Porchetta

During the holiday season last year America's Test Kitchen had an episode titled "Home for the Holiday's" found here.  I watched that episode and was inspired by the porchetta recipe. When we lived in Queens we were invited to the Osorio's house in Astoria for a wonderful feast.  Chef Osorio works at an Italian restaurant in Manhattan, he's actually from Bogota Colombia and his wife Jen is from Queens.  I can't remember his name, anyway he is an amazing chef!  He prepared a traditional Porcehetta in a La Caja China, which is a wooden or metal box you grill a whole pig in basically.  His porchetta was a huge piece of pork rolled with fennel, and other traditional seasonings.  He had my husband Parley cut it into slices, Parley sliced it into one inch thick slices.  Which at the time I'm thinking these dinner plate inch thick pieces of porchetta are enormous!  It was the most delicious, flavorful, and moist pork I'd ever tasted.  I didn't think anything about trying to make it myself since I didn't have any way to cook something that big or even know where to find such a huge piece of pork.  Then I saw that Holiday special from America's Test Kitchen I mentioned earlier and the chef used a manageable easy to find pork butt roast and I knew then I could make porchetta in my home kitchen.  While at the store I saw pork butt steaks and decided why cut slits in the fat cap of a huge roast and try to flavor a huge butt roast when I could flavor each layer and use the steaks, that's my contribution to this recipe.   Funny enough I went to a local Italian market to get supplies for our second Christmas dinner we were having with our Serbian "daughter for the school year" and they had porchetta in the fridge section and they were huge one-inch dinner plate slices; so I apologize to my husband for dismissing his cutting skills.  Did I mention we have a "daughter for the school year" from Italy and Serbia right now?  Probably not, anyway they are loving the food and are great inspirations for our family trying new food from both Italy and Serbia.  Mina is our Serbian "daughter for the school year" and Camilla is our Italian "daughter for the school year."  I've been preparing our holiday meals according to some of the food they normally, like Christmas for example.  By way of a little known fact we have just learned, the Serbian Orthodox Church follows the Julian calendar for holiday's so they celebrate Christmas on January 7th and Easter is also a week later than we traditionally celebrate it.  We'll be having two Easter Celebrations as we did for Christmas and highlight some Italian and Serbian holiday celebrations.  

Porchetta

Ingredients:

2-3 lbs Pork Butt Steaks

3 Tablespoons Fennel Seed

1/2 Cup Fresh Rosemary

1/4 Cup Fresh Thyme

12 Cloves Garlic

1 Tablespoon Black Pepper

2 Teaspoons Kosher Salt

1/2 Cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil

Process:  

Grind Together all the herbs, and spices in a blender or coffee grinder.  

If making in a blender you can add the olive oil and grind and mix together into a paste.  

Using a boning knife remove the t-bones from the steaks. 

Rub paste between each steak and stack the steaks together.

Using three lengths of butcher twine, tie the layers together, double the first part of the knot to make it easier to get a secure knot.

Put on a rack of a roasting pan in the fridge, allow it to dry for up 24 hours.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Place pork in the oven covered with aluminum foil for 2 hours, make sure the pork reaches an internal temperature of 180 degrees.

Increase the oven temperature to 500 degrees, remove foil from meat and place in a lined pan with foil, add meat to pan with twine removed.  15-20 minutes, Cook meat until an internal temperature of 190 degrees. 

Rest 15 minutes, cut across the grain. 

Enjoy!

Rotisserie Turkey

I used my rotisserie to cook turkey tonight.  OH MY GOODNESS, it was moist and delicious and full of flavor.  I used my previous method of flavoring the turkey and the rotisserie to cook it and well let's say we reached food coma inducing nirvana with this recipe.  This is how I will prepare our Thanksgiving turkey from now on.  Yes it really was that good, and yes I have no leftovers.  Oh, and we ate it with the Tetrazzini sauce poured over the top.   I posted the recipe here.  

 That is the beautiful turkey and Tetrazinni sauce together, and yes it was delicious!

Ingredients for Dry Brine Recipe:

6 lb. Turkey Breast (Mine was a small turkey with wings attached still)
Sea Salt

 Rub salt all over thawed turkey breast, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 24 hours.

Ingredients for Aromatics:

1 Yellow Onion

4 cloves peeled Garlic

2 sprigs Fresh Rosemary

Peel onion and slice ends off.

Place onion, garlic, and rosemary inside cavity of turkey.  

Place a ball of aluminum foil in cavity to keep vegetables and herbs inside turkey.

Place turkey on rotisserie spit and tie with butchers twine to prevent wings from flapping.

Set rotisserie to roast for 2 hours or until turkey internal temperature reaches 160 Fahrenheit.

