Well, the Pig Roast is over. I am so glad. It is sooo much work and it takes me a few days to recover. I'm achy and tired still. I had a few beers and a glass of punch, nothing to make me hung over for two days, but that is a little bit what this exhaustion feels like.
This year we had about 80 people in attendance. We had more folks last year, but this was a nice, managable size. The weather cooperated and the temperatures were in the high 60's, no rain, sometimes sun. All around it felt good. By the time the first people arrived, we actually had all of the last minute chores done! That might have been a first...
We took the pig out around 5:00. They had to shovel the dirt from the top of the mound. After that, the tarp came off. Then the wet newspaper was peeled back. The last thing to come off was the wet burlap. The wire cage holding the pig was then lifted out of the still hot pit and moved to the cutting table. It only took about five minutes to get the pig out of the ground and to the table. Those coals and hot rocks in the fire pit were still smoking this morning, two days after the pig came out of the ground. We even drenched the pit with water on Saturday night. Amazing.
The smell of the cooked pork filled the air once the pig was out. It really smelled good. The marinade gave it a nice gingery aroma. Even though the pig was slightly bigger this year and we had less people, there was more pork eaten. We only had around fifteen pounds of cooked meat left. We did bag it up and put it in a cooler and welcomed people to grab a bag and take it home if they wanted. It's hard to use up that much cooked pork. I'm going to make taquitos and burritos with the left overs I have. I also promised some to a few of my co-workers who were unable to make it.
We ended the night with conversation around the fire. We had this pit and the two table pits going. Nobody got too drunk and out of control. Everybody was just having fun. We had a few friends who brought their motor home and popup camping trailers and they just went to bed when the night was over for them. No drunk drivers on the road that way. The only think that happened that was a little uncool was our ornery neighbors complaining about the cars parked along the road. Oh, well. There is a fifteen foot easement on each side of the road and people can park there. Period. They called the police and a sherrif did a drive-by, but didn't even stop. Everything was fine. We were all just having a good time. I was also really glad to have the portapotties this year as that really cut the traffic in the house waaay down.
All in all the day was a success. I'm not sure we'll have another one where we open the invitation up to everybody like we did, but we'll probably have another something. We have talked about doing a baron of beef or a smaller pig above the ground, Cuban style. We'll see. Plenty of time to figure all of that out, but for now, I'm going to bed so I can catch up on my missed sleep!