At the end of summer, at least here in Uruguay, I like to grill again properly in the wood fired oven my favorite pork recipe, „Pork Rib Roast the French Way“. If you do it like the French, then always on a bed of vegetables and a cracky fat/skin crust.

For years, the recipe has lain dormant in my French cookbook. Last weekend it was then so far and was allowed in the oven. I went to the preparation at a very low temperature. Such a part is killed quickly. Therefore, at a little more than 100 degree Celsius (about 200 Fahrenheit) in the residual heat in the closed oven (cleaned out oven) and slowly pulled to 58 C (115 F). That lasted around 6 hours. Lot of work to control the temperature and add fresh glow, from the separate wood fire, all the time. But the taste is worth to do it, especially if you want a crust like above.

   Cooking with a wood-fire Pizza oven requires a bit of different equipment. So as the infrared thermometer, I use a Kintrex one, which I love for many occasions while cooking. Here I can cool down the oven till it shows my 100 degree Celsius. Also great to catch the water temperature and much more.

Seasoned in advance with herbs, marinated for 2h. The meat I got from the butcher from domestic breeding in the best quality.
Finally, properly made fire and crispy grilled in front of the fire. Classically, the barbecue roast is made on rosemary potatoes. The result, see above – very tender, juicy, aromatic. And the skin crust is just a delight, worth while waiting a whole day.

Pork Rib Roast in front the wood-fire, from a different occasion.

Ingredients.

1.2 kg pork chop in one piece (on the bone with fat edge)
2 cloves of garlic
5 large sprigs each of sage and rosemary
½ bunch each of thyme and parsley
1 tablespoon grainy mustard
1 tablespoon soft butter
salt and pepper to season
oil for frying
100 g smoked bacon in thin slices
250 ml white wine (alternatively meat broth)
5 large carrots
4 thin parsley roots
1 large brown onion
800 g small young waxy potatoes

Professionally trimmed pork roast rack, about 1,4 kg, with fat edge. Ready to roast.

How to do.

Pat the meat dry, if the fat edge is very thick, cut off some of it if necessary. Then make a deep cut along the bone so that the meat and bone still hold together.

Peel the garlic, finely dice 1 clove. Wash the herbs and shake dry. Pluck the leaves from 2 sprigs each of sage and rosemary, a good half of the thyme and all the parsley and chop finely separately.

Mix all the sage, parsley and half of the rosemary and thyme with mustard and butter, season with salt and pepper. Spread this mixture evenly in the incision of the chop. Salt and pepper the meat all over, spread the remaining whole sprigs of rosemary, thyme and sage on the fat side of the meat.

Tie the meat with kitchen twine so that the incision also holds together and the herbs are well tied. Now the cooking session starts. Because just a few readers would have and use a wood fired oven, I will switch over to a normal stove.

Preheat the oven to 180°. Heat plenty of oil in a large roasting pan on the stove, brown the meat in it over high heat all around. Remove and pour off all but a small amount of the drippings.

Place the meat in the roasting pan with the bone side down, place the bacon slices on the roast and cook the meat in the oven for about 30 minutes. If necessary, pour a little red wine or broth into the roasting pan after about 15 minutes.

   Your pork roast wrapped in bacon.

In the meantime, peel and clean the carrots and parsley roots and cut into 4-5 cm long pieces. Peel the onion and cut lengthwise into narrow wedges. Brush the potatoes vigorously clean in cold water, drain. Slice 1 clove of garlic. Mix vegetables, onion, garlic, potatoes and remaining chopped thyme and rosemary, salt, pepper.

Briefly lift the meat out of the roaster, remove the bacon slices and mix with the vegetables in the roaster. Put the roast back on top, add the remaining wine or broth and continue cooking for 30 minutes.

   Your pork roast on the bed of vegetables.

Then increase the heat to 200° (180° convection oven), stir the vegetables once, baste the meat with gravy and cook for another 30 minutes until the vegetables are cooked and the roast has a nice brown crust. Remove meat from oven, let rest briefly, then cut open and serve with vegetables.

Tips.

A fine red wine will always go incredible well with this dish. In case you just want to cook the roast without vegetables, make sure to have a good portion of liquid (I always use 50% red wine and 50% beef stock) underneath. Leave the roast on a grid, as you can see in the above picture with the bacon.

This recipe is a wonderful main meal in total. Leftovers always can be used a few days later or been frozen. We freeze everything, the meat, the vegetables and even the sauce. When warming up later, never use a microwave. Take your time and warm the meal up with around 150 C (300 F) in your oven.

While heating up in the oven it will stay moist and freshly roasted, if you take off the fat in advance. During warming up procedure the fat won’t get „cross“ anyway.

My dear friends – as good as this Pork Roast recipe is – as better is the „Crown Roast“. For a party or a larger group of guests or just for a festival, to show off, a crown roast is the better alternative. Here we go.

What a lovely presentation this is. A Pork-Crown made of 18 chops, bound together from 3 different meat parts. Served in Panama during a Christmas dinner. Luigi, Ron, Debbie, you might recognize it.

      We served this crown with spiced wild fruit-rice and steamed greens. Tip for you, take the golden foil off  and replace it with paper chop-holders, before serving.

     
The foil chop holders are good looking, but they get piping hot and one can burn the fingers. Better using them for roasting and then replace with paper. They are easy to make as one can see in the pics above.

Crown Pork Roast with Grilled-Pineapple Salsa.

