Braised Recipe 3 : Mexicanish Pork.

I like mexican food, or at least the idea i have in my head of mexican food. No doubt this isn’t really mexican food, but i imagine if i gave it to a mexican they wouldn’t hate it. Why would they? It’s delicious.

boneless rolled shoulder of pork
chicken stock
carrot
onion
celery
chilli
tomato puree

Take the pork shoulder and pre-boil it like you might have the ribs if you bothered to look at that recipe. This will boil out the impurities and blood and muck you’d only have to spoon off the top during the cooking process. Give it about ten minutes or so. Clean out the pot and then throw everything else in and the pork, with stock to cover, put a lid on, and simmer slowly for three or four hours, or enough time so the meat just falls apart when you touch it. Take out the pork and allow to cool.

In the forever you’ve got to wait for the meat, you might as well make some accompaniments. I like to have some refried beans, and a little salsa with my pork. I present both here. For the refried beans you will need…

tinned kidney/pinto beans
garlic
onion
stock from the cooking pork

Drain off the beans; you can use dried, but i don’t see the point. Add to the pan with finely sliced onion and a clove or two of garlic and cook it down lightly in the pork stock in a covered pan. If it boils dry, add more stock. Wait for the beans to turn tender and then mash dem up. When mashed, the pulpy insides will suck up most of the stock, but just add more to adjust the consitency to something resembling a thick humous.

You’ll have plenty of time to make some delicious salsa as well, for which you’ll need…

tomatoes

roasted peppers

spring onions

garlic

chillis

coriander

lime

olive oil

salt

Chop up the tomatoes, springers, then crush your garlic and finely dice. I use one birds eye chilli or a couple of average chillis chopped. Next, add the coriander, squeeze half a lime over what you’ve got chopped, a couple of glugs of olive oil and season. Alternatively just throw everything in a processor.

Back to the meat: when cool, break apart the meat into about thumb size chunks and apply a dry rub of…

cumin seeds
coriander seeds
cinnamon
salt
pepper
a little all purpose caribbean seasoning

Dry pan, toast the cumin and coriander, then grind. Add the rest. Apply to meat. The built-in fat in the shoulder means no oil. Put it into a hot oven. We’re looking to crisp the edges and get a decent crust on the meat and no more, otherwise it will get dry…incredibly dry. As soon as it starts to turn, grab it out, throw it on a chopping board and cut into little chunks. Meat done.

Cooking completed, place everything you’ve made into a warmed tortilla with a little sour cream and eat it with some friends you like.

Braising Recipe Number 2 : Lamb Shoulder.

This is a nice little recipe that reminds my stomach that i am its closest confidant, dearest friend and most despicable lover. It’s quite a nice way to prepare lamb, and it’s easy as shit to pull off. I’ve paired it here with a little yoghurt carrot salad that a friend of mine wants the recipe for. When he isn’t getting blazed and hitting bongs, he’s constantly pestering me for it. I’ll come to that later. First the lamb; for which you’ll need…

half a lamb shoulder
harissa paste, a couple of tbsp
coriander seed
cumin seed
fennel seed
ras al hanout
salt
pepper
oilive oil

First you need to roast the spices, so take a spoon of the fennel, coriander and cumin seeds and put them in a dry pan. Dry fry until they start to toast slightly, smell a lot and pop a little. Take them out and throw them in a pestle and mortar or a grinder or something heavy and grind that all up. Add the ras al hanout, salt and pepper and give it a mix.

Throw the lamb in a roasting dish apply plenty of olive oil and rub in the spices and the harrisa. Drop some unpeeled garlic around it, a few shallots if you want them and then cover with foil and put in the oven you should have preheated to 140C before you started the prep.

Leave this in the oven for a few hours. Let’s say three or a little more. Four tops. You can do five if you want, but i probably wouldn’t. Turn up the oven for the last 20 minutes or so if you want it to crisp a little, but please keep an eye on it.

In the meantime you might want to make the carrot yoghurt salad. You should. It’s nice. You’ll need...

grated carrot

yoghurt

lemon juice

olive oil

salt, pepper

Fry the carrot in good olive oil until softened and a little lighter in colour. I added a little of the roasted garlic from the lamb at this point. It’s optional. Allow to cool. Put in a bowl with some yoghurt, more olive oil and a touch of lemon if you need it, then season.

After such trials you’ll have a big chunk of sweet, moist meat and a pan full of fat. Set the meat aside and drain as much fat away as you can. There should be a rich pool of meat juices you can salvage underneath. Either make it into a gravy or spoon a little as is over the meat. I served as is, the meat, the salad and some pitta, but i wouldn’t be adverse to a good pilaf or some well made couscous to accompany. You could have it with chips…i don’t really care.

Braised Recipe Number 1 : Ribs.

Here’s a recipe for pork ribs braised in lu shui, aka master sauce. This is by far the best way i know to cook ribs, the best way to bring out the potential of what i see as a much misused cut of meat. I tire of these stiff, tasteless sticks of bbq meat that bypass the melting, fatty qualities of a good rib, and the slow braise in soy - what the Chinese call red cooking - means you get highly seasoned meat from surface to bone.

pork ribs, rack or split

1/2 cup of dark soy

3/4 cup of light soy

couple of glugs of chinese rice wine

4 tbsp palm sugar

tbsp schezuan peppercorns

bunch spring onions, cleaned, trimmed and halved

thumb sized chunk of ginger

one star anise

water/light stock to cover

If you get a rack of ribs, remember to take off the membrane that runs along the underside of the cut, because it’s a bit shitty and will only work against you in your mission of deliciousness.

Take a pot large enough to contain your ribs, and heat up a kettle of water. We need to pre-simmer the ribs to extract some of the blood and impurities that you’d have to skim off the braising liquid later otherwise. So boiling water and ribs into the pot, give it about ten minutes at a rolling boil and then drain them off.

Replace the ribs in the pot and the pot on the hob, then add your master sauce ingredients and enough water to cover the meat. Bring these up to a slow simmer, a really tender simmer and put the lid on. then walk away.

Three or four hours later, get some white rice if you want it, perhaps braise a little choi sum or pak choi in the pot and lay a few ribs on the plate. Most of the time i just eat it with a tsing tao and a boner.

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Please, please, please consider keeping this leftover sauce. after cooking these ribs, you’ll have added a deep rich pork flavour. Next time you use it it will flavour you’re new meat further, resulting in more delicious meat. Obviously there are some concerns that this isn’t exactly the most healthy thing you can do, but i assure you that if the sauce is brought back up to temperature again, and you’re heating it for hours at a time then it won’t give you rickets or make you poo and sick so hard you scream my name and curse me, beating your fist into a steaming pool of your insides, weeping diseased master sauce tears. If it makes you feel any better, the Chinese also call it ‘thousand year sauce’, ‘the sauce that goes on and on’ and ‘fine to reheat sauce’.

To store the master sauce, wait for it to cool completely. You’ll have a thick layer of fat on the top which you need to remove, and then pass the sauce through a sieve. Store it in a bottle, a pot, or a watertight boot in the fridge or freezer. Next time you want to cook with it, top up with a little more soy, wine, stock, et al.

Think about braising whole chickens, chinese sausages, eggs in shells..............