Jamies 6 Hour Slow Roast Pork Shoulder My Fennel Crackling Food

6-HOUR SLOW-ROASTED PORK SHOULDER

Steps:

• Remove the pork from the fridge for 1 hour before you want to cook it, to let it come up to room temperature.
• Preheat the oven to 220°C/425°F/gas 7.
• Place the pork on a clean work surface, skin-side up. Get yourself a small sharp knife and make scores about 1cm apart through the skin into the fat, but not so deep that you cut into the meat. If the joint is tied, try not to cut through the string.
• Rub sea salt right into all the scores you've just made, pulling the skin apart a little if you need to. Brush any excess salt off the surface then turn it over. Season the underside of the meat with a few pinches of salt and black pepper.
• Place the pork, skin-side up, in a roasting tray and roast for 30 minutes, or until the skin has started to puff up and you can see it turning into crackling. At this point, turn the heat down to 170°C/325°F/gas 3, cover the pork snugly with a double layer of tin foil, pop back in the oven and roast for a further 4½ hours.
• Meanwhile, halve the onions, carrots and celery, and break the garlic up into cloves (there's no need to peel them).
• Remove the pork from the oven, take off the foil, and baste the meat with the fat in the bottom of the tray. Carefully transfer to a board, then skim all but 2 tablespoons of excess fat from the tray into a jar, and pop in the fridge for tasty cooking another day.
• Add all the veg, garlic and bay leaves to the tray and stir them into the fat. Place the pork back on top of everything and place back in the oven without the foil to roast for 1 further hour, or until meltingly soft and tender.
• Carefully move the meat to a serving dish, cover again with tin foil and leave to rest while you make the gravy. Spoon away any fat in the tray, then add the stock (or replace with water, if you prefer) and place the tray on the hob.
• Bring to the boil and simmer for a few minutes, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon to scrape up all those lovely sticky tasty bits from the bottom of the tray.
• When you've got a nice, dark gravy, pour it through a sieve into jug using your spoon to really push all the goodness of the veg through the sieve. Season to taste, if needed.
• Serve the pork and crackling with the jug of gravy and all the trimmings - a dollop of apple sauce will finish this off perfectly.

PORK AND CRACKLING

Steps:

• Lay out your pork on a board and rub some salt and 1 teaspoon chopped rosemary into the scored lines, trying to get this into every bit by pushing and rubbing in. In a pestle and mortar smash up the fennel seeds, then the garlic and remaining chopped rosemary, and rub this into the meat ? not the skin, or it will burn. Place in a large roasting tray with the balsamic vinegar, bay and olive oil. Leave for about 1/2 hour to marinate.
• Meanwhile, preheat your oven to its highest temperature and brown the bones. Rub the skin of the pork with lots of sea salt ? this will help puff it up and dry it out. Place the pork directly on the bars at the top of the oven. Finally add the browned bones and vegetables to the leftover balsamic marinade, add 570ml, 1 pint water and put into the oven directly under the pork. As the pork cooks all the goodness drips from it into the tray. This liquid will then become your gravy. You also get quite charred bar marks on the base of the pork.
• The pork will take about 1 hour to cook. After 20 minutes turn the temperature down to 220C/425F/Gas 7. Once the pork is cooked, remove it from the oven on the rack and place on a piece of foil to save any juices. Allow to rest for at least 10 minutes. Finish off any vegetables that you are going to serve with it and make a gravy out of the juices in the tray which was underneath the pork.
• Put the bones, the liquid and the vegetables into a large pan. Add some water to the tray that contained the bones and vegetables, as there will be some Marmite-like, sticky stuff on the bottom to the tray which is very tasty. Reboil the water, scrape off all the goodness from the bottom of the tray and then pour everything into the pan. Bring to the boil, shaking occasionally, remove any oil, grease or scum from the top, then pass the contents through a sieve, discarding all the vegetables and bones. You can reduce and then correct the seasoning, to taste.

JAMIE'S EPIC ROAST PORK

Steps:

