Bf and I cooked at pork belly for my parents last Saturday night and it turned out restaurant quality! The crackling was crispy and NOT rubbery. The meat was juicy and moist.
To go with our pork belly we made mashed potatoes from royal blue potatoes (the best kind of potato for mashing) and salad with beautiful honey balsamic vinegar that I bought from my recent Busselton/Margaret River trip.
So to cook the amazing pork belly you will need:
ONE PORK BELLY - from the butcher's preferably - however many kilograms you want.
We got 1kg pork belly.
Ask the butcher to put some "incision" into the top of the pork belly. This ensures that the seasoning placed on top seeps into the pork.
So after the incisions are done, rub lots and I mean LOTS AND LOTS OF SALT (sea salt) and then rub olive oil on top. We also sprinkled some fried garlic that you get from the Asian grocery stores as well. Or if you have put garlic salt instead of sea salt.
Then put it in the oven - fan forced at 250 degrees Celsius for 20 minutes, you should start hearing the pork crackle if you have salted enough. After 20 minutes turn the temperature of the oven down to 180 degrees and cook for 40 minutes. After that it should be all done.
Because our pork was 1kg it took ONE HOUR - so for every kilogram you should cook the pork for ONE hour.
Then all you have to do it get it out of the oven and onto a plate.
With the juices from the pork add it onto your gravy or you can make your own apple sauce if you like. We just opted for a packet gravy with addition of the pork belly juices - we just didn't have enough time to have homemade gravy.
While the pork is cooking make the salad and the mash potatoes
Put some milk and butter into the mashed up potatoes; it provides a silky and creamy texture and if you really want something rich you can add cream.
And voila restaurant quality pork belly dinner at a fraction of the price.
I can tell you bf won brownie points with my parents.
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