Alternative cuts create tempting main dishes

You don't have to drown in fant, if you follow the right steps.
By VIRGINIA PHILLIPS
SCRIPPS HOWARD
It's cheap. It's fatty. It's ugly as a box of rocks. This part of the pig is insensitively known as the pork butt, and it deserves a better name.
Yes, the term "butt" conveys "rounded" and "meaty" -- but, no, it has nothing to do with a pig's bum. That's the hind leg, the ham department. A pork butt is in a tasty forward realm, high on the front leg. We are talking about the shoulder.
This homely but sexy roast is waiting to make your reputation. You can't wreck it. It cooks so sl-o-o-o-o-o-w, self-basting as it goes. Its succulence is legendary. A shoulder roast feeds a crowd for a buck or less a person and is often found on sale.
For leftovers, look forward to pulled pork for tacos or barbecue on a bun.
It is impressive to cook the roast in port wine. The braising liquid becomes a mahogany mushroom sauce for the meat that will be sliced thickly, including the browned crispy parts, and laid on a steaming hill of the best polenta you can find.
Doing it easy
For a casual dinner when the gang files through the kitchen to serve themselves, try the "Six-Hour Roast," with the pork roasting uncovered, developing a crunchy herb crust. Or with just a bit more tending, simmer it on top of the stove in milk the classic Bolognese way. When the meat is falling apart, lift it out and serve with the rustic dark golden gravy.
The trick is slow and low: long time at low temperature. This applies whether the meat is covered to braise, roasted uncovered or simmered on the stovetop.
While the pork is on autopilot, go ahead and slap a coat of paint on the house. (That's not entirely a joke. I have roasted a pork-shoulder butt more than 24 hours at below 200 degrees -- as in Paula Wolfert's "The Slow Mediterranean Kitchen" -- with outstanding results, but there is no need for a Guinness World Record. Slightly higher temps get fabulous taste and texture in a quarter of the time.)
Just yummy
When you come back five or six hours later, the kitchen will reek sweetly and dinner will have cooked itself. The meat will have slumped into juicy, spoon-tender temptation.
You have found yourself a shoulder to lean on.
It is the fat, basting everything as it melts through the intramuscular layers, that makes the dish so rich and tender. If you want to remove the fat very diligently, prepare the dish earlier in the day or even the day before. Then chill the pan liquid and lift off the fat in a single layer. Otherwise, use a fat-skimming measuring cup. This is a miraculous little artery-saver when you haven't the luxury of chilling time.
Pure tenderness
If the meat is done before you are ready to sit down -- and you will not need a meat thermometer to know this, it will be falling-apart tender -- reduce the heat to 225 degrees, and just let it go another hour while you serve your guests another drink. Out of the oven, the roast holds well on a warm platter, tented with foil, for 40 minutes or so, affording you ample time to skim fat and reduce the pan juices for sauce if you are making one.
The pork shoulder comes in two cuts, the butt and the picnic. Either, whether boneless or bone-in, may be prepared using these recipes, except for the braised-in-milk version, for which the boneless butt works best. Here's how they differ:
The right stuff
Most common is the boneless-butt-shoulder roast (sometimes called Boston butt, supposedly from colonial days in New England when this cut was stored in barrels, then called "butts").
This is what you find in nearly any meat department. It is a smooth symmetrical package, averaging 5 to 6 pounds, tied or secured in a net that you will cook it in, making it easy to fit into a pan, easy to brown and easy to serve. Boneless butts are often sold in halves, with each half giving you a 2- to 4-pound roast. Butchers will cut a whole roast in half. A bone-in butt is an even better bargain. You can remove the small shoulder-blade bone yourself or ignore it.
The picnic roast, situated on the lower part of the shoulder below the butt, includes some of the leg bone. The meat is coarser-grained than the butt but equally delicious when given the slow treatment. It is often sold boneless, too.
Leftovers
Pulled pork: There's nothing simpler than gently reheating leftover pork, shredded with a fork, in a good bottled barbecue sauce -- Bullseye and Bone-Suckin' Sauce are recommended. Pile on a bun with coleslaw.
Build a taco: On a soft flour tortilla, spread refried black beans, homemade or prepared, a generous spoonful of shredded pork, pickled purple onion or jalapenos, and some avocado slices. Roll up, heat gently in the microwave and serve with fresh tomato salsa.