2012 Cooking Club Week 23: Pork belly confit with green beans and apple sauce

Padraig Mor

Twice cooked pork belly confit with sauteed green beans and apple sauce

Despite being a cheap cut of meat, pork belly enjoys something of an elevated reputation as bistro and restaurant fayre. This recipe, originally by Gordon Ramsay, cooks the meat confit - immersed in fat. Apparently this is a lower fat way of cooking it than simply roasting, but I'd take that with a pinch of salt. This recipe has two great features; (1) despite taking three days to prepare, it's actually really easy to make. (2) most of the work can be done days or even weeks in advance, making it ideal for a dinner party. The only (moderately) pricey part of this recipe is buying the goose fat, but even that can be re-used later.

Ingredients
Approx 1.5kg pork belly, boned and skin left on but not scored (my butcher actually scored mine without asking but it didn't seem to make a difference).
1 tbsp coriander seeds.
2 star anise (I couldn't find them so used a bit of ground cinnamon).
Few sprigs thyme.
Few sprigs rosemary.
2 - 4 200g jars of goose fat, depending on the size of your dish. Can top up with any oil if you're a bit short.
Good lash of ground salt.

Method
1. Crush the coriander seeds and the star anise together and mix with the salt. Rub both sides of the belly with the mix. Put the belly, skin up, in an ovenproof dish (the smaller the better, as long as it fits flat). Throw over the thyme and rosemary, cover in foil and put in the fridge overnight.


2. The next day, remove the herbs and any excess salt or brine from the belly. Preheat oven to 150C (130C fan, gas 2). Put the goose fat (which may be solid or liquid or both, depending on storage) into a small pot and heat gently until it turns a brown/gold colour and starts to simmer. Pour the fat over the pork (and top up if necessary), cover with foil and place in the oven. Caution: the dish may be heavy. Cook for 3 hours.


3. Remove the dish and let the pork settle. Caution: the dish is now both heavy and full of boiling hot oil! The leftover fat can be kept in a fridge for a month or frozen for six months and is delicious for fry ups or roasting potatoes or vegetables.


4. Line a tray with a piece of greaseproof paper a bit larger than the belly. Lift the pork gently from the dish and drain off the excess fat as best you can. Lay the belly down on the paper, skin side down, and cover with another sheet of greaseproof paper. Cover with a tray weighted with several cans. Allow to cool and place in the fridge overnight.


5. The next day, remove the trays and cans. At this point, the meat can be left in the fridge for up to 3 days, or frozen for a month, and is simply trimmed and heated for serving. Remove the paper and any excess fat. Trim the edges so that the belly is now a prefect rectangle. This serves no taste purpose, but looks great! Score the skin into diamonds with a sharp knife.



6. Heat some oil in an ovenproof frying pan and put the pork in, skin side down. [My pic below shows half of the trimmed belly - rest went to the freezer] Leave for 3 - 5 minutes to crackle, then place in the oven at 220C (200C fan, gas 7) for approximately 20 minutes. Return to the hob and cook the underside for a couple of minutes. Place the pork on a board to rest and serve sliced or in large single portions. Second pic looks burnt but wasn't really!



7. Enjoy!



I served the pork with potatoes roasted in the recycled goose/pork fat, sauteed green beans and apple sauce.
The green bean recipe is here (and my pictures here) - note that although they don't say it, you can store the beans after blanching for up to several months in a freezer or several days in a fridge.
Ramsay serves his pork belly with an apple and onion veloute sauce but, having made it, I thought it was a bit bland TBH. I went instead with an apple sauce recipe by Michel Roux as follows:

Apple sauce by Michel Roux (pictures here)
1. Peel, core and finely dice approx 500g apples.
2. Bring to a simmer with 150ml water, 20g caster sugar and a pinch of ground cinnamon. Cover and leave for approx 15 minutes, until the apples are tender but not dry. Note if your apple bits are a bit large, you may need a lot longer.
3. Mix in 25g butter and a pinch of salt. Blitz with a hand blender and it's ready.

Roux offers no guidance on storage, but I've had some in the fridge overnight and it still tastes great!

Mr Simpson

Nice recipe, I'd always score it though, it helps to render out some fat and crisp up the skin when you're frying it.

Padraig Mor

mmcn90 wrote: »

Nice recipe, I'd always score it though, it helps to render out some fat and crisp up the skin when you're frying it.

Ramsay suggests scoring it just before the final heating stage, but mine was actually scored (accidently!) when I bought it. I'm not sure what the difference would be, but I wasn't too happy with my crackling. It looked fine but was a bit 'sticky'. Still tasted nice though. Next time, I might rub in some salt to the scored skin just before the final step.

Mr Simpson

Padraig Mor wrote: »

Ramsay suggests scoring it just before the final heating stage, but mine was actually scored (accidently!) when I bought it. I'm not sure what the difference would be, but I wasn't too happy with my crackling. It looked fine but was a bit 'sticky'. Still tasted nice though. Next time, I might rub in some salt to the scored skin just before the final step.

That would definitely work I'd say. Absolutely love pork belly!!!

yimrsg

Made this today, I've cooked belly pork loads before but this had by far the best crackling ever and the meat had a wonderful taste from all the spices. Never used star anise before but it was a big flashback to my youth drinking absinthe and assorted drunken mishaps. I didn't cover the pork completely with the goose fat but it didn't adversely affect it, before I pan fried it, I dried the skin and added salt but forgot to score the skin. If I was doing it again I'd wrap the meat in a bag when in the fridge as the spices are a bit powerful but I'd make a double batch!

The piece I cooked were the parts I trimmed off so it's looks a bit small but tasted amazing. Thanks OP.

http://imgur.com/i1HVC
http://imgur.com/7ET4J

Padraig Mor

Glad you enjoyed!

BaZmO*

Finally got around to making this. Absolutely gorgeous dish.

Local Lidl had pork belly on sale last week for a decent price so I picked one up.
It was 1kg so it fit perfectly into an IKEA tray that I have at home. You probably need to put a warning in about pouring the heated oil on top of the belly!! The oil spat and crackled so much. Next time I make I probably won't heat it up as much.

Anyway, great dish. Thanks OP.

Padraig Mor

Cheers Bazmo. Your pommes puree look delicious!