Pulled Pork Pizza Puffs

Anyone that knows me knows that pizza is my all time favorite food. However for me, I like to go unconventional with it.  Sure don’t get me wrong a hand tossed pie with rich tomato sauce, tons of melty cheese and a boat load of toppings rock but I like to push the limits when it comes to it.  Ever since I first introduced you all to my Cheesy Ranch Stuffed Buffalo Chicken Pizza Puffs, you guys have been asking me for more variations of them. I gave you the Italian Meatball one and then came the Club Puff but you still wanted more!

Since cooking for me right now takes a lot out of me I’ve been really taking advantage of my crock pot (and Mr. Fantabulous) to do most of the cooking.  For the pulled pork I followed my Bacon BBQ Pulled Pork Recipe tweaking the sauce and spices just a tad as I wanted more of a smokey flavor.  The pizza dough is my standard pizza dough used in all of my puffs. And of course I added cheddar cheese to it as well.  I mean it is pizza – there should be some type of cheese, right?

Since Mr. Fantabulous is in charge of grocery shopping let’s just say he’s doing an amazing job at buying milk, eggs and butter but when it comes to buying meat. Yeah… um no.  Actually in all the years we’ve been together I don’t think I’ve ever had him buy a single piece of meat.  It’s not that he can’t do it, it’s that well… I’m anal and certain cuts should have fat while others shouldn’t. Fortunately I have enough stuff in my freezer meat-wise that he wouldn’t have to buy meat for a few months.

As he was out in the garage cutting some wood for the downstairs I went out to check on what all I had in my chest freezer.  Of course he yelled at me to get back in the house but me being me put  my hand on my pajama’d hip and said “I’m not outside the house.  I’m still technically in the house as there is no outside inside here.”  Yeah I know that makes no sense but at the time I made perfect sense in my head.  Don’t judge.. I’m sick, remember. So I began rummaging and you know, it’s pretty awesome (and scary) when you find things in your freezer that you don’t remember buying OR that you forgot about. Low and behold I found a gorgeous 4lb pork butt that was going to be PERFECT for pulled pork.

After grabbing that bottom butt (giggle.. I so love saying that) and putting it in the fridge to thaw overnight I went and got our show snacks ready.  Mr. Fantabulous has been on this Sopranos kick we’ve been watching a few episodes every night while I’ve been home recuperating. Now one thing about me is that I’m so not a big tv person. Don’t get me wrong if I had the time I’d definitely get into certain shows but I have a couple of issues with TV in general.

Back in the late 90’s I worked for a company where the software we designed was used by the major networks to schedule what shows, episodes, commercials, etc were to air. Now I had a blast doing it but it kind of ruined TV for me. I say this as I couldn’t just turn on a channel and watch a show to enjoy.  I would watch it for ‘glitches’ in the programming, scheduling.  If the same commercial aired back to back immediately I’d think “Great.. who’s going to call and complain in the morning that the software broke.”  That job took the fun out of TV for me.

However the travel and perks were awesome of that job.  Going to the TV studios and behind the scenes of things rocked.  Being at MTV when Headbanger’s ball aired, Comedy Central with Crank Yankers or South Park and the other stations in general was seriously awesome.

The other thing with me and TV is honestly having free time. I work 2 jobs full time (my real job and TKW), I commute an ungodly amount of time every day, I work out 2-3 hours a day, I cook and spend time with Mr. Fantabulous and oh yeah… I sleep for 3-4 hours.  TV isn’t a priority for me. Trust me, if I could I’d be glued to The Cooking Channel or Food Network practicing for the day I will be on there (a girl has to have dreams, right?).

So when Mr. Fantabulous said he wanted to watch the entire series I said sure even though I didn’t think it would be my type of show.  But then again I thought I wouldn’t like Breaking Bad and OMG I LOVED that show.  LOVED!!! Now it’s funny having never seen a single episode of The Sopranos. It totally made me think of my husband’s Italian family and them being from New York well okay minus all the whacking and mafia stuff. But the way they spoke just cracked me up. Thing is, what makes this show for me is not so much the show itself but seeing Mr. Fantabulous get so into it and hearing him belly laugh over and over.  He’d say “OMG she reminds me EXACTLY of my grandma!” or “yeah we had family like that”.

Now back to grabbing my bottom… er I mean my pork butt bottom *wink*, when I woke up the next morning I threw the thawed piece of meat in the crock pot, the bbq sauce and spices and let that puppy do the work for me.  10 hours later I had the most AMAZING whiskey pulled pork ever.  So flippin’ tender and juicy.  Sweet lord it was awesome.  And sweet lord there was A LOT of it.  I mean A LOT!

