Chinese Slow Roasted Pork

Take a large and inexpensive lump of pre-scored pork belly from Brixton market. Cover it in salt and five spice. Wedge pieces of star anise and cinnamon bark into the seams of fat. Trim off nipples. Then roast in a seriously hot oven until the skin has started to become slightly crispy.

Turn down the heat to around 170'c and manoeuvre loads of ginger, a couple of chillies cleaved in half and a few cloves of garlic so that they raise the meat up from the base of roasting tin. This lets some of the fat render out. Roast gently for an hour.



Pour off the oozing fat and replace with an unhealthy glug of soy and some sake. Add more ginger, star anise and cinnamon. Return to oven and slow roast for 3 hours, topping up liquid when needed with rehydrated mushrooms and resultant stock.

Remove meat and place on a wire rack on a baking tray. Add more salt to the skin. Place under grill and give it a final whack of heat to crisp the skin up so it blisters.



Pour off the dark, juice into a sauce pan and add mirin, sake and rice vinegar. Reduce violently until it is sticky.



Meanwhile boil some rice noodles and steam some lettuce. Remove, pork from oven and hack in half. Combine all elements and serve to your ravenous housemate. Simple, cheap and seriously tasty.