BBQ Pork Sloppy Joes

1. 1
2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Wash and dry all produce. Cut sweet potatoes into ½-inch-thick wedges. Toss on a baking sheet with a drizzle of oil, salt, and pepper. Roast until browned and tender, 20-25 minutes.
   20–25 minutes
3. 2
4. Meanwhile, halve and peel onion. Slice as thinly as possible until you have ¼ cup (½ cup for 4 servings); finely chop remaining onion. Peel and finely chop garlic. Halve lime; squeeze juice into a small bowl. Halve buns. Add 1 TBSP butter (2 TBSP for 4) to a separate small microwave-safe bowl; microwave until melted, 30 seconds. Brush onto cut sides of buns.
   30 seconds
5. 3
6. To bowl with lime juice, add sliced onion, ¼ tsp sugar (½ tsp for 4 servings), and a pinch of salt. Stir to combine; set aside to quick-pickle.
7. 4
8. Heat a drizzle of oil in a large pan over medium-high heat. Add chopped onion and season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring, until softened, 4-5 minutes. Add garlic and cook until fragrant, 30 seconds more. Add pork and season with salt and pepper. Cook, breaking up meat into pieces, until browned and cooked through, 4-6 minutes.
   4–5 minutes30 seconds4–6 minutes
9. 5
10. While pork cooks, in a third small bowl, combine BBQ sauce, pickling liquid from onion, 3 TBSP ketchup (6 TBSP for 4 servings), ½ tsp sugar (1 tsp for 4), and ¼ cup water (⅓ cup for 4). Once pork is cooked through, add BBQ sauce mixture to pan. Cook, stirring, until sauce is thickened, 2-3 minutes. Taste and season with salt and pepper.
    2–3 minutes
11. 6
12. Meanwhile, toast buns in oven or toaster oven until golden, 3-5 minutes. Divide toasted buns between plates and fill with as much BBQ pork as you’d like. Top with pickled onion and hot sauce. Serve with sweet potato wedges on the side.
    3–5 minutes

Cooking notes

When scaling protein-led dishes, weigh the meat rather than counting pieces, and remember that the pan size limits how much you can sear at once.

For volume-to-weight conversions of any ingredient — flour, sugar, butter, salts — use the ingredient converter. To translate the recipe's oven temperature between °C, °F and gas mark, see the temperature converter.

When you scale this recipe up or down, remember that cooking time does not scale linearly. A doubled cake takes longer, but not twice as long; a doubled soup takes roughly twice as long. The cooking-time guide gives sensible starting estimates by dish geometry.