‘The Pioneer Woman’: Ree Drummond’s Pulled Pork Recipe Has the Perfect Spice Rub

Ree Drummond has a few variations on pulled pork, but her traditional version includes a “delicious combination of spices” that really gives the meat incredible flavor.

Ree Drummond makes an easy spice rub for pulled pork

Drummond demonstrated how to make the recipe on an episode of The Pioneer Woman where she made “classic cowboy food.”

“Pulled pork is a favorite around here,” she explained. “Everybody absolutely loves it … pulled pork is also perfect when you have to feed a crowd.”

Drummond added, “I’m telling you what. This pork is so flavorful. Before I put it in the oven, I had rubbed it with a delicious combination of spices. It is out of this world.”

She made the rub by combining brown sugar, chili powder, paprika, garlic powder, salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper. She rubbed it over a pork butt roast (also called pork shoulder roast), wrapped it in plastic wrap, and refrigerated it overnight.

Drummond shared her tips for cooking pulled pork

In the morning, Drummond put onion halves in a roasting pan, then placed the pork on top of the onions, and covered the pan with foil. She cooked it in a 300 degree Fahrenheit oven for 7 hours.

“You know, it’s always hard to give a precise time to cook pulled pork because it depends on the weight of the pork,” she said. “You basically want to cook it until it’s fork-tender.”

The Food Network host skimmed the fat off the liquid, put it into a saucepan, and added barbeque sauce. “So the sauce for the pulled pork winds up being a combination of the flavorful cooking liquid from the pork and the barbecue sauce,” she explained. “It’s a great combo.”

Drummond allowed the sauce to heat up while she pulled the pork apart. She removed the fat before using two forks to pull the meat. “It’s important to have patience when you’re pulling pork,” she noted. “It’s not a process that can be rushed. You just have to use two forks to break it up. You just want it completely shredded.”

The Pioneer Woman star added the cooked onions to the pork then returned the meat to the roasting pan and poured the sauce over the top of it.

The full recipe is available on the Food Network website.

‘The Pioneer Woman’ star’s pulled pork recipe earns rave reviews

Drummond’s pulled pork recipe gets solid 5-star reviews on the Food Network site,” with fans leaving comments like, “Perfect and yummy” and “Excellent combination of flavors.”

“Amazing! Made as instructed but take the time to watch the video because she includes a couple of instructions not written,” one reviewer noted. “My husband loved it. It was so tender and the sauce had great flavor. We used an 8 lb bone-in pork shoulder and 7 hours was perfect.”

Another reviewer shared, “This was so easy and delicious!! Huge hit and the house smelled amazing all day. I didn’t realize I should’ve let it sit overnight with the rub. I let it go a couple of hours and it was still great.”

One person raved, “I absolutely love it! It’s my new go-to recipe!”