Allow turkey to continue rotating for 15-20 minutes without heat in the rotisserie, this will help to redistribute juices evenly and resting also brings the temperature up slowly without losing any juice.

Remove from spit and place in oven safe dish with aluminum foil to rest 5 more minutes before carving.

Enjoy!

Rotisserie Turkey Breast

Printable Recipe Found Here

6 lb. Turkey Breast (small turkey with wings, no legs)

Sea Salt

1 Yellow Onion

4 cloves peeled Garlic

2 sprigs Fresh Rosemary

Rub salt all over thawed turkey breast, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for 24 hours.

Peel onion and slice ends off.

Place onion, garlic, and rosemary inside cavity of turkey.  

Place a ball of aluminum foil in cavity to keep vegetables and herbs inside turkey.

Place turkey on rotisserie spit and tie with butchers twine to prevent wings from flapping.

Set rotisserie to roast for 2 hours or until the breast internal temperature reaches 160 Fahrenheit.

Allow turkey to continue rotating for 15 minutes without heat in the rotisserie, this will help to redistribute juices evenly and resting also brings the temperature up slowly without losing any juice.  

Remove from spit and place in oven safe dish with aluminum foil to rest 5 more minutes before carving.

Slice and serve.

Enjoy!

Lamb Gyros

I love Greek food, and since I live in a very Greek neighborhood, it is really easy to find all the yummy food to make Greek Food.  Lamb Gyro's were my husband's dinner choice for our monthly menu.  Our friend's the Martinez's and Tina and Jessie came over to help make and eat Gyros. I love having Whitney and Tina over because they are so over the top helpful.  This recipe is sort of like Alton Brown's recipe, very loosely.  The gyro's turned out really, really, yummy, and I have no leftovers!  On an almost completely unrelated note, our tax refund was automatically deposited and we drove to the Apple Store on 5th Avenue (Manhattan) and I got a new MacBook Pro.  It is a wonderful computer!  

 Yes that is a lamb gyro and I made it!  I think I'm turning Greek.  I really think so (Just Kidding, I'm really English and Danish).

Ingredients for this recipe are:

4 lbs. Ground Lamb (freshly ground if you can get it)

1/4 cup Fresh Thyme

1/4 cup Fresh Rosemary

1 tablespoon Sea Salt

2 teaspoons Freshly Ground Pepper

6 cloves of Fresh Garlic

1 Yellow Onion

 Remove Thyme and Rosemary leaves from stems, chop the leaves small.

 Peel and finely dice the yellow onion.  Push garlic through garlic press.

 Using your hands to gently mix all the ingredients together in a metal mixing bowl.

Lay two pieces of 18 inch long plastic wrap with the long sides overlapping enough to seal and 
create a larger piece of plastic wrap.

Place the meat on the plastic wrap.  

 Wrap the plastic wrap around the meat and twist the ends until a tight log is formed.

Place lamb log into a plastic zip top bag and refrigerate over night.

Preheat oven to 325 Fahrenheit

Unwrap lamb and place on a aluminum foil lined small rectangular pan.

Bake lamb for 70 minutes or until internal temperature reaches 175 Fahrenheit.  

 Remove lamb from oven and allow to rest cover with aluminum foil for 10 minutes.

Slice meat and serve inside a pita with Tzaziki sauce (homemade recipe found here), sliced
cucumbers, Spring salad mix, crumbled feta cheese, Spanish Olives, and diced tomatoes.  

Enjoy!

Lamb Gyros

Printable Recipe Found Here

4 lbs. Ground Lamb (freshly ground if you can get it)

1/4 cup Fresh Thyme

1/4 cup Fresh Rosemary

1 tablespoon Sea Salt

2 teaspoons Freshly Ground Pepper

6 cloves of Fresh Garlic

1 Yellow Onion

Remove Thyme and Rosemary leaves from stems.  Chop the leaves small.

Peel and finely dice the yellow onion.

Push garlic through garlic press.

Using your hands gently mix all the ingredients together in a metal mixing bowl.

Lay two pieces of 18 inch long plastic wrap with the long sides overlapping enough to seal and create a larger piece of plastic wrap.

Place the meat on the plastic wrap.  Wrap the plastic wrap around the meat and twist the ends until a tight log is formed.

Place lamb log into a plastic zip top bag and refrigerate over night.

Preheat oven to 325 Fahrenheit

Unwrap lamb and place on a aluminum foil lined small rectangular pan.

Bake lamb for 70 minutes or until internal temperature reaches 175 Fahrenheit.  

Remove lamb from oven and allow to rest.  Cover with aluminum foil for 10 minutes.

Slice meat and serve inside a pita with Tzaziki sauce, sliced cucumbers, Spring salad mix, crumbled feta cheese, Spanish Olives, and diced tomatoes.