Falls Creek Falls

Amazing weekend camping and hiking in and around Falls Creek Falls State Park in TN.  Gorgeous weather all weekend long and a heck of a way to kick off the spring camping season.  All of the waterfalls and creeks are easily accessed from scenic overlooks so it was a convenient, if not a bit lazy way to see the sights.  Here are some pics from the park.  Enjoy!

Hog Roast

Well folks, it was an eventful Saturday at the Hollar house.  Despite illness earlier this week, we had a non refundable hog on order and something had to be done.  As it was our first time attempting to smoke an entire pig, we were frothy with anticipation and excitement.  What began as a box in our bathtub (too big for our freezer):

...was soon unwrapped and this sad looking grey pig was placed on the grill:

Now the next step was smoking ole Wilbur here into a fall apart, delicious mess.  Aaron brewed up some of his famous Carolina style vinegar based sauce.  Here is the recipe:

white vinegar

apple cider vinegar

hot pepper sauce

red pepper flakes

salt and pepper

brown sugar (dissolved in vinegar stove top with the remainder of the ingredients)

This delicious sauce was injected into the pig for the ensuing 10 hour period while it smoked slowly with hickory wood and charcoal.  We got the smoker on clearance and it did us well.  Here was the (nearly) finished pig:

It was quite a feast, and we ended up saving a huge amount of pork for the coming weeks.  Nice kickoff to the first beautiful weekend we've seen in many months.

Pig Pickin

You could say we are finally coming out of hibernation.  With the move to Nashville, and the purchase of a new home, we have been busy to say the least.  But as winter thaws, we get restless and head back to the woods...or at least, the backyard.

This weekend we opted not to camp, and instead to stay home, cook a pig and watch the Final Four.  Now, when I say “cook a pig” I mean, cook an entire pig.  We ordered this 50 pound Wilbur from a local butcher about 2 weeks ago.  

The original intention was to have a blow out house warming party with all my new coworkers and Nashville friends.  We wanted to expose them to original eastern carolina BBQ.  But alas, flu and pneumonia this week struck the Hollar household with a vengeance.  In lieu of infecting all of our new friends, we opted instead to cancel the party.  Unfortunately, it was too late to cancel the pig reservation.  So...pig roast weekend it is!  I have no idea how we will possibly store all of the cooked meat in our tiny freezer, but somehow we will have to make it work.

Hog roast begins tomorrow at 8am.  Stay tuned for pics...