Unemployment Pork

    Today's recipe came from an article I found in the New York Times. It called for a thick hind of pork, beaten until tender, and coated in a spread of olive oil, garlic and rosemary. The dish is meant to be cooked over an open flame so as to sear the skin to a crunchy burgundy. The rump should also not be barbequed. To preserve extraneous juices and flavor, it must be cooked in a rimmed pan above an open fire. The idea is such that, if executed properly, the resulting pork hind will blacken on the outside while preserving a moist, tender on the inside. The New York Times Magazine recommended it be cooked with peaches, cut in half and pitted, to add to the flavor. In concept, it was a meal worthy of a four-star restaurant. Here is what actually happened:

      As it turns out pork butt is rather expensive. The pig is awfully modest for an animal with a 30 dollar ass. I searched high and low for a generously priced swine hind – from Hannaford's, to Market Basket to Shaw's. But, alas, in my current state of income-less leisure, I could not afford that ass.

     Instead, I settled for cuts of pork loin. The recipe from the New York Times called for the meat to be beaten until tender, about 3/4'' thick. I did not own a tenderizer and, as detailed before, was in no position to go out and buy one. So, I did what any man would do, and I proceeded to beat the spit out of the loin with my bare hands (see picture bellow). This was made unpleasant by the impact marks left by my unusually large knuckles, a product of years of cracking. Small, knuckle sized craters were left in the meat, which I tried to beat around so as to dilute their actual depth. "Ew," said my brother. 

     Until that day I had never been in a real fight.

    After the meat was pulverized, I set to work on the spread. Two cups of extra-virgin olive oil were pored into a bowl. I added to the mixture, slightly more than a tablespoon of rosemary, picked from the garden behind my house, and 5-6 cloves of garlic. As previously mentioned, I like my garlic. This was, however, the first time I attempted to use a garlic press (ignore the apparent chronology of these blog posts).

Pictured bellow is my family's garlic press:

   Do you notice anything peculiar about the device, aside from the leftover garlic on the flat head? I do, it's a terrible invention. The concept is that the garlic sits in the little basket and the flat head comes down upon closing so as to smush the garlic through the little holes. This is idiotic because, naturally, more of the garlic ends up smushed on the surface area around the holes than actually goes through. Now, not only is your garlic not in your meal, its stuck all over the inside of the press! Thus, this tool cannot be used without the aid of another knife to pry loose smushed garlic. It should have little spikes on the flat-end to line up with the holes! Someone who can weld needs to get on this, ASAP. 

   But, I digress. Once the spread was made and mixed together, I coated the loin with copious amounts of salt and pepper. I then added the spread, as lavishly as I possibly could, to both sides of the meats. Excess spread, of which there was not much, was to be poored into the pan for cooking.

   However, this presented a problem, as I had no idea what pan would fare well on top an open flame. The pan would also have to be large enough to accommodate the amount of meat I was preparing. Initially, I thought a cookie sheet might work, but then I remembered that it would probably explode, sending metal shrapnel into the chief. I decided against this.

   Eventually, I decided on no pan at all. Rather, I took a good amount of heavy-duty tin foil, folded up the edges, and declared it a surface on which to cook pork. The peaches were then pitted and, once the entire ensemble was placed on the grill, were lain around the sides to blacken. 

   The peaches cooked much faster than the meat and, therein, had to be moved to the upper rack about halfway through the process. The meat itself took about 20 minutes to blacken on the outside and, when finished, I say without a hint of modesty; was damn good.  Not bad for the discount version.

The Final Product:           

TBU

-EM