"Let's Eat!"

Archive for the ‘Ham/Pork’ Category

Sure, everyone has their family recipe for Sunday gravy, well that is if you were of Italian heritage, others would refer to this as Spaghetti Sauce. Well I’ve made many a Sunday Gravy, had some failures and some great successes, this recipe has always proved to be one of my best.

This recipe will make approximately 20 cups of gravy.

For the gravy you will need:
Four 28 oz cans crushed tomatoes
One small can tomato paste
Two cups beef stock
One medium size sweet onion
Carrots – enough to equal the volume of the onion
Four or five sprigs fresh oregano
Four or five garlic cloves
Fresh ground pepper
Kosher salt
Two pounds country ribs
Two pounds Italian Sausage (your choice of sweet or hot)
Two pounds ground chuck
Two pounds ground pork
Enough stale bread (I used leftover Italian bread) to equal the volume of the ground meats
Two cups milk (or more if necessary)
Two cups shredded Parmesan cheese
Two large eggs
Olive oil
Vegetable oil

In a heavy bottom stock pot heat four tablespoons olive oil until shimmering. Place carrots, onion and garlic in a food processor and run until the vegetables are of a paste consistency. Thoroughly brown the country ribs (in batches if necessary) until a nice brown crust forms, remove and set aside. Pour off any liquid from the stockpot, add four tablespoons olive oil, reheat until shimmering then brown the Italian sausage until a nice brown crust forms, remove and set aside. Pour off any liquid, add two tablespoons olive oil, and reheat until shimmering. Place vegetable past along with tomato paste to the stockpot and cook until the mix is somewhat dry. Deglaze pot with the beef stock scraping up all the fond at the bottom of the pot. Add the four cans of crushed tomatoes, the sprigs of oregano and the ribs and sausage to the stockpot. Reduce heat to very low, place lid over pot and simmer for 5 or 6 hours. To reduce the possibility of the gravy burning I take one of the unused burner grates, place it on top of the burner you are using, make sure that it is firmly in place, put the stockpot on that tiered burner. Stir the gravy every occasionally to insure a good mixture.

While the gravy is simmering make the meatballs. Break up the stale bread into medium to small chunks, but into a bowl large enough to hold the bread and both meats. Pour one-cup milk into the bowl, as the bread starts to absorb the milk using a fork start to mash the bread. If there is not enough milk continue adding more until you can mash the bread into a paste. Add the parmesan cheese, the eggs, the meats, salt and pepper (to taste) and using very clean hands or hand covered with rubber gloves and work the mixture until it is thoroughly combined. Form the mixture into equal balls (I like mine large). In a sauté pan large enough to hold the meatballs, heat approximately one-quarter cup of vegetable oil until shimmering. Carefully lower meatballs into oil, do not crowd, work in batches if necessary, and cook until a nice brown crust forms rotate balls until all sides have that same rich brown crust. Set aside meatballs until cooled enough then place in the refrigerator. During the last one to one and a half hours of cooking the gravy, add the meatballs submerging them to cover. During the last half hour taste the gravy for seasoning and adjust if necessary. Once the time used in this recipe is completed, cool to room temperature.

Remove the meatballs, sausage and ribs from the gravy and portion two cups of the liquid into quart freezer bags for future use. Similarly portion out the meatballs, ribs and sausage into quart freezer bags for future use.

Over the holidays I had an excess of pomegranate, and not wanting to waste them, I separated the seeds and froze them in a zip log bag. I knew that I would be looking for something different and just recently came up with this quick dish. Additionally, I had purchased a large quantity of pork loin cut into steaks, it was a deal, price wise, so I just couldn’t pass them up. You can substitute pork chops very easily.

You will need:
Pork Loin Steak – approx. 6 oz./serving
Olive oil
Fresh ground pepper
Kosher or Sea Salt
Pomegranate Seeds – approx. 1 TBSP/serving
Pomegranate juice – approx. 2 TBSP/serving (I used POM brand)
Beef stock – approx. 2 TBSP/serving
Unsalted butter – approx. 1/4 TBSP/serving

Prepare the pork – heat a sauté pan (oven-proof, not non-stick) over medium high heat, brush both sides of pork with olive oil, salt and pepper to taste (it is OK to be generous here). Sear pork to get a nice rich color on both sides, put into a pre-heated 350 degree F oven to finish (cook until temperature is 140 degrees)

For Glacé – when pork is finished remove from sauté pan, keep warm by covering it with aluminum foil. Deglaze the pan with pomegranate juice scrapping up the fond. When juice starts to thicken add beef stock, pomegranate seeds and butter. Heat through until butter is emulsified into the sauce, pour over pork and serve. If you don’t have the pomegranate seeds diced dried cherries will work. Enjoy!

