Danny’s slow roast belly of pork to die for recipe
Posted by Fiona Nevile in Pork Ham Bacon Sausages | 143 comments
Joint of pork belly with skin side down ready for slow roast
We have Sunday Lunch in the evening and Danny usually cooks it. If I have the day off, I can spend hours in the garden and totter in at dusk to a great meal. Perfect.
Last week he cooked the best pork that I have ever tasted. I had bought belly of pork from Fred Fitzpatrick on a whim.
Danny was polite and definitely suspicious when I showed him the thin joint. Belly of pork is a slim, boy racer sort of cut. A rib of small bones and meat that appears to be stingy. Wrong. BOP has loads of meat.
I was working last weekend and arrived home to tantalising smells drifting from the oven.
“I found a great recipe. But didn’t have the ingredients so made up my own and experimented with a new method,” D explained, as he sliced the delicious meat.
The pork had a deep, mellow flavour and the crackling was truly superb. The skin and fat both took starring roles. Proper crackling underpinned by a sparkling melt in the mouth layer beneath. I was not eating ‘fat’ but gently roasted, bite sized pieces of heaven that had transmogrified in the long slow cooking process into something with texture and flavour. I would kill for a decent pork scratching. Danny’s home made version impressed me and after the first forkful of meat I reeled with applause and, I hate to admit it, envy.
Edit Oct 2015: Getting the crackling good and crispy can be a hit and miss affair. Every oven is different. See Sue’s comment below. If it’s rubbery, you can pop it under a low grill for 5 minutes or more but be careful not to let it blacken and burn. I guess it’s best to play safe and score it, and rub on salt and oil in the traditional manner.
Do also consider serving this perfect Yorkshire pudding recipe with this or any roast.
| Danny’s slow roast belly of pork to die for recipe |
- I kilo joint of belly of pork
- 10 leaves off a sprig of rosemary
- 3 small cloves of garlic sliced
- Foil big enough to form a nest under and around the joint
- Place the pork, crackling side down, in roasting pan. Distribute the rosemary and garlic evenly over the base of the belly. Take the foil and press it over the belly to make sure that the herbs will not shift.
- Turn the whole lot over, crackling side up, and form the foil into a snug nest around the joint, leaving the crackling exposed and ensuring that the fat from the crackling will drip into the foil nest.
- Roast at 140c (fan) for 3 hours and then turn down to 130c for another hour (4 hours!) – these are our fan-assisted oven temperatures so you may wish to adjust for a conventional oven, but not by much I think. Maybe +10% maximum.
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Hi Fiona,
I discovered this recipe several months ago and have done it several times now, it’s always a great hit with all the family, especially the crackling! Thanks again for the inspiration, your site is wonderful.
Jan
Tesco do a rather nice Belly Pork with extra Matured Norfolk pork, seasoned with black pepper. It is quite cheap.
Well I used Danny’s recipe again and the pork was fantastic.
Main service was for Sunday Evening Roast Dinner. It then served again on Monday and Tuesday.
Hi Merryn – thanks for your kind words 🙂
Because it is such a flat and “thin” cut, I believe that a 2kg joint should not take any longer than a 1kg. Having said that, no harm in testing it after the four hours as described in the recipe.
Good luck with it!
Hi…found you by accident when I googled”slow roast belly pork”….LOVE the website! I’ve got a 2.5 kg pork belly in the fridge for Sunday lunch tomorrow….how much should I increase the ooking time from Danny’s 1kg joint? I’m guessing probably another 30-45 mins on the higher heat and perhaps another 30-45 mins extra on the lower heat? I don’t want to dry the whole thing out…on the other hand I don’t want it undercooked either! Thanks!
I was first inspired to try this recipe 2 years ago and I have found it to be so forgiving with regard to cooking time and herbs used. I use slices of BP and finish off under the grill for amazing crackling. So easy and oh so good!
Please could you tell me how to adjust cooking times for a rolled belly of pork joint? Cant wait to taste this, sounds yum!!
Hi Siobhan
Danny says roast it for the same time as a flat joint.
Thank you so much for such an amazing recipe, have just made it and it was superb!! Never tried crackling before but it worked amazingly well. Will be having this again and again, no doubt trying other combinations also. Many thanks again and well done!
Right, that is a definite must try one.
Good to see this thread still alive after 4 years! Just about to start a roast belly now, and it reminded me that I should have left a message on this page last year, when I doing it for the first time. Thanks for the advice, many times over! Bay leaf, thyme, orange zest, garlic and a splash of white wine this time…:)
What a great thread! I didn’t see this recipe but I did the same last week at a friend’s house (he had some rosemary growing out the back) with the only difference being we finished the skin off over a BBQ and then cut it for 7 or 8 people to have a bit.
I’m going to do it again today sans BBQ with a red wine risotto – not sure if this will work but seems to make sense to me!