Take your Sunday roast to the next level with this roast leg of pork. Served with a mouthwatering homemade gravy, this perfect pork roast calls for a veritable family feast: Slow-cooked and flavour-infused; tender and juicy…and then of course, super crispy, bubbly pork crackling.
You need a LOT of salt on the skin. In fact, salt is what helps the skin go bubbly-crispy rather than hardening into a rubbery flat sheet of skin.
Leaving the bone in adds a bit of extra flavour and having a layer of fat helps to keep the meat nice and moist as it roasts. If you’ve cooked it right, it should pull apart into shreds with a couple of forks although you could carve it into slices with a serrated knife. If you’re worried about scoring the crackling yourself, ask your butcher to do it for you.
Let the pork roast rest for a good 10-15 minutes so all of the tasty juices stay in the meat before carving. The longer you wait, the juicier the meat. Rest assured that the crackling won’t go soft while resting. Enjoy this roast leg of pork with a great glass of red wine!
CHEF’S TIP
If you have time, rub salt in the pork skin two hours before cooking and leave it uncovered in the fridge.
Roast Leg of Pork with Crispy Crackling
Ingredients
- 2 to 3 kg leg of pork keep the bone and skin on for best flavours
- coriander
- 2 tbsp black pepper and coarse sea salt freshly grounded
- 3 carrots cut in halves
- 1 bulb garlic keep the skin on, brake them into cloves
- 3 red onions cut in halves
- 3 sticks celery halved
- 4 bay leaves
- 600 ml water
- 1/2 bunch fresh sage
- 1/2 bunch flat parsley
- Few sprigs of rosemary
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 220°C.
- Place the pork on a clean work surface and make scores in diamond shapes or small squares a few centimetres apart through the skin into the fat with a sharp knife. Take care not to make it too deep.
- In a mortar, grind the coriander, salt and pepper.
- Rub the salt into the scores, pulling the skin apart to make sure the salt goes in.
- Make sure you brush off the excess salt.
- Turn it over and season with a pinch of salt and pepper again
- Place the pork, skin-side up in a roasting tray on top of the onions, garlic and carrots and place it in the preheated oven.
- Roast for 30 to 45 minutes until the skin of the pork starts to puff, and you can see it turning into crackling
- At this point, turn the heat down to 170°C and cook for about 4 1/2 hours or until the meat on the sides pull apart.
- Drizzle the sage and rosemary with olive oil and sprinkle on the roast. Place the roast back in the oven and let these herbs become crispy (This is optional). Remove the leg to a board, cover with tin foil and allow to rest while you make the sauce.
Gravy
- Place the roasting tray on the hob over medium heat, add the flour and stir it into the pan juices so you get a sticky paste.
- Slowly add a little water until you have a lovely rich sauce, add a little butter if you prefer it to be even richer.
- Pour the contents of the tray into a jug or bowl. Add a bit of mustard and parsley and blitz to a sauce with a stick blender.
- Season the sauce to perfection.
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