Oh, but I Love Porchetta!

The Lamb and the Porchetta

I must, before I forget, carry on with the recipes from my family get together the other week.  Yesterday I hopefully made you drool over the prospect of fine British Lamb cooked in wine and tomatoes for many, many hours till it simply slid off the bone. At the meal we had two meat dishes, for I am a firm believer that the best meals has not one meat offering but two. And the other dish to grace the table was the wonderful and succulent Italian Porchetta; rolled and roasted belly of pork.

Many British families go into reverse gear when you mention belly of pork. The see in their mind’s eye the fatty offering with thick skin and imagine some greasy morsel swimming about their plate in a pool of dripping. Well, their loss! The thing with Porchetta is that though it is one of the fattier cuts, once it has been roasted for three or four hours, what you are left with is succulent, highly flavoured and quite irresistible. So, to proceed.

1. Mug your best local butcher.

Although supermarkets do stock belly of pork, it is often in rather sad, small lumps. This is a family dish – you need plenty of it. My butcher cut me a piece about 40 cm long – but you can go longer if you have a hungry table. The belly normally has the small end of the rib rack still attached to it. I asked the butcher to strip those out and I cooked those separately for something else.

The butcher will probably ask if you want the skin scored – unless you have a really sharp pointed butchers knife, I suggest you let him score away.

2. Prepare the Porchetta

You will need the following ingredients:

• Large handful of fresh rosemary
• Large handful of fresh sage
• Half handful of Thyme
• 6 or more chopped cloves of garlic
• Salt and pepper
• Olive Oil
• Ball of string!

Lay the belly skin down. Rub the surface of the meat with salt, pepper and leave for a little while to absorb. Now cover the whole surface with the chopped herbs and garlic. The meat should be carpeted with them so that it looks like a lawn! You can also sprinkle on some ground fennel if you like – I don’t always have it and it is not completely vital. Now, roll up the belly into a cylinder and tie it up with string, nice and tight. The herb stuffing should not be protruding anywhere. Rub the skin with salt and olive oil.

3. Roast It

Heat your oven up to hot! Now oil the bottom of a roasting pan and put your porchetta in it. Cover with heavy cooking foil. Put the pan in the hot oven for 20 minutes, then reduce the heat to medium – around 150 degrees Celsius.

Roast the porchetta, leaving it covered for 3 to 4 hours. I went for the 4 hour option myself! Towards the end, check to see how crispy is the skin. If you want it more crispy, then remove the foil for the last 30 minutes. With mine the other day I found I did not need this.

You will know when it is cooked because the skin will be really thin and much of the fat under the skin layer will have melted away. Remove from the oven and let stand for 15 minutes or so, still covered to keep warm.

4. Serve it

Now, I have never yet managed to get thin slices from a porchetta, it always disintegrated on me – and I love it like that! Remove the skin, chop up the meat and serve it on a long dish. Break up the crackling, and lay randomly over the top. Serve with a huge salad and rice or – well, anything really. This dish works in both Winter and Summer, so you choose!

Mange Bien!

Related posts:

1. Lamb in a huge pot
2. Piri Piri Chicken
3. Eggplant Heaven – Imam Bayildi
4. Bolognese
5. Thank Goodness for Turkey

Tags: Belly, Crackling, Garlic, Porchetta, Pork, Rosemary, Sage

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 7th, 2010 at 8:49 pm and is filed under Recipes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.

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