a gravy.

This is a good 'cook once, eat three times' recipe. The leftover meat can be made into a wonderful pulled pork sandwich and the root vegetables can be pureed into a soup. Other ideas for leftovers are tacos, burritos, empanadas or a very flavourful hunter's stew.

Pork Butt Oven Roast

Preheat oven to 400F. Prepare the meat by rinsing and patting dry with paper towels. Drizzle with oil. I used sunflower oil because that is what I had but any vegetable oil would be fine. Season generously with sea salt, freshly ground black pepper and ground cumin. Rub in all over.

Place meat in roaster fat side down. Cover and seal with aluminum foil. Bake at 400F for about 4 hours for a 5 lb roast. In the last hour add cut up vegetables such as squash, carrots, potatoes and fennel in the pan surrounding the meat.