ROAST PORK BELLY WITH VERY LOUD CRACKLING.
It’s a lovely meal for the weekend, teamed with garlic-scented white beans.
Deciding on roast pork belly was the easy part.
It’s a great cut, and those who love knock-knock hard crackling will love you forever as they crunch loudly away (turn the music up, maybe).
And I’ve got it down to just three ingredients.
Ah, but what to have with it? You need to contrast the richness, not add to it. The conversation swirled from the Commonwealth, with roast potatoes, peas and apple sauce; to Korea, with soft butter lettuces, rice and spicy kim chi. Lentils? Mash? Red cabbage? Coleslaw? Finely shaved fennel and dill salad? All good ideas.
It went on for so long that I ran out of time and had to just whack open a couple of cans of white beans, pimping them with chicken stock, garlic and loads of parsley.
And it was so exactly right, because the beans were content to be in the background. They’re very unassuming, white beans, and I found them relaxing to eat, yet they worked hard to emphasise the sweetness of the pork.
They turn the roast crackling into the acknowledged star, the way the corps de ballet support the principal, instead of competing.
They set the scene, working as a collective, becoming part of something larger than themselves.
(Yes, I am aware they are only beans, but I am enjoying myself. Although I might do us all a favour and stop now.)
HOW TO GET GOOD CRACKLING:
Take the packaging off the pork as soon as you walk in the door. The aim is to dry out the skin as much as you can. Wipe dry with a paper towel, score the skin, and leave in the fridge (uncovered) overnight or for 24 hours (even just a few hours will help).
To score, use a sharp knife or Stanley knife, and cut across at 1 cm intervals, without cutting into the meat. Keep the cut going right to the edges, so the fat can run off as it renders.
Scoring it in this way also makes carving a cinch. The crackling is practically pre-carved, and the meat soft and tender.
ROAST PORK BELLY WITH WHITE BEANS
1 kg piece belly pork, boned and skin-on
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp sea salt
Remove the scored (see above) pork from the fridge and allow to come to room temperature.
Heat the oven to 240C conventional (220C fan-forced), and line a roasting pan with baking paper.
Rub the pork all over with the olive oil, then rub with the sea salt, and place on an oiled rack in the roasting pan.
Roast the pork for 30 minutes, then reduce the temperature to 180C conventional (160C fan-forced).
Roast for 35 to 40 minutes or until a meat thermometer inserted into the middle of the thickest part of the meat reads 65C.
Bring the temperature up to 240C conventional (220C fan-forced), and give the pork a good blast for 10 to 15 minutes until the crackling is crisp, golden and blistered.
Rest the pork for 10 minutes under a loose sheet of foil.
Carve into 1 cm slices, using the scored rind as your guide. Serves 4.
FAST WHITE BEANS
2 x 400 g cans white beans (cannellini)
1 garlic clove, peeled and sliced
200 ml chicken or vegetable stock
Half tsp smoked paprika
Sea salt and pepper
2 tbsp parsley, freshly chopped
Drain and rinse the white beans and chuck into a saucepan.
Add garlic, stock, paprika, sea salt and pepper and bring to the boil, stirring, then reduce to a simmer for 5 minutes.
Mash a few of the beans to thicken the sauce, then stir in the parsley, and add a good swirl of olive oil.
Spoon onto a warm serving platter (or individual plates), and place the pork on top.
TIPS:
Seek out pork from a female pig, rather than a male pig – the hormones can taint the flavour of the meat.
You’ll get better crackling if the surface is all at the same level. If some of it is lower, stuff some scrunched kitchen foil underneath to even it out.
If your crackling still isn’t happening, gently cut the skin away from the meat in one piece while you rest the pork, and give it a blast in a hot oven.
Adding wilted spinach or kale to the beans is an excellent idea.
Slice any left-overs and throw into a Thai coconut-milk curry with greens and herbs, fish sauce and lime, see below.
Thanks for dropping by! And thanks for your comments and suggestions. Thanks to my long-time friend Robyn for the lovely fluorescent pink heart linen tea towel I immediately used as backdrop, it’s gorgeous.
Special thanks to Terry for saying “this would be great in a curry” five times throughout dinner, then making good the next day by adding the sliced left-overs to a fabulous curry with Thai eggplant, thoughtfully garnished with twigs of re-heated crackling.
I would like to acknowledge the traditional owners of the lands and waters upon which I work, live, cook and play; the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. Thank you for sharing your culture, traditions, knowledge, spirit, art, music, humour and food traditions, allowing us all to experience a greater sense of belonging in this ancient land.
My sister visited earlier in the week. Her kids - to our side of the family's horror - DO NOT LIKE ROAST PORK. We cannot understand how this has come to be, but there we are.
Therefore, she requests roast pork every time she visits, secure in the knowledge that th'Bloke and I, at least, share in the adoration of a good roast pork with crackling.
We try to source a locally-grown free-range roast, but it can sometimes require a bit of planning. The local IGA and butcher are pretty good though.
And this is precisely the technique we use. Dry out the pork, ensure it's well-scored, rub with salt/oil. We blast in a very hot oven for about the first 10-15mins, then turn down to cook the meat, then turn up again at the end to finalise the crisping.
What I don't understand, however, is the concept that there's crackling left over the next day for another dish. Meat, yes. But crackling?? Never happen!! (The rule in our family is pretty much "do not stand between the women of the family and crackling or chips if you value your life").
In exchange for her roast pork, my sister podded up the results of my dried bean harvest (aka "letting the string beans stay on the vine too long past edible" :) ), collecting about 2 cups of white beans and 1/2 a cup of very pretty lima beans.
The white beans promptly got soaked overnight to make one of my favourite soups, with a smoked ham/bacon hock (or the leftover Xmas ham bone if it's around), the usual chopped onion/celery/carrot, white beans of any variety, stock (tho frankly it does fine with water due to the hock), and a tin of tomatoes added in round two, when the fat is skimmed off and the meat stripped off the hock and bones removed.
The beans operate in the background, as you've so lyrically noted, absorbing the salty smokiness of the hock :) , and make this a ridiculously well-rounded soup.
I forgot that parsley and beans and pork go together - good suggestion. I'll add some to today's lunch soup. Curly parsley, to be a bit retro. I actually like the flavour of it a little more than flat parsley at the moment, although I grow both, which means I eventually end up with half-curled parsley, which is fun - they cross-pollinate.
Mum told me that the key was the 24 hours in the ‘fridge Jill. Interestingly she always poured a jug of boiling water over the pork first. If the butcher had done the scoring, this really opened the skin up and allowed the salt and oil to penetrate. Works every time. The beans sound great and Terry is as hilarious as ever. Thanks Jill