Pulled pork is one of the staple meals in our house. We probably have it about once a month. It’s actually fairly convenient; you throw your pork in a slow cooker or pressure cooker for a while with some type of seasoning and then shred it. The hardest parts are shredding it and cleaning up! With that being the case, I don’t necessarily see a huge need for a more convenient option like Costco’s Kirkland Signature Smoked Pulled Pork. Is it really a better option than homemade pulled pork?
Other convenient meat products from Costco that are similar to this pulled pork are the Cuisine Solutions Sliced Grass-Fed Beef Sirloin, Del Real Foods Pork Carnitas, Kirkland Signature Beef Pot Roast, Dom Reserve Singles Steelhead Salmon Poke, Schwartz’s Smoked Meat, Kirkland Signature Rotisserie Chicken, Kirkland Signature Roasted Garlic Chicken Legs, Kirkland Signature Italian Style Beef Meatballs and the Kirkland Signature Turkey Breast.
Location in Store
The pulled pork is located in the refrigerated deli section at Costco, the item number is 1611040. I bought it at the Kalispell, Montana Costco however I have also purchased it in Canada and reviewed it originally here back in 2018.
Taste
This is a big nope for me. Unfortunately, I could tell as soon as I opened the pouch that I was going to be disappointed by this pulled pork. It’s very fatty/greasy and the quality of the meat is poor. My pack was full of fatty and gristly pieces that were very noticeable just from looking at the pork.
If you manage to get a good piece of the pork, it has a decent flavor. It’s very smoky, which I like, but almost tastes more like very processed ham. It’s not horrendous though. The flavor works well in a pulled pork sandwich, which is how I tried my pulled pork.
To be completely honest, this is one of the worst Kirkland Signature products I’ve ever had. The quality of the meat is poor. At least a quarter to a third of my pack was meat I found inedible. The rest of the meat was fairly greasy from all the fat in the pack and tasted just okay.
The only way to get a decent meal out of this pulled pork would be to carefully pick out all the gross bits before you serve it, which means a lot of effort for a supposedly convenient item. You’d probably still end up having some gross bites slip through because there are so many bad parts and there’s no way to get rid of all the grease.
Cost
The two-pound tray of pork costs $13.99 USD which doesn’t seem that expensive but it’s not worth it in my opinion, even though it’s convenient.
Convenience
I warmed my pulled pork in the microwave, and it definitely smelled delicious! By about halfway through, my kitchen had a nice smoky pork smell. The pulled pork is fully cooked already and comes vacuum-sealed in plastic.
I’m not a big fan of the two cooking methods. Both tell you to heat the pork in the plastic pouch it comes in.
This doesn’t seem great from a health perspective and also ends up not even being very convenient when you’re trying to get your very hot, very greasy pork out of the pouch at the end. I dripped grease all over and burned my fingers!
The pork needs to be kept refrigerated the best-before date is about nine weeks from when we purchased it. If you’re not going to use it by the best-before date you can also freeze it. Some ideas for using on how to use pulled pork are tacos, salads and sandwiches.
Nutrition
Calories
A 3-ounce or 84-gram serving contains 160 calories, 11 grams of fat, four grams of saturated fat, 60 milligrams of cholesterol, 780 milligrams of sodium, one gram of carbohydrates, zero grams of fiber and sugar and 16 grams of protein.
With so little carbohydrates the pulled pork is definitely keto-friendly.
Ingredients
The ingredients list is short and sweet without any artificial ingredients. The pork is vegetarian-fed and antibiotic-free. There are no nitrates or nitrites added to the pulled pork. I’m surprised that it’s “all-natural” because of how processed it tastes.
The pulled pork is gluten-free as well as dairy-free.
Scoring
Taste: 3/10 – The best pieces are a 6 or a 7, but too much of the meat is a 0.
Cost: 4/10
Convenience: 10/10
Nutrition: 9/10
Overall
Walk on by!
We eat a fair amount of pulled pork in our house, both homemade and from a couple of restaurants we like. While it’s usually not made from prime cuts of pork (though we make ours from pork tenderloin), pulled pork shouldn’t be this fatty.
Have you tried the Costco Kirkland Signature Smoked Pulled Pork? Do you like it?
Please note that this review was not paid for or sponsored by any third party. This product was purchased by Costcuisine for the purpose of producing this review. The opinions in this review are strictly those of Costcuisine. Costcuisine is not affiliated with Costco or any of its suppliers. In the event that Costcuisine receives compensation for a post from the manufacturer of a product or some other third party, the arrangement will be clearly disclosed (including where the manufacturer of a product provides Costcuisine with a free sample of the product).
