Roast Pork Belly with Caramelised Red Cabbage

Fennel Roasted Pork Belly on Parmesan Mash with Caramelised Red Cabbage

Just a quick one because I am terribly behind in a lot of these posts. This was a pretty simply meal I thought up after coming across a great little Chinese butcher called Wing Hong, around the corner from where I work in Northbridge (the studious among you might be able to work out where that is now). They sell more parts of a pig than I knew existed, and so I eventually braved the language barrier, headed in, and managed to buy myself a pork belly. The fact that I was actually asking for chicken is irrevelant, and we’ll all pretend it was a great idea from the start.

Pork Belly is a pretty trendy cut of meat of late, or at least it was up until a year or so ago. So maybe I’m behind the times, but that’s never stopped me from jumping on the bandwagon. So what to do with it…I heard you whispering excitedly… thanks to the bugs I’ve installed in EVERYONES house ! Ahem…

Honey & Fennel Rubbed Pork Belly

Well, for some reason the words “roast pork belly with fennel” jumped into my head… perhaps from a recipe I’d seen before, perhaps from a dream (albeit a sad one) I had once… who knows… but the inspiration was secured.

So after scoring the top of the belly and rubbing a bunch of fennel seeds, salt, pepper, and olive oil into the top, it was time for oven. (oh and some sliced fennel to go with it, but don’t do what I do and leave it in there for 40 minutes to burn unmercifully into little fennel crunchy charcoal chips).

Le red cabbage

The next part was another dream like idea that came to me… Caramelised red cabbage, which had been sitting in the fridge for too long and needed to be given a good home. Fortunately cabbage is a good hardy vegetable, and can withstand the long periods of neglect that it is often forced to endure in the dark recesses of my fridge.

So sliced up into strips and sauteed in a little white wine vinegar and sugar, til nice and soft and caramelisedly looking.

The rest was pretty basic, a garlic mash made by crushing a couple of cloves of garlic into boiled potatoes and mashing with salt, pepper, and cream, for smooth texture and consistency.

Slice the pork belly up into thin pieces and layer daintily on top of the cabbage and mash.

Score one for breaking language barriers the world over. You never know what you might find.

Rack of Lamb with Honey & Balsamic Sauce

Lamb Rack with Sweet Potato Mash and Honey Balsamic Reduction

There’s something about a nice rack of lamb that makes it hard for me to pass by, when idlely drifting through butchers shops, purveying their cuts. Lamb is one of my favourite dishes full stop, but to be able to combine it with a ready made handle AND have it look classy on a plate at the same time, is just genious.

So this was a pretty simple dish I made up on the spur of the moment (read: spent all day thinking about and scouring the web for ideas), which I think turned out just dandy.

Lamb Rack

  • Rack of Lamb (or two)
  • Olive oil (a given really, just buy a few gallons of good quality olive oil and you will be doing yourself a big favour)
  • Rosemary (Is it possible to do a lamb dish without rosemary ?… I think not)
  • Salt (do yourself another favour and go and get some Maldon Salt… beautiful texture and flavour for cooking)
  • Cracked Pepper (do yourself a huge favour and buy a pepper mill, and load it up with peppercorns)
  • Balsamic Vinegar
  • Honey
  • Red Wine (nothing specific, but preferably something drinkable)

To Serve With

  • Sweet Potatos
  • Butter
  • Cream
  • Rosemary
  • Fennel

How I made it

So firstly, cut down into your lamb rack a little and stuff every concievable orifice you can find with fresh rosemary, salt, black pepper, and libations of olive oil. Score the fat on the back of the rack, and rub that down with salt and pepper too. Now crank your stove up to high and sear your lamb rack in a healthy dose of olive oil in a hot pan. Make sure you give it a good covering so that the tricky parts all receive a fair amount of heat, and then when it’s looking charred to perfection, drop the heat, and put it into the oven to continue cooking through til done. Keep the pan juices as we’ll use those for the sauce.

Once the lamb is away in the oven, peel and slice your sweet potato and fennel. Get the sweet potato boiling in a pot of salted water, and braise the fennel in a little white wine and butter over a low/medium heat so it softens up. Once the sweet potato is cooked, but not mushy, drain the water and mash with extra rosemary, butter, cream, salt, pepper, and a little grated parmesan.

Next the sauce… Pretty simple really… Into the pan juices goes a good few dashes of balsamic vinegar and a good squeeze of honey (I’d give you measurements, but i really didn’t use any… I generally cook to taste and measure things by eye). Give this a taste and you have a lovely sweet balsamic flavour coming through… which I then pulled back to savoury land with the help of a splash of shiraz and dash of beef stock. Reduce the sauce down, and keep stirring to make sure the honey doesn’t seperate, and perhaps thicken with some corn flour and water… and you’re done.

If God didn't want us to eat animals... he wouldn't have them out of meat.Lamb Rack

At this point I cut all the lamb racks up into french cutlets (if thats what french cutlets are of course… ) and attempted to pile it onto a plate in some sort of attractive formation. Sadly failing… after taking some photos, I heaped the rest of the lamb on top and Sharon and I devoured them as best we could.

Delish.

Egg Week – Poached Eggs on Sweet Potato Mash

Poached Eggs on Sweet Potato & Spinach Mash

Well egg week continues here at Abstract Gourmet. Lazing around last night, wallowing in my own little world of ennui, and too lazy to cook a “proper” meal. I once again turned to my new favourite book of the moment, Eggs, by Michel Roux.

This recipe was supposed to be called “Herby Poached Eggs in Mousseline Potato Nests”. Problem was I was running low on potato, and so I made the executive decision to give sweet potato a run. This was easy as pi (3.14159 26535 89793 23846 26433 83279 50288 41971 69399 37510…). Boil some sweet potato in salted water until its soft. Drain, mash, add butter, mash again, add a little milk, some baby spinach, and some parmesan, mash again. Stop.

Cook two poached eggs to perfection, make a little mound of mash on your plate and put a hole in the middle, drop the eggs in and top with a sauce or stock reduction of your choice. I choice to reduce a little of my home made chicken stock with a stick of butter and a touch of corn flour. Then a little cracked pepper and we’re done.

Poached Eggs on Sweet Potato & Spinach Mash

Red Wine Braised Venison


I bought some venison recently, and decided i’d have a go at cooking it…

The dish consisted of two small venison fillets, braised in a red wine, beef stock, butter, and leek mixture… Cooked until just medium rare.

It was served over a peccorino (sheeps cheese similar in texture to parmesan) and cream mash, and had some rosemary buttered peas and carrots thrown in for some form of nutritional balance.

The peas were fresh organic peas I bought from the cityfarm fruit and vege markets.

I think the venison was still a little tough… but other than that it was all quite tasty.

The wine was a delicious fruity NZ Pinot Noir from Central Otago… Rippon Estate… sublime.