• Put the pork skin in the fridge, uncovered, to dry out while you cook the pork. You'll get double crackling - one from the pork joint and one from the skin.
• Preheat the oven to 240°C/475°F/gas 9 (full whack).
• To make the flavoured salt, place the fennel, peppercorns and bay in a pestle and mortar and smash the living daylights out of it. Peel in the lemon zest, then pick in the herbs and have another bash. Add the salt and bash again until fine (alternatively whiz in a blender).
• Score the pork fat in a diamond pattern, then rub in 1 tablespoon of flavoured salt with a good drizzle of olive oil, massaging it into all the nooks and crannies.
• Peel the potatoes and parboil in a large pan of salted boiling water for 10 to 15 minutes until softened. Drain and steam dry, then tip into a large baking tray.
• Scrub, top and tail the parsnips and slot them in with the potatoes, then place the tray on the bottom shelf of the oven.
• Place the pork directly on the bars of the oven above the potatoes and parsnips to catch all the tasty juices. Reduce the oven temperature to 200°C/400°F/gas 6 and cook for 1 hour 20 minutes.
• For the sauce, place a large sheet of non-stick baking paper over a large sheet of tin foil. Place the onion, apple, pear and peach in the middle with a good lug of bourbon, then fold up the edges and twist to make a sealed 'money bag' parcel. Cook in the oven with the pork for 1 hour 10 minutes, or until soft.
• Remove the pork, potatoes and fruit from the oven. Cover the pork with tin foil and leave to rest for at least 30 minutes while you make the crackling. Carefully drain the fat from the potatoes (cool and reserve for another day), and set aside.
• Carefully remove the foil layer from the fruit parcel, then hold the paper bag over a bowl and pierce a hole in it with a sharp knife to release the juice. Squeeze any remaining juice from the fruit, then transfer to a chopping board, roughly chop (discarding the cores, pips and onion skin) and add to the bowl. Leave to cool, then cover and set aside until ready to serve.
• Deseed and clank up the pumpkin into wedges, place into a baking tray and season with salt and pepper.
• Turn the oven back up to full whack. Score the reserved pork skin in a zig-zag fashion and place directly on the bars of the oven. Put the pumpkin underneath and cook for 30 minutes or until golden and crisp.
• To make the gravy, peel and roughly chop the onion, then fry with the minced pork in a large frying pan on a medium heat for 10 minutes, or until golden and soft. Stir in the flour and mustard, then add a good lug of bourbon and flambé, if you like. Pour in the stock, bring to the boil and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes until thick and delicious.
• Remove the crackling and pumpkin from the oven. Drain the fat from the pumpkin and discard, then tip the pumpkin into the tray with the other roasted veg and return to the oven to warm through.
• Slice up the ribs and carve the rest of the pork. Bring it all together at the table and serve with the veg, crackling and fruity sauce.

SLOW ROAST PORK SHOULDER

Steps:

• Preheat the oven to 150C/130C Fan/Gas 2. Put the pork in a roasting tin.
• Cover the tin with foil and roast for 4 hours, 30 minutes. When the cooking time is almost up, parboil the potatoes and parsnips for 5 minutes. Drain. Increase the oven temperature to 200C/180C Fan/Gas 6.
• Uncover the pork and drain off most of the fat. Drizzle the honey over the skin. Put the potatoes, parsnips, onion, carrots, and pepper around the pork, turning over to coat in fat. Return to the oven, uncovered for 35 minutes, or until the vegetables are cooked and the crackling crisp.
• Put on a serving plate and keep warm.
• Drain off most of the fat from the tin. Stir in the flour and whisk in the stock, making sure you scrape up any meat pieces that are stuck to the bottom of the pan. Add the cider. Heat until simmering, whisking constantly. Simmer for 2 minutes and serve with the pork and vegetables.

SLOW-ROASTED PORK WITH FENNEL & BLACK PEPPER

Steps:

• Cut the string from the joint and unroll it. Flatten out as much as possible, cutting through any thick pieces if necessary to give you an even thickness of meat. Mix the garlic, fennel, pepper, rosemary, bay and 1 tsp salt. Sprinkle evenly over all sides of the pork and massage it in. Place on a platter, cover loosely with foil and chill for at least 4 hrs or up to 24 hrs.
• Re-roll the joint and tie at intervals along its length with string. Bring to room temp an hr before roasting and heat oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Roast the pork in a roasting tin for 2 hrs, basting occasionally and adding the wine after 1 hr. Remove from the oven, transfer to a platter and pour over the pan juices. Cover tightly with foil and leave to rest for 15 mins. Serve with beans (see 'Goes well with') and salad (see below).

NIGELLA LAWSON SLOW ROASTED AROMATIC SHOULDER OF PORK

Steps:

• The day before you plan to serve the pork, preheat your oven (make sure it's clean) to the highest heat possible.
• Sit pork skinside up on rack in a roasting tin.
• Chop garlic and ginger, and then pound to a paste in a pestle and mortar, add chilli or chilli flake and 1 tbsp of oil and 2 tbsp vinegar until spreadable.
• Rub this paste all over scored skin, pushing it into the cut lines of the rind. Place pork in oven and cook 30 minutes.
• In bowl that paste was in, pour the rest of the oil and vinegar. When pork has been in oven half an hour remove it from the oven, switch heat down to 120 degrees Celsius
• Turn pork over (best to use oven gloves for this, though they will get dirty). Pour oil and vinegar over the underside (now the top of the pork)and put back in the low-heated oven for 23 hours.
• About half an hour before you're ready to eat, turn oven back to the highest it will go, remove pork and turn it back crackling side up. Put it back in the oven for 30 minutes to get it hot and crisp. It may need another 10 minutes to get it really crisp.
• Remove pork from oven, slice off the crackling and break it into pieces. Carve meat into slices and serve with crackling.