What do you get when you put nine layers of pulled pork, mashed potatoes, barbecue sauce and baked beans in a clear plastic cup? A guilt trip, maybe, but the answer at this year’s Royal Agricultural Winter Fair is a Pulled Pork Parfait.

The $7 meat sundae is the hottest new thing to hit the food court at this year’s Royal, where everybody’s talking about the odd-looking concoction. Meat lovers and barbecue enthusiasts are wolfing it down, while cautious but curious eaters are satisfied with an explanation.

“What’s in that parfait?” one woman asks, pointing at a menu board Monday night as her boyfriend orders a pulled pork sandwich.

“We get asked that question a million times a show,” replies Frank Caputo, the congenial pitmaster at Hank Daddy’s Barbecue stand. “And what I usually say is, ‘you have one guess.’ ”

“I was looking at yogurt or marshmallows,” is the woman’s double-barrelled guess.

“It’s potatoes,” Caputo reveals. “The most common answer is yogurt, but I’ve heard everything from ice cream to lard.”

The couple wanders away, content with a sandwich.

“It’s weird but a lot of people think the parfait sounds gross,” observes Caputo, a father of three from Maple, Ont. “It’s just pork and taters. You can put it in a cup and walk around and eat it.”

Indeed, you’d eat the four elements spread out on a plate. The parfait format simply forces you to eat a combo of elements in every mouthful.

The savoury parfaits, which look like a caramel and vanilla sundae, are already a hit on the North American fair circuit.

Big T’s BBQ won best new food honours at this year’s Calgary Stampede with its Pulled Pork Parfait, made from pulled pork, mashed potatoes and gravy. Stampede-goers have been eating Hot Beef Sundaes from the Homestead Grill for several years. Those involve roast beef, corn, mashed potatoes, gravy and cheddar topped by a cherry tomato.

South of the border, Porky’s BBQ out of Lafayette, Ind., is garnering lots of blog buzz for taking its Pork Parfait to fairs all over the U.S.

The Royal, which runs until Nov. 14, has 38 vendors in its food court. Some are perennially popular, serving things like röstis, buffalo burgers and roast lamb on a bun. Hank Daddy’s, nestled between Subway and the Dairy Farmers of Ontario, is one of just three new vendors this year.

Caputo, 43, spent two decades in financial services before quitting to turn his passion for barbecue into a business. He toured American barbecue joints, was mentored by a Georgia pitmaster, and did charity events last year before kicking into high gear this year.

He takes Hank Daddy’s (“my friends used to call me Hank, my kids call me daddy”) to fairs and festivals dishing up smoked goodies like pulled pork, brisket, pork ribs, sausages and pulled chicken.

Caputo is fuzzy on the birth of his Pulled Pork Parfait, but recalls putting a bunch of his offerings together in a cup last winter. Since his three daughters loved it, he figured it would go over well.

The parfait is served with a fork and built like this: pulled pork, Hank Daddy’s Original Barbecue Sauce, mashed potatoes, sauce, pork, sauce, potatoes, pork and baked beans (which are optional).

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Caputo launched his parfait at the Carassauga festival in Mississauga in May, and took it to the Beach Rib-Fest in June and the Bala Cranberry Festival in October.

He makes his own rubs and sauces. For the parfait, he seasons pork butts with his sugar/spice/smoke rub, and smokes them over peach wood for about 10 to 12 hours.

“I cook to 205 (Fahrenheit),” reveals Caputo. “195 is fully acceptable — it shreds nice, it pulls nice. But 205 is my magic number.”

Since Hank Daddy’s can’t use a smoker inside the Royal, the meat is cooked off-site and shredded on-site. Caputo usually pulls his pork by hand, but is trying out a Ro-Man Pork Puller that attaches to a drill and shreds a butt in eight seconds.

On the Royal’s opening weekend, he sold 60 butts worth of meat. Each butt weighs about 10 pounds. To shred that much meat by hand at his tiny booth would have needlessly created lineups.

His mashed potatoes are instant. His baked beans are Bush’s. His barbecue sauce is homemade.

So how many calories are in a Pulled Pork Parfait?

“Calories?” asks a baffled Caputo. “No idea. But I can tell you our sauces — because they’re made of brown sugar, honey and maple syrup — would be pretty high in calories.”

jbain@thestar.ca

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