Doesn't that just pull your pork?

A few months ago, my buddy Dan told me that the Food Experiments cooking competition was coming to town and that the event's theme was "smoke." I've had decent success as an amateur backyard BBQ chef, so when Dan told me I should sign up I jumped at the chance (as long as he would be my teammate at the cook-off).
Long story short, Dan and I painstakingly tested our entry over the course of the month leading up to the competition, a turn on Hawai'ian kalua pig that we called "Pulled Pork Will Be My Constant": pork shoulder brined in pineapple juice, smoked salt and grenadine, rubbed with red Hawaiian salt and smoked paprika, smoked over cherry wood for 7 hours, then braise-finished in the oven with more pineapple juice. We garnished it with a balsamic vinegar and red pepper coleslaw and chopped hickory-smoked cherries. It looked a little something like this:

In addition to the jury panel of esteemed Columbus chefs, critics and food celebrities, there was also an audience vote among the 200+ attendees of the event. Our dish ended up winning second place in both categories and was the only dish of the 17 entries that placed in the top 3 of both the jury and the audience. A pretty neat trick, even if Ricky Bobby might disagree.Fast forward to present day, when our mutual friend and ex-bandmate Mike came to town. He asked us for details about the dish and the competition and it occurred to me that we had not documented our process. I decided the best thing to do would be to try to replicate the dish and keep a record of it. Hence, the birth of the Braise Jebus food blog. More back story than you ever could have wanted. Sorry.
I promise I'll get to the actual cooking shortly...