Lydia P.

This recipe has been in my family forever. It comes from my father’s side of the family and my father and his siblings each inherited an enamel baking pan from my grandmother. These baking pans, 13 ½ inches in diameter, were from my grandfather’s bakery and had very, very long handles for use in my grandfather’s huge brick ovens. They cut the handles off of these pans for use at home.

You will need:
1-2 lbs ricotta cheese
2-4 handfuls of pecorino romano cheese (half a pound works better)
8 Italian sausage, cooked and sliced thin
1/2 lb perciatelli, broken into thirds
1 dozen eggs

Preheat oven to 350F
Fry the sausage. Boil the macaroni.
Beat the eggs, add the ricotta and romano cheeses to the egg mixture. When the pasta is cooked and drained, add that to the egg mixture. Slice the sausage, add to the mixture.

Grease the pan with the sausage fat. (13″ round enamel pan is best)
I took 3 tablespoons of sausage fat and greased the pan with that and did not add any more fat to the mixture. Pour mixture into pan and smooth it out on top so there is no macaroni sticking out of the top (unless you like burnt, crunchy macaroni).

Bake for 1 hour or until knife comes out clean. (mine took 70-75 minutes) It will be brown (NOT burnt!) on top.
This can be served either hot or cold. It freezes well, too!

You can cut this recipe in half and bake it in a glass deep baking dish (13×9) as well.

When we prepared this recipe we used half the amounts stipulated. Not knowing the size of the handful of cheese mentioned we went with one full cup of Pecorino. It is difficult to determine link size when purchasing the sausage so we went with 2 pounds.

As you can see in the photograph of our version we used a football shaped baking dish which was sufficient in size to hold everything. Using the fat from the sausage to grease the baking dish hadn’t been tried before by us but really like the idea, it gives the dish a little added dimension.

Thank you Lydia and congratulations on being the first, of hopefully many, Guest Chef.

Pork has always been one of my favorite proteins. I wanted to add an Asian element to my repertoire so came up with a simple recipe for Teriyaki Glaze to add that facet. With the summer soon to be at hand I prepared this dish with grilled pork loin chops but it works well with other cuts.

You will need:
Loin pork chop – approximately 6 oz./person.
Olive oil
Salt/Pepper

For the glaze you will need:
Soy Sauce (I used Tamari Soy for this recipe) – approximately 1 TBS/2 servings
Mirin – approximately 1 TBS/2 servings
Sesame Oil – approximately 1 tsp/2 servings
Ground Ginger – approximately 1 tsp/2 servings
Brown Sugar – approximately 1 tsp/2 servings

Grill pork chops as you traditionally would except that they need to be just undercooked as they will be finished in the glaze.
In a sauté pan large enough to hold the chops combine all elements and at medium heat cook until the sauce starts to thicken, turn off heat, cover to keep warm. When chops are ready place them into sauté pan with glaze turn once to coat the pork. Cover pan and put in oven heated to 350° to complete the cooking process. The time needed will depend on the thickness of the chops cook until internal temperature reaches 160°/165° remove from oven and let rest for 10 minutes.

I served this dish with Four Rice Medley.

Not only for the holidays, a good baked ham works in so many ways. In some cases, ham tends to dry out on the inside due to the density and cooking time used, one way to insure that you get a nice, moist interior is rather simple. Approximately 90 minutes before you put the ham in the oven place it, with its packaging intact into a vessel large enough to hold the ham with an inch or two to spare. Run your tap, hot water, until it reaches maximum temperature, fill the vessel (with the ham in it) with hot tap water to at least one inch above the product. This technique raises the internal temperature enough so that the cooking time is reduced providing a moist finished product.

You will need:
Roasting Pan
One butt or shank ham* approximately six oz./person
Orange/Cognac Glaze

Set oven temperature to 250° F. Remove ham from water bath and open packaging. With a sharp knife cut grooves into fat/skin side of product just deep enough so that glaze seeps into product. The grooves should be about one inch apart to form a diamond pattern in the fat/skin. Spread one-half of the glaze over ham and place into roasting pan. Roast at 250° F for 20 minutes/pound. Three-quarters way through the roasting cycle spread the other one-half of the glaze over ham. At the end of the roasting period, remove from oven, tent with foil and let the ham rest for 10 minutes. Slice ham to desired thickness and serve.

I served this with Caramelized Sweet Potato/Carrot Medley

*Butt ham is meatier with less fat but is harder to carve due to complex bone structure. Shank ham is not as meaty and has more fat but is easier to carve due to a single bone as compared to the butt.