Sunday, 27 April 2014

The Sunday Roast

Sundays are all about the roast dinner and my hubby is getting pretty good at making them. I know he'll read this with a smile.

Usually the good old English roast is chicken, beef or lamb - however today we had pork belly and it was amaze-balls! I licked the plate clean almost.

We kept it simple, a few roast potatoes, some white cabbages and cooked cherry tomatoes. You've got to load up on your vegetables, they are good for you after all. This recipe is actually quite healthy (if you avoid eating the crackling).

So I suppose you're thinking how to cook this??

When choosing your meat, choose a nice bit of pork belly from a good butcher, preferable free range and rare breed, weighing about 1.3kg. Take the pork belly out of the fridge about 1 hour before you want to cook it, to allow it to come to room temperature.

Firstly turn on your oven and put it on the hottest setting to let it warm up.

Using a sharp knife (it has to be very sharp) score the skin in a diamond pattern cutting the skin, but being careful not to cut the actual meat, and rub in sea salt. Pour and rub in some olive oil then lay the meat on top of a layer of vegetables. You can use vegetables such as potatoes, sweet potatoes, garlic and onions. Use anything you fancy. Also sprinkle on some freshly ground black pepper and herbs like rosemary, thyme or sage...be creative!

Place your oven tray into your very hot oven for 10-15 minutes or until the skin of the belly starts to bubble and is golden brown. Once this happens, turn down your oven temperature to 170c/gas mark 3 and roast for 1 1/2 hours. Remember to set the timer!

In the last half an hour of cooking the meat, boil a pot of water and place white cabbage in to cook. Once cooked, stain the water and serve.

Once your oven timer beeps, remove the meat from the oven. Slice the meat in to your desired serving sizes and also use the vegetables in the oven tray.