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This last weekend I hosted a luau for my little family. The center of the meal was this instant pot kalua pork (AKA Kalua pua’a). I have made a slow cooker version before but wanted to try it in the Instant Pot this time.
Since we were unable to have a vacation this year due to the pandemic and serveral other reason, I decided to bring the vacation to my home.
I settled on hosting a luau for my 2 now married sons with their spouses, my daughter, my husband, and my mom. I tried to make my backyard look festive with a few decorations from the dollar store. Amazon also has a few party sets that are inexpensive for decorations too. I asked eveyone to dress for a luau if they wanted to.
I did have a photo spot set up for pictures to be taken if anyone wanted one. Also, I created a Hawaiiian music playlist alnong with a beach sounds playlist with my Apple music. We played both playlist at the same time. One was played from my phone, the other from my husband’s phone. This way we could have festive music along with the sounds of the beach.
My mom had a set of poi balls from a previous trip to Hawaii that she brought with her. Everyone had a chance to test their skills with them.
Of course, we had do have a great Hawaiian style meal.
We have a few Hawaiian restaurants here in Utah. I centered the meal around a basic Hawaiian plate that you can find at these restaurants. They include kalua pork, steamed rice, and Hawaiian macaroni salad. We also had fresh fruit along with a pineapple dip. I will be sharing all the recipes this week.
Guests began the night with my favorite recipe for a virgina pina coladas. We ended the evening with a new recipe I tried for a Guava Cake. It turned out wonderfully.
So, today we are discussing the recipe for Kalua Pork.
Like I said, I have made kalua pork before in the slow cooker. So I gave it a try this time in the Instant Pot and it worked fabulously.
You only need 3 ingredients to make this pork – salt, liquid smoke, and pork roast. More specifically you should use red Hawaiian salt if possible. I was able to purchase some from a local store called Harmons. However, pink Himilayan salt is a good substitute if you can’t get Hawaiian salt.
The Instant Pot version takes a little more than 1 1/2 hours to make. The meat was so tender, it was falling apart as I was removing it to be shredded. NOw the pork has great flavor and can be served as is. However, my family like to enjoy it with teriyaki sauce. They like to use it on the pork and the rice. I made a teriyaki sauce from another recipe to serve on the side for those who want it.
Instant Pot Kalua Pork
- Total Time: 105 minutes plus time to come to pressure
- Yield: 10 servings 1x
Ingredients
Instructions
- Cut the pork roast into 4 chunks. Pierce each chunk with a fork a couple of times and place in the Instant pot. Add in 1 cup of water.
- Pork the lquid smoke over the pork and then sprinkle with the salt.Place the lid on the Instant Pot and be sure the valve is set to seal. Cook on high pressure for 60 minutes. All the Instant Pot to do a natural pressure release for 25 minutes. Then manually release any remaining pressure.
- Remove the pork from the instant pot and shred, removing aany excess fat. Remove most of the juice left in the pot. You want about 1/2 cup left in the pot. Add the shredded pork back into the Instant Pot with the remaining juces. Allow to sit in the juices set on warm for 15 minutes, then serve.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 100 minutes plus time to come to pressure
- Category: Pork
- Method: Instant Pot
- Cuisine: Hawaiian
Recipe adapted from I Heart Naptime.