I was very disappointed in the smoked pulled pork from Kirkland/Costco. It was dry, bland and was like eating shredded tissue paper….even the dog turned his nose up at it.
Would not recommend this product and certainly not buy it again…a waste of 10.00$
Yeah following the directions isnt enough. I nuked it per instructions, drained the grease, then added my own carnitas seasonings and threw into a cast iron pan and cooked on 450 for 15 minutes and came out nice and crisp. Do not over cook or it will dry out.
My package was congealed fat clinging to grizzled pork, smoked heavily to the point of being ham. Not really pulled but grizzled thoroughly. No piece was spared. I think it may be meat scraps from the cutting block.
If only it was like the beautiful artwork on the package.instead of shameful deception.
I made a trip to Costco today to buy some Kirkland Pulled pork, was disappointed I couldn’t find it anywhere today. I’ll check again in a couple days. I try to keep some in freezer to have on hand. I’m a fan of it!
Just had this. Have made my own pulled pork and used for soups. This is extremely salty. I don’t think I can use it in soup. This is nothing but stringy ham. I may throw it away because I don’t know what to do with it. I will not eat it. I tried it with rice. Food waste is a sin.
Disgusting. More fat than protein. Not a good ratio. This can not be real smoked meat. Smoke flavoring added. Do not purchase this item.
Had company over for lunch and planned pulled pork sliders. We bought 3 packages of this ”brisket” This was a ”pulled pork” total bust. It contains curing nitrates. Was just shredded ham along with the grissle. Not even close to ”pulled pork”. Will be returning one left.
Costo ues to sell ”real” pulled pork but this aint it.
NEVER BUY AGAIN!
It is shredded canned ham.. Not pulled pork at all.. Was able to doctor it up with our own homemade pulled pork sauce.. Won’t buy again..
This stuff is nasty.
My elderly dad was allowed to go to Costco unsupervised 😉 and came back with this. It was barely edible. Tasted like spam and so artificial it was unpleasant. Serious rip-off.
Agree, not my favorite!
I just tried it and separated it into 5 separate dishes with different sauces. My wife and I loved it…nice smoke flavor and I have smoked my own pork shoulder in a real smoker then finished in oven for 4 hrs. This is a convenient meal…warm up in boiling water or try the cast iron pan…shred it up, add your favorite sauce and enjoy!
Thank you for your comment! Glad you liked it!
You people are nuts. This pulled pork is delicious. This is what pulled pork is suppose to taste like. Porky and fatty. If you go to any bbq joint that’s what it is. To me pork tenderloin is too lean and tasteless. The only thing that saves it is the sauce. This is made with pork shoulder or pork butt which that is what pulled pork is suppose to be.
I don’t think it’s the worst dish in the world, but a quick look at the ingredients will tell you that it is “Pulled Ham”. A listed ingredient is Sodium Nitrite, and that explains why this looks and tastes more like sweet, somewhat greasy, shredded ham. It’s pink, even after being heated to way higher temperatures that turn uncured pork to that “well-done” brown color.
I don’t have an aversion to nitrites in my meats, but pulled pork is a dish that doesn’t need it for preservation or flavor.
This pulled pork was the worse I ever tasted or fixed. Breaking it up before heating it I found huge chunks of fat and hard stringy bites that were not edible. Half of the package I bought was thrown away. Worse ever.
Follow the directions on the package and you will end up with the same greasy inedible concoction the review and most people leaving comments reference. However, putting it in a cast iron pan and cooking it on med heat to render the fat changes everything!!! It’s never going to compete with properly prepared Carolina / Texas / Memphis / etc. style pulled pork, but it’s pretty damn good, very damn easy, and very damn inexpensive! Just prepared it tonight and panicked when I saw the greasy mess that came out of the microwave. I threw it in a cast iron pan on the grill out of desperation. 30 min later, magic! The kids loved it!!!
Agree returned two packages to Costco, awfully fatty and greasy. Clearly not up to Kirkland brand standards.
This is Awfull. Full of fat and gristle. Went down the disposal.
Shame on you Costco for putting this in your store. I’m going to be wary of anything that says Kirkland from from here on.
Agree completely. This is not worthy of Costco!!
This is not pulled pork. This is ham. H
Isn’t ham pork? 😑
I agree it’s very very greasy! But we like the flavor and the zero carbs, so I shred it and crisp it slightly by broiling in the oven on a cookie cooling rack over a pan. It turns into delicious carnitas, and quite a bit of the grease drains off.
Thanks for the review of the pulled pork. I was curious about the product; it sounds too greasy & salty for my taste.
It is quite greasy and salty! Actually my husband had the leftovers andsaid it was not edible and the fat had all congealed in the fridge.