Aloha boys and girls!

Welcome, welcome again to Sunday Gravy.

There’s preseason football coming this week! Granted it’s the Hall of Fame Game and it features the uniforms of the Lions playing the uniforms of the Chargers but it does mean preseason is officially here!

Hard Knocks with the Buffalo Bills debut is next week on the 5th and then it’s time to wrap up this fucking brutal NFL offseason in style.

Which means, there are only a handful of Sunday Gravy episodes left for this here Season 11.

I’m about ready for my break, motherfucking BELIEVE THAT! But I will soldier on and bring the Gravy until then.

Like our episode today, I hope to feature some upcoming recipes that will appeal to not just our readers but the lucky little fuckers those readers will hopefully be cooking for.

Take today for example. Pretty simple prep but flat out fucking delicious results. This shit is insanely delightful. We’re going full on “Island Style” again and I believe you’re going to enjoy this immensely.

And it just so happens that Balls started his new weekly Tiki Thursday feature just a few days ago.

Symmetry and shit!

This menu was the featured meal at a Hawaiian themed dinner I hosted. Had the family crew there and everything. Son-in-Law’s dad is from Hawaii so everyone loved the concept. Both of the 2 eldest granddaughters are 1/4 Hawaiian and all of us are very well schooled on the cuisine.

We had an incredibly fun time at this gathering. Just a fucking blast.

Can’t wait to show you this whole thing so let’s get it on!

Let’s start with the obvious. Got to get in character for this shit.

Pineapples are perfectly in season right now and this prickly fucker was goddamn perfect. Super juicy yet still firm of flesh. Flawless pineapple.

Trim this damn thing up. You know how right?

Then you got to get rid of those prickly motherfuckers that stud the pineapple flesh. This method works best.

Cube it up. You want these a little smaller in size for our application but if you wanted to keep these in larger chunks just for eating purposes, knock yourself the fuck out.

And you’ve got some fresh delicious pineapple. It’s right in season between March and July and close to perfect if you can get it.

We are going to use the pineapple to make a nice pineapple jalapeno salsa.

Deseed, rinse and finely chop 1 fresh jalapeno. Add in a couple of tablespoons of minced red onion, give a squeeze of lime over everything. Mix thoroughly and toss with the pineapple. 

Next up on the agenda we’re going to create some Hawaiian Mac Salad.

recipe via playswellwithbutter.com

Hawaiian Macaroni Salad!

8 ounces dry elbow macaroni or short pasta of choice

1 medium carrot, peeled as desired and grated

1 cup Real Mayonnaise

1 teaspoon granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

1/2 teaspoon onion powder

1/2 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon turmeric

optional: up to 1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

kosher salt and ground black pepper

Let’s get busy.

Shred the carrot.

Grab your mayo(s). Didn’t have quite enough of my standard Blue Plate mayo so we added in some last second Hellman’s.

I can only imagine the vast array of mayo comments we’ll be dealing with today.

Once again for the record Blue Plate is made in New Orleans but I order some online because it’s a little more “Mayo” like. Meaning it’s closer in taste to homemade mayo. More eggy in taste is what I’m getting at. As mentioned before Best Foods mayo is sold on the East Coast as Hellman’s. Same shit different name.

Yes. That recipe does indeed say one cup of mayo.

Cook the macaroni until al dente, add the rest of the ingredients and you’ve got your mac salad.

I garnished with some fresh chives. This was made a day in advance to offset the amount of work coming the next day. Honestly, it wasn’t that much work at all, as you’ll see.

Cover and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Hawaiian mac salad is different than your other macaroni salads giving its lack of crunchy bits inside. They prefer a smoother product which explains the lack of fresh onion and/or celery.

Next day is here and we need a bigass hunk of pig. Guess who just happens to have some in the freezer leftover from when we did root beer braised pork a few weeks ago?

This here motherfucker!

Cut this big ass chunk into smaller chunks for cooking.

Next cut some small slits in the pork and insert garlic cloves. I did about four cloves per chunk.

Now heat up some cooking oil in your Dutch oven or cooking pot and give the pig a sear. Say 5 minutes per side.

Nothing too crazy, just want some nice browning on the outside.

Work in batches until everything has been seared. You need this to cool off for a bit because it will require a bit more handling before cooking.

Once cooled slap the pork on the banana leaf.

This is a very easy recipe from here but it does require 2 additional ingredients that require some additional seeking out.

Hawaiian sea salt – yep I got the red salt.

AND some liquid smoke.

Grab a small bowl and dump in 1 and 1/2 tablespoons of the salt plus 1 tablespoon of the liquid smoke and make a kind of paste. Then rub and apply all over the pork.

Now, well fuck shit. Do your best wrapping these in the banana leaf. It’s a bit of a goddamn pain in the ass.

If you remember back a couple of years we did the whole “Wrap in banana leaf” thing when we made cochinita pibil.

Think we did a better wrapping job on that one though.

Slap that lid on the pig and into the 325 degree pre-heated oven she goes for 2:45 to 3 hours.

When cooked, let the pork cool again just enough to shred. Fortunately this slab today was the boneless part of the original big ass slab. The root beer pork side got the bone.

When the pig is shredded add in 1/2 more tablespoon of the liquid smoke and mix it all together right there in the pig liquid from the cooking process.

Fuck me! This pig is sooo fucking delicious.

As we sat down to start eating the son-in-law showed up and he brought some charsiu bao from a Hawaiian bakery he frequents.

And the ever present Spam Musubi.

You know how the plate lunch thing works yeah?

Scoop of rice, scoop of mac salad, scoop of protein or two then add on some of the fresh pineapple salsa.

The red container is holding my chile tepin which did not go on the meal, we just had it around for snacking purposes.

This meal? Holy fucksticks. Every single item complimented every other item. Exceptional! That pig is wondrous. Juicy and succulent and redolent of the liquid smoke. Rich, fatty unctuous perfection. The mac salad has a little zing from the cayenne, a little earthiness from the turmeric and is smoother and almost refreshing despite having a full goddamn cup of mayonnaise in it. 

The salsa is fresh and bursting with summery goodness. I grabbed a tortilla and made a kahlua pork taco with some of the salsa and a little of the chile on it. Motherfucker. Imma do this again and just make some goddamn tacos.

This is a fantastic pig recipe. Right up there with some of the best I’ve ever made. Easy. Just a handful of ingredients and you talk about bang for your buck.

I’m literally salivating as I write this.

FUCK I want that right now!

Do this whole thing people with the pig and the mac salad and the rice and give that salsa a whirl for any grilling gathering. It’s a showstopper.

This week’s fun holidays courtesy of “A Bit of Good News”: “July 27 is National Chicken Finger Day, National Creme Brûlée Day, National Day of the Cowboy, National Love Is Kind Day, National Scotch Day, National Sleepy Head Day, Bagpipe Appreciation Day, Dungeons & Dragons Day/Gary Gygax Day and Walk on Stilts Day.

Holy shit we hit the goddamn jackpot!

Chicken fingers and scotch for everyone with Creme Brûlée for dessert!

We’re getting there kids. The season approaches. 

Still a few more episodes to go.

Got another one next week. You In?

See you then!