This bright red achiote-basted crown roast of pork is given the tropical treatment with a side of spicy grilled pineapple salsa, cooked once with Jess Pryles and several times with the „Buffalo’s“ in Panama. Achiote is great to cook with, you can buy it in jars or make it easy by yourself. Recipes are available through the internet, just have a look.

Let’s talk about “WOW” dishes. Prime rib is a wow dish. Perhaps because of the cost. Perhaps because of the sheer side and impressive nature of a giant chunk of bone-in sub-primal. Crown roasts take that wow factor and boost it up a couple of notches. See, a crown roast is in fact the same cut as a prime rib (whether lamb, pork or beef), but it’s been expertly trimmed by the butcher, then folded around on itself to form an impressive crown shape. Best to buy it from your butcher, otherwise it can be a lot of work.

Beautiful ready made Pork Crown Roast from my butcher. Notice the string holding it together and notice the precut through the rib-bones for easy splitting later on. The above one, bought in Australia, is made from 3 separate rib racks, each 5-6 chops.

A pork crown roast can be as visually impressive as its red meat counterpart without being quite as rich (on both the stomach and the wallet!). Just like with beef breeds, there are certain breeds of pork that are considered superior.  Talk to your butcher and get his advice, a large crown roast will yield 10 generously sized chops. Here in Uruguay they don’t know about such a cut, so I took some pictures to the butcher and preordered them.

That was one here in Uruguay, different then the Aussie one, but will do. A good idea is the ball of tin foil in the center, it will keep the crown in shape. Leave it during roasting inside, except you fill the center with one of the favorite fillings, similar as you use it in turkeys.

The method of cooking this crown roast was a reverse sear. Reverse is is any cooking method that uses low and gentle heat to start, then finishes the meat with a hot sear. The ‘gentle’ part of the cook can be anything from sous vide, to indirect grilling, to smoking. It’s not what you use that makes it a reverse sear, but rather the order in which you applied low then high heat. I prefer to do it on the grill (BBQ) rather then using the oven.

This bright red achiote-basted crown roast of pork is given the tropical treatment with a side of spicy grilled pineapple salsa. Notice the pineapple slices aside of the roast. It is so easy to make and such a fantastic BBQ or oven dish to spoil your guests and yourself.

Ingredients.

For the roast:
1 x 2 1/2 kg (5 lb) crown roast of pork
4-6 tablespoons pork rub
2 tablespoons vegetable oil (I like coconut oil)
1 teaspoon cider vinegar
1 teaspoon achiote paste

   Fantastic serrano chilli’s.

For the salsa:
1 small firm pineapple, cored and sliced
1 large bunch cilantro
3 hot chilli’s (serrano peppers), red and green
1 medium red onion
1 lime
salt to taste

This is a feast, from the grill, just now in autumn (here in Uruguay) or spring in the North.

How to do – Roast.

Preheat an grill or oven set for indirect cooking to 150 degree Celsius (300 F). Sprinkle the pork seasoning liberally over the crown roast, rubbing it in well to all the crevices between the chops.

Place the roast on the indirect side of the grill or into your oven and cook until it reaches an internal temperature of 70 C (140 F). Once the meat is at the correct temperature, bring the temperature up to 240 C (500 F).

In a small bowl, combine oil, vinegar and achiote paste. Use a brush to baste the roast with the paste mixture, then return to indirect cooking on the hotter grill. Cook a further 10-15 minutes until the paste sets to a lovely color.

While the roast finishes cooking, lay the pineapple slices directly over the coals and sprinkle with a little salt. Cook 2 minutes per side, so that char marks develop but the fruit doesn’t get too soft. Have a look on the picture 3 above. Remove the roast from the grill and cover loosely with foil to rest for 10 minutes.

Believe me – this is better then chicken wings !!!

How to do – Salsa.

While the roast is resting, prepare the salsa.

Dice the charred pineapple strips into fine pieces and place in a bowl. Roughly chop the cilantro and finely dice the onion, then add to the pineapple.

Cut the stem off the chili, and finely slice into rounds. If you prefer a less spicy salsa (serrano can be fiery!) de-seed before slicing. Add the chili to the bowl along with the juice from the lime. Mix all the ingredients together and season with salt to taste.

To serve, slice the roast into chops by cutting between the bones. Top with grilled pineapple salsa.

Tips.

Another serving idea is the tropical combination with a spicy-sweet fruit rice from Thailand. Fruit and sweet and pork goes so well together. In case you like it more German, then try it with potato dumplings and hot plum or hot apple salsa, a delight, believe me !!

And finally, how about BEEF ROAST ?

This will be on the expensive side, but sometimes one will impress their guests based on decoration, taste, money and size. That will be a big party meal !

This 3 1/2 kg (see above – about 8 pound) rib eye crown was 26 days aged, beautifully trimmed and sold for US$86.– per kilogram. This won’t bend to a round crown, so one will roast it as a „standing up rib roast“. Most beef ribs must be roasted like this, because it is almost impossible to round smaller pieces below 16 to 20 chops.

        Here you can see why it’s not possible to round a short piece of meat into a crown. And no one want to trim off the best meat inside. So, folks, this will be allocated to a large crown and then filled and over-baked with a tasty fruity side dish.  See below. Imagine – a lovely glass of red wine, appreciated with a group of good friends or family. May be this Corona Easter Weekend is the right time to celebrate !?   I hope you enjoyed this post !