Good luck
@Brunneria
Planned 23/1 fast didn’t happen. Gym visit led to mid-afternoon hunger.
Breakfast - none
Lunch/snack - bag of pork crunch
Dinner - 2 pork belly slices seasoned with garlic salt and pepper with buttered cabbage. Felt stuffed so ditched the planned chocolate chia pudding with cream and went for 5 Hotel Chocolat 100% buttons.
Looking for tips on cooking pork belly - this was my first time cooking it (or any kind of pork). Have unpleasant childhood memories of pork, so have always avoided it, but while away at Easter, a pork chop was the best option on a menu and it was totally delicious, so now experimenting at home. Tonight’s strips were baked for an hour (30 minutes each side) on gas 6 (400F) and while the fat crisped up, the meat wasn’t as tender as I’d have liked. Any ideas? Pic below.
Goonergal, if you ask Dr Google you'll find as many different methods as recipes. I get the impression that belly pork is pretty flexible in terms of cooking methods,
We don't buy slices, but have the butcher cut it to order for us, and they're very obliging. We have a slab of belly, which we have cut into what would be very wide slices, then have them halved again, to create sort pf chunky rectangles, which in this house represents one per portion. The rind is scored
The favoured method in this hacienda is as follows.
Take the meat out of the fridge and allow it to reach room temperature and ensure it is dry. In this house that bit means it sits at room temperature in a spare oven in the roasting try, with the rind uppermost.
Heat the oven to as hot as it will go. Put the meat in, but immediately turn the oven down to 140/150c (fan) and give it a very decent ignoring for a couple of hours. During this decent ignoring, the meat will become quite a bit "taller" as the fat starts to render.
It'll easily be in the oven 3-4 hours at that temperature. Once the inner temperature reaches 68.2c, whack the temperature back up to 200/220c to crisp the crackling, but keep an eye on it. It'll likely only take about 10 minutes.
Allow to rest in the usual way and dive in.
In this house roasties and the like are done in another oven, so I can't advise if you're looking to do those, but only have a single oven arrangement.
MrB is the maestro of the belly roast. I did flat ribs of beef using the same technique the other evening and declared then my bets ever roast. Yes, they were utterly delicious, having had them vacuum marinading for a couple of days beforehand.
