The Korean Staple That'll Deliciously Bind Your Next Pulled Pork Dish

If you're looking for a dish to prep for the week ahead that will keep you excited every mealtime, pulled pork is a fail-safe choice. When cooked properly, it's tender and bursting with flavor that deepens whenever you reheat it. There are also multiple ways to serve it: Turn it into a slider, stuff it into egg rolls or empanadas, pair it with rice pilaf, transform it into pork ragu for pasta dishes, the varieties are endless. To give pulled pork an even more appetizing flavor and texture, use gochujang to bind your preferred rub with the meat.

An essential item in Korean cuisine, gochujang deserves to be known and featured in more dishes. It's a paste made with red chili peppers, glutinous rice, fermented soybeans, sugar, and salt, and the fermentation process it goes through lends gochujang a complex layer of flavors with a nice level of heat. Plus, with its tacky texture, it is just as good a binder for pulled pork as the usual mustard or hot sauce. Imagine it seeping into the scored meat, infusing it with sweet, spicy, savory, tangy, and umami goodness. Gochujang's vibrant red color also helps create an appetizingly dark bark since its sugar content caramelizes any dry rub you choose to use.

Since the paste encompasses a wide range of tastes, it'll work well with your usual recipe. Use it as a binder for apple cider smoked pulled pork to heighten the savory and sweet combination of pork and apples.

You don't even have to use rub with gochujang since it's packed with flavor already. For a truly Korean-inspired twist, slather it evenly all over the pork butt or shoulder, then cover the meat in plastic wrap. Let it marinate in the refrigerator for 24 hours or longer for the pork to get a richer flavor. You can then smoke the meat the way you normally do without worrying about it drying up. Just remember to adhere to the low-and-slow principle of making pulled pork.

Customize your signature binder or marinade, too, using gochujang as a base. Mix it with honey, rice vinegar, brown sugar, and minced garlic to intensify its flavor and caramelization. For a more pronounced spiciness, buy gochujang that's labeled either medium or hot, with the tub or label colored red; the less spicy variant comes in green-colored containers.

Gochujang is also a great basting sauce when cooking pulled pork on the grill. Whisk it with vinegar, sugar, and salt until the paste is dissolved and brush the mixture on the pork every 45 to 60 minutes until the meat reaches an internal temperature of 205 degrees Fahrenheit. Later on, use any remaining sauce on the shredded pork. If you're using a slow cooker, you can switch the barbecue sauce in our easy pulled pork recipe with gochujang for a saucy dish that's still sweet and tangy but with added hits of umami and earthiness.