Freezing and reheating pulled pork

[Tricky]

Any tips for doing this at a large scale? We're making a dinner for 120 teenagers and will be doing pulled pork in advance, freezing in freezer bags and reheating onsite a week later.

On site we will have a couple of propane-powered 3 burner camp stoves where we could either warm the pork on steel griddles OR heat it in the bags in large pots of water on the stove (like I do it at home). Suggestions on reheating, storing and serving the pork for sandwiches at this larger scale? How would you do it?

 

[thirdeye]

Reheating in a water bath is my favorite method. After cooking and resting, I will either do one of these methods for packaging.

1. Coarsely separate the muscle groups, then chill in an ice bath. Then freeze.

2. Chill down the entire butt (foil wrapped in a zipper bag) in an ice bath and refrigerate overnight. Slice, bag and freeze. Upon the reheat the meat still pulls right apart with no effort. This photo shows a chilled butt sliced the following day.

Reheating liquids to add during the reheat can be foil juices, pork broth, apple juice or Coca-Cola.

 

[Kaptain Kadian]

Vacuum seal and a sous vide or simmering water. Do it all the time.

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[TravelingJ]

Reheating in a water bath is my favorite method. After cooking and resting, I will either do one of these methods for packaging.

1. Coarsely separate the muscle groups, then chill in an ice bath. Then freeze.

I used this method last week and it was certainly one of the juicier reheats I've done so far. Very favorable results.

2. Chill down the entire butt (foil wrapped in a zipper bag) in an ice bath and refrigerate overnight. Slice, bag and freeze. Upon the reheat the meat still pulls right apart with no effort. This photo shows a chilled butt sliced the following day.

This seems like a bit more work. Is there any benefit to going this route?

 

[NickTheGreat]

I also do the water bath method at home. For like 8 or 12 oz at a time. I've never done for that many people at once!



I smoked/froze/reheated pulled pork for about 50 people a few years back, and just did the reheat with apple juice in a big electric roaster. It was good, but dried out a little bit.

 

[mchar69]

You can get the 2 gallon size ziplocks. I bet there's 30 servings in a 2 gallon bag.
I'd guess 10 bags would do it for teenagers. How many butts are you going to do?
15?

 

[thirdeye]

(coarse pulled) I used this method last week and it was certainly one of the juicier reheats I've done so far. Very favorable results.

(chilled, sliced and frozen) This seems like a bit more work. Is there any benefit to going this route?

So, this meat is fork tender and comes right apart after heating. The biggest advantage is when slices are plated is that each person gets some of each muscle group in the butt (instead of a luck of the draw when you pull a butt).
The secondary advantage is purely showing off :mrgreen: ....because most people don't see slices very often, and they flip over the tenderness.

 

[cpw]

If you have mass quantities to reheat, I've had the best luck with big bags in boiling water.

 

[Smoke on Badger Mountain]

I’m a fan of vac sealing and reheating in a water bath myself.

 

[Chester]

I’m a fan of vac sealing and reheating in a water bath myself.

Yes, the vac sealing really helps the process.