I've developed a liking for pork belly. Well, that's not quite true. Love is probably a more accurate word, rather than like!
Pork belly is easily available in most supermarkets here and is not expensive. I love the crunchy 'crackling' on top and the succulent, juicy meat.
Pork belly holds strong flavours well, especially Asian spices and herbs. You can marinate it, and it forgives a little over-cooking. Actually, I think it is better over-cooked than under-cooked.
We ate this pork belly with roasted sweet potato and pears, and a salsa of avocado, tomato and cucumbers in lime and soy. It was a tasty Sunday evening dinner.
What you'll need
* Serves four with a little left over.1kg piece of boneless pork belly, with the skin and fat finely scored. *If you don't know how to do this, ask your butcher to do it.
1/2 cup sweet chilli sauce
2 tsp vegetable oil
Salt and pepper
What to do
Preheat the oven to 220 degrees Celsius. With some paper towel, pat all the moisture off the meat. Then cover the meat with the oil. The best way to do this is pour the oil on the top then use your fingers to massage it into all parts of the meat.Once this is done, season well with salt and pepper. Put the meat, skin-side up in a roasting pan, sprinkle extra salt (about 1 teaspoon) onto the pork skin, then place into the oven. Bake on high heat for 20 minutes.
Reduce the heat to 170 degrees Celsius, and cook for a further 50 minutes.
The skin should be nice and crunchy by this time. Remove from the oven and rest for 10 minutes.
The slice into medium-thickness slices using a very sharp knife.
Once sliced, use a spoon or basting brush to paint the sweet chilli sauce onto the meat. The heat of the meat will slightly caramelise the sugar in the sauce.
Serve while hot.
Dear Nat. Just to let you know, I looked at and read your blog, and took interest in the pork belly, so I decided, after looking, touching and admiring this product in the supermarket for the past four years, I would have a go at cooking it. So, I bought a very lean piece and cooked it. Wow, how beautiful and tender.
ReplyDeleteI applied oyster sauce and some salt to the bottom and oil then did the thing for the crackling. At first it wouldn't crackle, so I upped the grill section of the oven and promptly burnt the crackling, however, it was salvageable, and no one was the wiser.
I then made sweet and sour crunchy vegetables (recipe from 'Table') some steamed rice and waited for the comment from the man of the house. He ate the lot, so it may be a special treat on the menu for us in the future.
So thank you for your suggestion. How beautiful and tender. So, you have encouraged me to go places that I have not been before, many thanks,
could you copy and paste this to your blog, I have trouble doing it. Mum x