Amidst all the herb excitement last weekend I found time to cook this satisfying stew. You may remember I discovered pork osso buco at Waitrose a few months back. And that I reckoned it needed slightly different treatment from veal osso buco. Well, this was the result. I loved the effect of the orange gremolata with the slightly sweet, spicy pork. The meat btw is still only £3.99 a kilo.
Serves 4
3 tbsp olive oil or other cooking oil
1kg pork osso buco
1 large onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 large carrot, peeled and finely chopped
1 stick of celery, trimmed and finely sliced (optional)
1 small red pepper, quartered, de-seeded and diced
2 cloves of garlic peeled and crushed
1 tsp sweet pimenton/paprika + 1/2 tsp hot pimenton or hot paprika or chilli sauce
1/2 x 400g tin of chopped or whole tomatoes
225ml chicken or vegetable stock made with 1 tsp vegetable bouillon powder
1 tbsp red or white wine vinegar
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
For the gremolata
Grated rind of one orange, preferably unwaxed
1 clove of garlic, very finely chopped
1 heaped tbsp chopped mint
3 heaped tbsp chopped parsley
Heat the oil in a casserole and brown the pieces of pork on each side. Remove from the pan, tip in the vegetables and garlic, turn down the heat, cover and cook over a low heat for about 7-8 minutes until beginning to soften. Stir in the pimenton or paprika then the tomatoes (breaking them up if whole). Add the stock and vinegar, bring to the boil then return the meat to the pan and bring back up to simmering point. Cover the pan and cook over a very low heat or in a low oven for about 2-2 1/2 hours until the meat is coming away from the bone* Take the meat out of the casserole and set aside. Strain the liquid and put the veg in a food processor or blender and whizz until smooth. Add as much of the liquid as you need to make a smooth thin sauce. Return the meat to the pan and heat through in the sauce. Make the gremolata. Combine the ingredients and chop them together so they are well combined. Serve the pork with new potatoes, rice or couscous, sprinkling over the gremolata.
* I also reckon this would work really well with boneless pork as a quick sautéed dish. Slightly more expensive but not a lot. Oh, and the vegetables at the back of the rather blurry picture were a reduced (99p) pack of root veg which I roasted instead of making a stew out of them. That worked well too.
Sounds good. I don't particularly like the veal version which I find too fatty - I assume this isn't..saying that, I haven't come across this version in France yet, or at least not in the supermarket. Have you at all during your trips here, sounds interesting:)?
ReplyDeleteProbably slightly less fatty than the veal version recipes2share but you're right, I'm not sure you could find this cut in France. Maybe make the quicker, boneless version I suggested which would also be slightly leaner?
ReplyDeleteAha I was waiting to see your more fruity version! It looks and sounds lovely. I've never cooked or eaten prok osso buco. I really like the idea of using orange int he gremolata instead of lemon too.
ReplyDeleteThanks, Helen! I think it might work well Moroccanish flavours too, like a tagine though pork of course is entirely un-Moroccan
ReplyDeleteI was tempted to make the pork osso bucco but could not find them in Waitrose. It seems that the forgotten cuts range has been reduced in scale probably due to poor sales. But I managed to find some in a London's Chinatown supermarket called pork hocks for just credit crunch busting £2.55 per kilo!
ReplyDeleteI will be following your recipe today fairly closely omitting some of the ingredients to reduce costs and cooking it in the slow cooker. I feel a cheap cut like this needs long slow braising. It will be accompanied by buttery mashed potato to mop up all the gravy.
Hope the recipe went OK, Robert. How did it work with pork hocks?
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