Saturday 8th June - Recipes for Son and Father - Pork and Lamb

http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pork-recipes/slow-roasted-spiced-pork-loin-with-black-eyed-beans-and-tomatoes

Waitrose do a really nice "pulled  pork" joint in their pre-packed meat section. It feeds three at a pinch, and is ready after about an hour in the oven. However, because it has been cooked already, and you are only reheating and finishing it off, you shouldn't heat any left-overs again. Though it is pretty good in a sandwich...

It is also quite expensive, so I wondered about doing it myself. I had a packet of belly pork slices that needed cooking, so I looked through my Jamie Oliver cook books (ok. I admit I have several.)

Now his recipe starts with "take a 7lb piece of French-trimmed loin of pork". haha Who are you kidding!

This is what I did; you will notice that in the picture I am using LAMB! That's because it was So Good that I repeated the same idea with some New Zealand lamb steaks that happened to be on offer the next time I went shopping. That was good too.

I used a metal frying pan with a good lid that can go in the oven. He uses a roasting tin that can go on the heat, and then covers it with foil before it goes in the oven. You could use an oven proof casserole, or start in a frying pan and transfer it to a roasting tin later. Up to you.

Set the oven to 180

PORK VERSION

This is what I did. As usual, I didn't have half the ingredients that Jamie included (it was late in the week - we'd run out of lemons).

Heat a frying pan. Rub the pork slices with paprika and olive oil, and fry them for a few minutes on each side. all over. Remove to a plate. If the pan looks very fatty, drain some off.

Now fry an onion, some celery, some garlic, some chopped carrots (these veggies seem to get into everything). Lob in a can of chopped tomatoes and half a can of water - couldn't find any wine. Drain  a can of butter beans and stir them in as well (whatever happened to that can of black-eyed beans? I'm sure we had some somewhere?) Some salt, some pepper, we have rosemary and bay in the garden so that's ok. Put the pork slices back on top of everything, cover, and put in the oven for around one and a half to two hours.

LAMB VERSION - with pictures!

and a red pepper

the sliced onion and celery going in the pan



I had some olives that needed eating, so chopped them
up and added them along with garlic. The usual
can of chopped tomatoes and half a can of water (wine would be better!)
came next, and a drained can of chick-peas also got stirred in.

Seasoning - stock powder herbs, salt, pepper, all about to
be stirred up together.

The lamb steaks just fit on top, with a bay leaf
and some rosemary tucked in

I brought everything up to a simmer and put it in the oven (180 degrees) for about 2-3 hours, checking from time to time to make sure that the liquid hadn't disappeared (it hadn't)

My word, that was good. We rationed ourselves to one leg steak each, with plenty of sauce. The rest is in the freezer for another day.