Crispy, juicy slow cooked pork belly, squash agrodolce, white beans and radicchio
It's my Ultimate Alternative Autumnal Sunday Lunch, and it's all here for you
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Welcome my friends. Phew! I’m so thrilled to be back and properly on the mend, with my appetite and tastebuds in tact and raring to go, for which I am outrageously grateful. So I bring you something utterly bloody delicious and very good indeed to celebrate. I’m sorry it’s a couple of weeks late because of the Covid, but I hope you’ll understand it’s worth the wait.
Because we are now deep into the season of roasts, of course I want you to invite your friends round for a cosy afternoon and lay on an abundant, stylish autumnal feast for them that impresses, delights, and warms their precious cockles, BUT doesn’t leave you in a panting, sweating heap in the corner after cooking it. So I bring you my ultimate ‘alternative’ autumnal Sunday roast menu that marries bold, beautiful Italian and British seasonal flavours, teaches some nifty techniques that will have you wowing everyone with your crispiest of crackling, juiciest meat, fragrant broth and frankly addictive sweet-sour squash side dish, but really, is a snip to pull together. Its secret is that it leans heavily on stunning seasonal produce that doesn’t need all that much mucking around with, but looks restaurant fit.
Pork belly is a cut that has become the darling of my, and many restaurants’ tables over the past ten years for a very good reason - it produces sublimely crispy crackling and juicy, succulent meat, thanks to the layers of fat it carries, which in turn carry so much flavour, though of course much of this depends on how the animal it comes from has been reared, so it’s worth hunting out some high welfare, slow grown pork belly from a trusted butcher, which will bring home the bacon in flavour terms.
We’re talking about slowly roasted, meltingly tender, gorgeously juicy pork belly with THE BEST CRACKLING (because isn’t that the whole point!?), which, as it roasts creates fantastically flavourful broth which you spoon over the puddles of creamy, parmesan-laced beans and roasting tray gubbins (official term), serving with soft, sweet-sour squash agrodolce and a punchy, citrussy radicchio salad. It’s less involved to bring together than a trad Sunday roast with all the trimmings, and it’s a really cook-friendly menu because while the pork cooks you have ample time to make the sides, which are all pretty simple but no less sensational.
I’m actually a bit obsessed with the roasted squash dish, which is glazed with a wonderful piquant cider vinegar and maple syrup reduction, inspired by the sweet-sour Italian ‘agrodolce’ sauce, and I can’t wait to hear what you think, I love how it cuts through the fatty flavours of the pork. The creamy beans are such a good dish to have up your sleeve - disarmingly simple and super flexible, if you’re veggie (or have veggies coming for lunch) they actually make a great meal in their own right with the squash and salad, perhaps with some added burrata or mushrooms to flesh it out a bit.
Sunday roasts are a huge thing in my family. They were sacrosanct for us growing up, and we would often host extended family at our home in the Kent countryside for my mum’s epic, unbeatable, incredibly long roast lunches, which were undoubtedly the highlight of the week and usually resulted in my dad napping on the sofa in a food and wine coma afterwards. Home grown vegetables from dad’s veg patch, and meat from our beloved butcher were the stars of the show, and my sister would squabble over who got the last crispy potato. Mum’s potatoes really are the best. And I’ll be sharing my crispy potatoes (learned from her) later on in the year as part of the Christmas menu I’ve got in store for you, so watch this space for that…
If you’re not a Sunday roast person, then this would work equally well for a lovely friends’ dinner, or even a date night supper - you’ll have leftovers for days, which is no bad thing.
As a reminder, in case you’re looking for a dessert, you can’t go wrong with this party piece, quick cook pavlova, try it strewn with stewed apple or roasted quince, with custard folded through the cream. Or get involved with this brown butter butterscotch apple pie. I’ve got a very, very delightful pudding in the works for you, coming really soon, but it just needs a couple of final tweaks. I don’t want to publish it until it’s just right.
As always, I hope you love these recipes (PDF also included if you want to print) and please do speak to me in the comments and let me know how you get on. I love to hear from you. Happy weekend x
Crispy braised pork belly with sage and parmesan white beans, squash agrodolce and radicchio salad
Serves 4-6
Meltingly tender, slow cooked pork belly with the crackliest crackling, roasted on a bed of gently anise fennel, softened apple and onion and fragrant bay. There is something so distinctly autumnal about this dish, and it’s such a good one for a cosy Sunday roast or dinner for friends. One absolutely crucial step with this which I really hope you’ll follow