Pork and apple hotpot (Nigella)
Jan. 31st, 2021 05:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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cookbook_challenge My aim is to cook three new recipes from recipe books in the house each month. I am catering for me, a 16 year-old and a 13 year-old (plus a 19 year-old in university holidays). Everyone's tastes vary and I tend to be stuck in a rut of rotating the same things that everyone will eat. I would like to finish the end of the year with a slightly longer list of things everyone will eat and try the things where I've thought "I'll try that one day but haven't actually tried it yet.
Recipe 1.
Pork and Apple hotpot from Nigella Lawson's KItchen, Recipes from the heart of the home.
Ingredients
3 x 15 ml tbsps oil
3 onions halved and cut into half-moons
250g streaky bacon
50g plain flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
seeds of 4 cardamom pods crushed, or 1/4 tsp ground cardamom
salt and pepper to taste
6 boneless pork loin chops
4 Granny Smith apples
1 x 750ml bottle sharp. pressed apple juicee
1 ovenproof dish approx 20cm diameter x 13 cm deep or 24 cm round casserole with lid
Instructions
Preheat oven to 170C/gas mark 3. Warm oil in a wide, heavy-based pan and fry the onion for about 10 minutes until soft. Remove to a bowl
Cut or scissor the bacon into small strips and fry in the oniony pan for a few minutes. Add to onion bowl and mix together.
Put flour, spices and seasoning in a freezer bag and add 3 of the chops. Roll them around and shake off excess flour. Sear chops in oily pan and remove to a plate. Cooke the other 3 chops in the same way.
Peel and core the apples, cutting each one in half. Slice each half into fine segments and then arrange all the ingredients in the ovenproof dish or casserole as follows: A layer of onions and bacon, 3 pork chops, a layer of apple slices, onion and bacon, 3 pork chops, apples slices, onions and bacon, apple slicees.
Tip the remaining spiced flour into the oily pan and stir before whisking in the apple juice. Bring to the boil, then pour into the layered dish letting it filter slowly through to the bottom.
If necessary, make a lid for the dish with greaseproof paper and foil and sit it in the oven on a baking sheet as it may leak. Otherwise pop the lid on your casserole.
Cook in the oven for 3 hours until the pork is cooked through and the apples are tender.
Variations
For 3 of us including a 16 year-old boy, I used 4 pork steaks (making 2 layers of 2), 2 onions and 3 apples but kept everything else the same. I got the layering a bit wrong or didn't have quite enough things for enough layers so possibly I'd keep the onions and apples as written in future. I didn't do the plastic bag thing. I just put the flour in a pasta bowl and coated the pork in it.
Verdict
Perhaps I overcooked it - my oven tends to run high - but there wasn't much liquid left and the onions and apples had turned into a sort of jam. It was nice but the kids thought it was too sweet. This might partly depend on the apple juice. Ours was a gift from friends in the local apple pressing co-op and sweetness can be variable, but I thought it was sharp when we drank it.
Would make again for me and visiting people who are not my children but would put more apples in it and not cook it for as long.
Recipe 1.
Pork and Apple hotpot from Nigella Lawson's KItchen, Recipes from the heart of the home.
Ingredients
3 x 15 ml tbsps oil
3 onions halved and cut into half-moons
250g streaky bacon
50g plain flour
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
seeds of 4 cardamom pods crushed, or 1/4 tsp ground cardamom
salt and pepper to taste
6 boneless pork loin chops
4 Granny Smith apples
1 x 750ml bottle sharp. pressed apple juicee
1 ovenproof dish approx 20cm diameter x 13 cm deep or 24 cm round casserole with lid
Instructions
Preheat oven to 170C/gas mark 3. Warm oil in a wide, heavy-based pan and fry the onion for about 10 minutes until soft. Remove to a bowl
Cut or scissor the bacon into small strips and fry in the oniony pan for a few minutes. Add to onion bowl and mix together.
Put flour, spices and seasoning in a freezer bag and add 3 of the chops. Roll them around and shake off excess flour. Sear chops in oily pan and remove to a plate. Cooke the other 3 chops in the same way.
Peel and core the apples, cutting each one in half. Slice each half into fine segments and then arrange all the ingredients in the ovenproof dish or casserole as follows: A layer of onions and bacon, 3 pork chops, a layer of apple slices, onion and bacon, 3 pork chops, apples slices, onions and bacon, apple slicees.
Tip the remaining spiced flour into the oily pan and stir before whisking in the apple juice. Bring to the boil, then pour into the layered dish letting it filter slowly through to the bottom.
If necessary, make a lid for the dish with greaseproof paper and foil and sit it in the oven on a baking sheet as it may leak. Otherwise pop the lid on your casserole.
Cook in the oven for 3 hours until the pork is cooked through and the apples are tender.
Variations
For 3 of us including a 16 year-old boy, I used 4 pork steaks (making 2 layers of 2), 2 onions and 3 apples but kept everything else the same. I got the layering a bit wrong or didn't have quite enough things for enough layers so possibly I'd keep the onions and apples as written in future. I didn't do the plastic bag thing. I just put the flour in a pasta bowl and coated the pork in it.
Verdict
Perhaps I overcooked it - my oven tends to run high - but there wasn't much liquid left and the onions and apples had turned into a sort of jam. It was nice but the kids thought it was too sweet. This might partly depend on the apple juice. Ours was a gift from friends in the local apple pressing co-op and sweetness can be variable, but I thought it was sharp when we drank it.
Would make again for me and visiting people who are not my children but would put more apples in it and not cook it for as long.
no subject
Date: 2021-01-31 07:06 pm (UTC)One question though: does the recipe really call for *14* tsps of cloves? That seems like a lot to me, but I don't often use spices, so maybe that's normal?
no subject
Date: 2021-01-31 07:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-01-31 09:43 pm (UTC)