Each week, I provide two recipes at this site. I call this week’s “Pork, Lamb And Other Things That Aren't Remotely ‘The Other White Meat’ — Part 3.”
BONELESS PORK-LOIN ROAST: Serves four full-blown wage earners or three consultants who don't know when they'll eat this well again.
This is one of the easier, tastier meals you can make and can only be screwed up if you put on too much dried rosemary (they're like little pine needles; a few go a long way), too much sage (which will give the roast a soapy taste) and too little garlic (garlic not only intensifies the flavor of the meat; liberally applied, it also will prevent vampires from dropping in just as you're about to serve).
Ingredients
1 2 to 3 lb. boneless pork roast, tied
1 cup soy sauce
garlic powder, puree of garlic or 2 cloves fresh garlic
seasoned salt
pepper
3 tbs. white wine mustard
1. Gently pierce the roast and marinate in all of the above ingredients, in a sealed container, in the refrigerator, for several hours.
2. Remove the container from the refrigerator and the roast from the container 30 minutes before you begin cooking. Heat the oven to 350Ëš F.
3. Place the roast on a "V" or "Y" rack inside a baking dish or uncovered roasting pan. Carefully pour and spread the marinade over it.
4. Put the roast in the oven and cook for about 25 minutes per lb., depending on your oven. (Some ovens heat up quickly and will cook the pork unevenly.)
5. When you slice into the center of the roast and the color is off-white but no longer pink, it should be ready to eat.
6. Don't forget to snip off the strings — and even though they're now coated with garlic and herbs, and quite crispy, don't give in to your dog's plaintive negotiating ("Look, I'll stop trying to kill the pool man. I'll show you where I buried your André Agassi sweat band. I'll stop gnawing on the kid's Chia pet. Just gimme a length of that roasted twine!").
Side Dishes: Baked or oven-roasted potatoes, potato pancakes, Pasta Plain-a with lots of romano and/or Parmesan cheese; green salad with vinaigrette or Caesar dressing.
Cool Presentation Award: Sliced thin and arranged sunburst style on a platter, with a bowl of garlic mayonnaise and serving spoon in the center. To make garlic mayonnaise: Put three tablespoons of mayonnaise (diet, regular or low-fat) in a bowl. Add two teaspoons of garlic powder, garlic puree or crushed garlic, and a dash of seasoned salt. Stir. Hard, huh?
LEG-OF-LAMB ROAST: Serves four fun-loving grown-up Grecophiles who'll think the meal is so authentically Athenian that after dinner they'll dance, guzzle ouzo, pick your table up in their teeth, and, first thing next morning, schedule jaw reconstruction surgery.
I like using the same cooking method for leg-of-lamb that I use for making rib-eye roast or prime rib: If the lamb is still on the bone, I ask the butcher to remove it and "cradle" the roast so a fat layer rests atop the meat, flavoring it as it cooks.
I also use many of the same herbs and spices, though adding some solid shakes of curry powder and tarragon leaves to the mixture, and marinating the meat for several hours in olive oil and rosemary (rather than soy sauce), provide some savory variations.
Ingredients
1 2 to 3 lb. leg-of-lamb roast, cradled and tied
1 cup olive oil
rosemary
garlic powder, puree of garlic or 2 cloves fresh garlic
seasoned salt
pepper
curry powder
tarragon leaves
1. Gently pierce the roast and marinate in olive oil and rosemary, in a sealed container, in the refrigerator, for several hours.
2. Remove the container from the refrigerator and the roast from the container 30 minutes, or a little more, before you begin cooking. (The oil has probably congealed a bit. Room temperature should re-liquidize it.) Heat the oven to 350Ëš F.
3. Place the roast on a "V" or "Y" rack inside a baking dish or uncovered roasting pan. Carefully pour and spread the marinade over it.
4. Spread the garlic, seasoned salt, pepper, curry powder and tarragon leaves all over the lamb roast.
5. Put the roast in the oven and cook for about 25 minutes per pound.
6. When you slice into the center of the roast and the color is pink (but not red), that's the best time to take the roast out of the oven and place it on the cutting board. Wait about 5 minutes at the most (during which, you may be surprised to learn, the lamb is actually still cooking), then snip the twine and start slicing as thin as possible.
Side Dishes: Lamb is wonderful with white rice (into which you can add a little curry powder and soy sauce before boiling) or garlic mashed potatoes; a green salad, Greek-style — lettuce, tomatoes, onion slices, olives, cucumbers in a simple vinaigrette — is not only the perfect complement, it also just made my mouth water. (It's as advisable to not go grocery shopping when you're hungry as it is to not work on a cookbook an hour before dinner.) And while it's not a side dish, I strongly recommend that if you prepare the lamb the way I've suggested, you serve it with mint or apple-mint jelly.
Cool Presentation Award: Slice it! Serve it! And have plenty of ouzo, chilled white Zinfandel or Cabernet available (the Greek wine retsina is quite good, but if you're not used to it, its bouquet may tend to remind you of cough medicine), along with a cadre of designated drivers.
A Glossary of Useful, Common and Completely Obvious Cooking Terms with which You Can Dazzle Your Enemies and Irritate Your Friends
This Week: Macaroni to Marmalade
Macaroni - Noodles that apparently resemble feathers, such as might be stuck in the caps of equestrians named Yankee Doodle on their way to town.
Maitre d' - Generally, the first of several restaurant employees you'll tip in the course of an elegant evening — and arguably, the most important, since if he isn't properly compensated, you won't be rapidly seated. And when you finally are, it will be next to the silverware station of the busboy affectionately referred to as Spaz. (In restaurant protocol, the maitre d' is the captain's superior officer — unless you're on a cruise ship, in which case the only one more revered than the captain is the person who keeps replenishing the prawn trays at the buffet.)
Manhattan - A cocktail, a clam chowder, and a mysterious island on which — according to native folklore — may be found the terrifying City That Doesn't Sleep!
Marinade - What you need in order to marinate.
Marinate - What you can't do without marinade.
Marmalade - Not a bad marinade.
Posted on Tuesday, September 16, 2008 in
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