Easy peasy porky belly – low carb dinner for two or four or six…
Yep there’s a whole lotta fat in pork belly. But we’re not afraid of fat and hey we won’t be eating pork belly every day now will we? There’s also a whole lot of salt but that’s the only way to achieve crispy crackling. And if you’ve noticed the lack of salt in many of our other recipes prepare for a saline treat today with:
Pork Belly, Sage & Apples
Okay then let’s get cooking…
Ingredients…
- A piece of pork belly weighing in at at least a kilo /2lbs (there’ll be plenty leftover so invite some friends round).
- A couple of onions roughly chopped.
- 2 apples grated.
- 10 chopped sage leaves & a couple of bay leaves.
- 2 crushed cloves of garlic.
- One tablespoon of olive oil, black pepper, too much salt and a splash of cider vinegar.
Get Cooking…
To have any hope of good crispy crackling (which is never guaranteed in the Lean Ape kitchen) you need non-soggy pork. That means buying from a real live butcher where such things are wrapped in grease proof paper rather than being shrink wrapped. Leave it uncovered in the fridge for a day so the skin really dries out before cooking.
- Preheat the oven to full whack.
- Score the skin at 2cm/1″ intervals with a Stanley knife (or get the real live butcher to do it for you).
- Mix the apple, onion, herbs, garlic, oil and black pepper and place in a small shallow baking dish. Pop the pork belly on top and rub the skin very generously with plenty of flaky sea salt.
- Put in the oven and cook on high for 20 minutes. Then turn the heat down to 200ºC/390ºF and cook for around an hour. The skin should be golden and the pork juicy with no sign of pink.
Serve alongside butter beans tossed with lightly fried peppers. There should be a few tablespoons of juicy, sagey, onions & apples – you might well want to keep quiet about that and eat the lot yourself don’t forget to make sure everyone gets some of this “sauce”.
Enjoy!
