Not A Leg

I asked the market to give me a leg of lamb, but they gave me a pork roast instead.  So when life gives you a pork roast . . . I’m sure you can finish this sentence on your own.

I decided to cook it sous vide, because sous vide cooks the food exactly the way you want it, and because it melts the collagen and makes everything tender.  So I went looking for a recipe, and found one in Tina Baker’s Sous Vide Cookbook, for what she calls Chinatown Braised Pork, essentially an attempt to re-create those crimson, shimmering slabs of pork you see in restaurant windows in Chinese neighborhoods.

I’m not sure that’s exactly what I got, but what I got was choice.  I started with a spice rub of salt, cinnamon, cloves, pepper, and ground fennel (which I didn’t have), then added a sauce of hoisin sauce, honey, soy sauce, sherry, and sesame oil, with some garlic, star anise, and ginger thrown in.  I cooked it for 24 hours at 134 degrees F, then browned the exterior in a skillet and carved it up.  The interior was tender and pleasantly (and safely) pink, and extremely flavorful with the sauce on it.  Kathy wanted acorn squash, so that’s what we had with it, along with peas.

Cooking raises the morale in lockdown, which is why I cooked elaborate meals even when I was alone for three months.

After all, I’ve got the time, don’t I?