Teriyaki Shredded Pork

Ingredients:
¾ cups soy sauce
2 cups water
1 cup white sugar
1 tbsp. cornstarch
1 clove garlic (pressed or chopped finely)
½ tbsp. ginger (fresh or powdered)
1-3 lbs. pork loin/roast

Directions:
Bring the soy sauce, water, sugar, cornstarch, garlic, and ginger to a boil in a sauce pan. Take ½ of the sauce and put it in with the pork in a crock pot for 4-5 hours on high heat (turn down to low heat half way through cooking). Set the other ½ of the sauce aside for later. Cook the pork until fork tender. Drain the sauce from the crock pot, take any excess fat off the pork loin and shred. Add remaining sauce back into the crock pot and warm the sauce with the pork for about 15-30 minutes. Serve over rice (omit salt when cooking rice).




Tips:
This makes a TON of sauce. So use as much meat as you think is necessary for your family. For my small family of 4 I usually do just 1 lb. of pork (and I use pork loin chops) and there are PLENTY of leftovers. It doesn't look like it will make a lot, but trust me, it goes a long way over rice. But you could easily do up to 3 lbs. of meat with the sauce you have.

I also trim the excess fat off BEFORE I cook the meat. I find that if I don't the fat will just flake off into the sauce and then stick to the meat when I shred it and it is kind of gross. But on the other hand, the fat makes it more tender, so do it to your preference.

As noted in the recipe above, I never cook the rice with salt because the soy sauce is so salty that it is a bit too much if you cook the rice with salt. You can also omitt the butter to cut down on calories (it will make the rice stickier).

I love this recipe because it so easy! You do have to plan to start it around 1:00 to get it ready for dinner time, but that's the only tricky part. It is delicious too - one of my husband's favorites.

From the kitchen of Tannie Datwyler