One thing though I love about pulled pork is that you can use it on pizzas, sliders, subs, sandwiches, nachos, lettuce wraps and so forth.  Plus pulled pork freezes beautifully!  Trust me I have several containers in the freezer now that I have portioned out to meals for us.  Easy peasy!

Around the time I this was done Mr. Fantabulous asked what I was making as a snack for our date with The Sopranos.  LOL  Since I make pizza every single weekend I made him his usual pizza and with the extra dough I decided to make some pizza puffs stuffing them with this glorious pulled pork.

Since these take longer than pizza I put these in the oven first (I gave the man a pre-snack snack to tide him over for his real snack… LOL). I patted the dough into small rounds, put some pork in the center. Next I cut off some chunks of sharp cheddar cheese to put on top and then squoze (yes I said squoze…. ‘squoze – the past tense of  squeeze’) some bbq sauce on top.  The ends I gathered up like a pretty little purse to seal and put them down on the baking sheet.

When these were done I pulled them out, cranked the heat up and quickly put his pie in the oven.  When his real snack was done these were cool enough on the inside to eat.  Okay now I may be partial since I love pulled pork but these are my favorite pizza puffs thus far. The dough was so soft and tender inside while the outside had that pizza crunch.  The meat was juicy and just fell apart and that cheese was all melty and infused with the bbq sauce.

As I carried is plate of pizza back, his drink, 2 puffs for me with a side of sauce just in case (remember, I’m a dipper) and a drink for me.  We got all snuggled up in bed and then silence.

Now did you ever *know* when someone is staring at you.  Like you can feel their eyes boring a hole in the side of your head stare?  Yeah… Mr. Fantabulous was doing that (which I expected) since I had something that he did not.  Without moving my eyes to look at him I said between bites “Honey you won’t like these. They are a new type of pizza puffs and it’s stuffed with pulled pork.”

<deep sigh exhale>  “Oh yeah I don’t like pulled pork.  Maybe make it next time with chicken. I’d like that then.”  LOL  yeah sure, I’ll get right one that babe.

After a few episodes of The Sopranos, Mr. Fantabulous belly laughing and my just lying there grinning at him all in all it was a great night.  It’s nice when we have times like these as he talks more about his family and ‘tings they would do growing up.  I can remember the one episode where they showed Paulie’s living room. The only chair he had in there was this wing chair that was covered in plastic.  As soon as Mr. Fantabulous saw that he had to stop the dvd as he was laughing so hard he had tears coming down his face.

All he kept saying was “OMG OMG OMG that’s what my grandma’s house was like!  Everything had plastic on it!  I can remember when I would go sleep there and I had to sleep on that thing in the middle of the summer with no air conditioner!  I lost layers of skin on that thing!”  Then he restarted the movie only to have Paulie move and the chair ‘crinkled’.  Stop went the movie and more belly laughs came out.  By this time I was cracking up because he was laughing so hard.

He said after she had passed away the one cousin got the furniture.  He said that it looked pristine – not a mark on it.  HOWEVER… *giggle*…. however when they took the plastic off the material pretty much disintegrated due to it never having any air on it.  Did you have a relative that did that?  Cover their furniture in plastic?

While we’re what, several years way behind of the times in watching this show, it’s all good.  I’m having an absolute blast now with it.  Plus I don’t have to wait until the next week to see what happens.  And if you’ve seen it… NO SPOILERS please. I wouldn’t do that to you so don’t do it to me.

Print

Looking for more Pizza Puff and Pizza Dough recipes try these!

These Cheesy Meatball Stuffed Pizza Puffs have all the same awesome flavors as a meatball hoagie but it’s portable and less messy!

Get into the zone with my Ultimate Pizza Calzone!

Forget those childhood wedgies where your gutchies were pulled up around your ears! You’re going to WANT this Ultimate Pittsburgh Steak Wedgie!

Like it spicy and hot?  Try these Cheesy Ranch Stuffed Buffalo Chicken Pizza Puffs!

I’m telling you, once you have this Indoor Grilled BBQ Beef Shortrib Bacon Pizza you are going to be doing the “Mmm Mmm Mmmm” happy dance in your underwear as it’s THAT GOOD!

For you non-red sauce fans you NEED this Herbed Prosciutto Tomato Onion White Pizza!

These Club Pizza Puffs are great straight out of the oven, warm, room temp or cold!  Perfect for your kids lunches!

Totally unconventional when it comes to pizza as this doesn’t have red sauce but prosciutto and arugula!  It’s AMAZING and you’re going to love it! Prosciutto Pizza Parma

If you have thisSimple Pizza Dough Recipe in your recipe file, you’ll be set forever when it comes to pizza!  The only thing that’ll limit you is your imagination!