How to Cut a Whole Boneless Pork Loin into Several Meals

Below is a WHOLE pork loin.

At a grocery store you might find them halved to create the “Sirloin end” or a “Blade-end.”

As you learn more about what comes from each end, you could opt to just buy THAT particular half.

I always start by portioning the whole Pork loin into 4 “roasts” that you can cut into a bunch of different stuff.

Starting from the Blade End (Right to Left in My Header Photo)

This portion comes from near the Pork butt and has similar qualities like fat content and tender meat.

Some of my favorite ways to use it are:

Keep the roast whole and smoke it like you would a pork butt into pulled pork.

OR cook it in a slow cooker.

Unlike the sirloin end, the fat content will help prevent it from drying out.

I also like to cut it into small pork Ribeye Chops – roughly 1-2″ thick.

The steaks or chops here look eerily similar to a “beef ribeye steak.”

This is easily one of my favorite things to grill or pan sear.

You can also take the pork ribeye steak above and cut in half – this will create “country style ribs.”

These taste similar to baby back ribs – just without the bone.

Moving Up to the Center Rib Portion

The size of the center rib will depend on how big you cut the blade end above.

It will still have similar qualities to the blade end but start to become leaner.

Some of my favorite ways to use the center rib are:

I personally leave this whole like a roast (145F) OR cook it for pulled pork OR I’ll cube it up for stew meat.

You can also cut into thin OR thick cut, boneless pork chops.

A lot of the time at grocery stores they’ll cut these razor thin, but you can make them thicker at home.

Moving Up to the Center Loin

This section is rather lean and in most cases this is where you get your thin cut chops from OR your pork roasts.

This section has better marbling than the sirloin end, which is why that section is cut into chops (below).

I opted to leave this as a whole roast (cooked to 145F internal)

I personally wouldn’t use this section for pulled pork as it’s quite lean.

Lastly, the Sirloin End

As you start getting closer to the sirloin end, the meat will sort of transition into being more fibrous with connective tissue.

This end is usually made into thin cut chops.

I opted to cut into a super small roast for myself and several thin cut pork chops.

The thin cut chops are the total opposite of ribeye chops.

They have very little fat content and depending on where you cut them from, they can have connective tissue (gristle) running through them which can be less appetizing.

This is also another reason I made a smaller roast is because the gristle tends to trail towards the end.

You could also opt to turn this sirloin end into stew meat.

The Result: The Whole Pork Loin Cut Up

There are really tons of ways to cut this thing up but hopefully this is some inspiration.

The pork loin was 7.84 lbs and $1.89/lb or $14.82.

For that amount of money I made roughly 5 meals.