Roasting a Hog.

Roasting a hog sounds quite straight forward, but of course it isn’t.
There are a whole raft of things to do and specialist people to do them. I shall try and explain the basics of this.
The Hog roast is for about 200 people, so first off (American expression) one hog (pig) ain’t enough, so they roast one pig but buy in a load of pork joints. These are called ‘Pork Butts’. The pig must be prepared, by a preparation team. It is slit down the stomach and ‘bits’ removed and cleaned, then stuffed with secret spices and sour oranges. It then has a scaffold pole pushed from one end to the other. It is then skewered on to the pole by what seemed to be about 10 long bolts. Then wire mesh is wrapped round it. This is to hold it together when it cooks.
The pole is suspended over a large charcoal fire inside a huge BBQ. An electric motor is used to rotate the pole. The hog was set roasting at about 4.00 on the Friday afternoon. It is then watched over by a team of Hog Watchers, who make sure that it doesn’t get to hot, but has a good supply of coals. It cooks for about 20 hours, in that time the skin burns and the legs burn off as well. Then is allowed to cool for about 4 hours, so that it can be handled. Meanwhile a team of Butt Rubbers are employed toseason the pork joints, which are then cooked in another large BBQ. This year they cooked 28 pork butts. I suggested that they may like their own T-shirt with ‘Hoggy Bottom Rubbers’(rather than Soggy Bottom) on it.