Random Thoughts Thunk While Cooking: A cook is only as good as the ingredients and ingenuity used. What a nightmare. What a colossal nightmare. lol For the non-liver lovers, chicken would've been a good substitute, but did I get breasts or tenders. No. I got thighs because it reminded me of a dinner made by my Aunt Mary-on-the-farm when I was a child. I cleaned and cut for a very long time. The chicken livers were frozen, but, in the past, it's never been a problem. These things were just awful - all mashed up together (like someone took a meat pounder) to the point where I really had to hunt for the connective tissue. Just in case, going to a real butcher instead of taking a chance at the supermarket was supposed to not have this problem. Surprise. I can't even give him the benefit of the doubt and I tried. No self respecting cook would ever use this things in a sauce or a soup. I've cooked purchased, pre-cooked, bacon once before for BLTs but really didn't pay that much attention to it other than the fact it cooked quickly without grease everywhere. Last night, I really got a chance to eyeball it. When the box says to cook it til crispy, it really means to cook until dry. There's a difference. lol I didn't use it. So, prosciutto wouldn't be a good candidate for rumaki. Pancetta would, though. I didn't use pancetta because I wasn't quite sure how it would go with the marinade and other stuff I was making. So, I used a nice smoky bacon. More later. Nice photo array, Rob333!

Linda, It was already pre-cooked. It says pork shoulder and in with the hams, so it might be a boston butt, I'll have to look when I get home. Rob, would you just warm it like ham, and serve with white beans and corn bread? that sounds pretty good... Or do I have to treat it just like ham... and how different from ham will it taste? I was really in the mood for some pulled pork, but I don't know what I need to do to it. Can I make it into pulled pork, and if so, how? Do I re-cook it? In a slow cooker (mine is too old and too samll, but I could cut some) or in a dutch oven? with BBQ Sauce on slow heat? Or do I just get out the forks and try to pull it as is? I think that might be like trying to pull a boiled ham... Teresa, I think DH might like your option 1 if I can figure out how to execute... and I greatly appreciate the advice on how to freeze it...

If you read the article that Colleen posted you'll understand why some don't open with cooking. The problem for the diners is having to prise them open. I woldn't bother serving closed ones for that reason. The joy of cooking them fresh is that you know that each one that you've cooked was closed and alive when it went into the pot. So you don't have to worry about the safety of a closed one. I might be more concerned about a product that I hadn't cooked myself.

Quick report. Meal was a big hit. But, after the day we'd had, so was bed. Ride started at Welches OR and ended at Government Camp OR, which is about 15 miles east along Hwy 26 if you are sensible, but instead we went in the other direction, north into the National Forest on logging roads, and proceeded to ride all the way around Mount Hood, a sort of clockwise circuit, and reach Government Camp from the opposite side. The 42 miles of twisting roads through the forest were gorgeous, with remarkable views, thankfully much shade, generally decent road surface, and we saw two cars in 8 hours. I enjoyed seeing Mount Hood from the back side, a view that not that many people see. But there was also no potable water, no cellphone coverage, several miles of gravel road, and what seemed like endless climbing. There were short steep descents but you couldn't really bomb down them, because the road did have the occasional monster hole or collapsed area, which might be hidden in a patch of deep shadow. And it was 102F up there, according to someone's fancy bike computer. I ran out of water about fifteen miles from the first civilization in Parkdale, got dehydrated, and despite drinking a ton of water and Gatorade at the little grocery store there, my thighs and calves started cramping up on the next stretch, which was a 10 mile climb to reach Hwy 35. I was in my very lowest gear, trying to turn the pedals with as little force as possible, feeling the muscles get tight. Sometimes I had charley horses that I had to pedal through. A couple times I had to get off the bike and sit down until my muscles stopped seizing up. We got to Hwy 35 with another 20 miles of climbing ahead. This is a pretty desolate two lane highway, with no cellphone coverage for most of the way and, on Saturday around 6 pm, maybe one car every 5 or 10 minutes. Several miles down the highway, one of our group had her rear tire blow out. Not the tube, but the tire casing itself. It had been sliced open on a gravel stretch, back in the forest. Our patch held for 50 miles but now the tire had a pencil sized hole worn in the casing, Mary Jean's bike was unrideable, and the sun was getting low. The other three rode ahead to find a cellphone signal and call AAA to retrieve her, and also call her husband to see if he was close enough to come get her. Rick had ferried our clothes and food to the condo that morning, then returned to Portland, due to return late that night. I stayed with Mary Jean, for entirely selfish motives - I figured that the AAA driver who picked her up would surely give me a ride too. With nothing to do, we tried patching the tire casing again, rode half a mile, blew out the re-patch, and started walking, wondering how many hours the others would have to ride to find cell coverage and how busy AAA was on a Saturday night and when the sun would set. It was getting dusk now. A pickup truck approached and slowed, the driver peered at us, and drove on. Several minutes later the truck returned from the other direction, and he was one of the local AAA drivers, off duty, looking for us on his way home. We arrived at the cabin right when our companions rode up. They had ridden to an area with a single cellphone "bar" about forty minutes after leaving us, spent another 15 minutes trying to explain the situation to AAA over a garbled connection, and the closest AAA truck on duty was busy in Sandy, over an hour away. We'd have been out there after dark. Our driver told us that the area where we had been walking was a sort of local Bermuda Triangle, populated with bear and cougar, where people disappeared mysteriously. Most recently, a father and his adult son, hiking, had never been seen again. The thing is, all the locals agree, a cougar wouldn't take on two adult men. So, as you can see, the dinner that night didn't have to be good to be good, if you see what I mean. But it was good too. No-one was awake enough for the swimming pool or hot tub. The next morning I left the others - they were staying in the condo all weekend - and rode the 15 miles down Hwy 26 to my car in Welches. That was a great descent, curvy two lane highway, all downhill, good pavement. Get in a low tuck and you can hit 60 mph on a road like that, in spots you can actually keep up with cars. I didn't, because I was carrying a bag of clothes over my shoulder. I was dehydrated for a day afterwards and my legs still feel heavy. I have a list of precautions to take if I ever ride in the backcountry again. And I made some new friends. So it was a nice day after all.