Author Archives: Home Cooked Heston

SousVide Pulled Pork


SOUSVIDE PULLED PORK 

This tasted every bit as good as it sounds. Being a HCH dinner party I had to impress of course and as you can see below it pulled apart too easily. Combining this with some slaw, caramelised onions and steamed buns (that my dear friend Dre made bless her they added to the dish) with spiced infused apple sauce or a killer smokey BBQ bourbon sauce, it was so damn good. As I know a lot of you guys don’t have SousVides I will also give you a method equivalent for the oven or slow cooker.

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 Ingredients

For the Pork
– 1 Kg of Pork Shoulder
– 2 Cups of Stock (Pork or Chicken)
– 1 Tbsp of Peppercorns
– 1 Tbsp of Coriander Seeds
– 1 Tsp of Fennel Seeds
For the Caramelised Onions
– 3 Onions, Sliced
– ¼ Cup Balsamic Vinegar
– 2 Tbsp Brown Sugar
For the Slaw
– ¼ Head of Red Cabbage
– ¼ Head of Green Cabbage
– ½ Bulb of Fennel
– 2 Carrots, Grated
– Kewpie (Japanese Mayonnaise)
– Juice of ½ a Lemon
For the Apple Sauce
– Store Bought Apple Sauce
– 3 Star Anise
– 1 Cinnamon Quill
– 10 Peppercorns
For the Bourbon Sauce
– 2 Cups Tomato Sauce
– 1 Cup Bourbon Whiskey
– ½ cup brown sugar
– ¼ cup balsamic vinegar
– 3 Tbsp Chopped Garlic
– 2 Tbsp Liquid Smoke
– 2 Tbsp Worcester Sauce
– 1/2 Tsp Cayenne Pepper
– 2 Tbsp whole grain mustard

 

 

 

 

 

 

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METHOD

DAY 1: For the pork, debone the pork shoulder and remove any unwanted fat and gristle. Place the pork in a vacpac bag along with the stock, pepper corns, coriander and fennel seeds. Seal and place in the fridge over night.

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DAY 2: Fill the SousVide with water to the fill line located inside and set to a temperature of 57.5ºC. Place the bag with the pork in and leave until day three.

DAY 3: For the apple sauce place all ingredients into a vacpac bag and seal. Place into the SousVide and await for the final day to come!

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DAY 4: For the caramelised onion, place them in a fry pan on medium heat and cook them until they become translucent. Next add the sugar and balsamic vinegar, this starts your caramelisation process. Turn down the heat and cook for five to ten minutes or until sticky and caramelised. For the slaw, use the mandolin to shed the two different cabbages, fennel and cabbage carrots and put into a large bowl. Add the kewpie and lemon juice and using a fork combine all the ingredients together. Season with salt and pepper.

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For the bourbon sauce, place all ingredients into a small saucepan and whisk to combine. Bring to a simmer and cook for ten minutes then remove from the heat and set aside for the flavours to infuse. When you are ready to serve take the pork out of the SousVide and put on a hot frypan to brown and caramelised all over. Remove from the pan, place on the largest meat cutting board you have and with two forks pull apart the meat with oh so much ease.

To assemble cut the buns in half place a little bit (or a lot) of the pork, some slaw then caramelised onion and top with either of the two sauces (or both we were hungry!) and enjoy.

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Below are the links for cooking in the oven:

http://userealbutter.com/2007/11/09/carolina-style-pulled-pork-recipe/

AND here is the recipe my good blogger buddy GusFace Grillah made for pulled pork

http://gusfacegrillah.com/2014/03/03/pulled-pork-the-first-attempt/

Adapted the bourbon sauce from the guys at Modernist Cuisine link below. I added so many other ingredients to mine but the thing is I forgot all of them as i did not write them down 😦 haha

http://www.modernistcookingmadeeasy.com/info/modernist-recipes/more/sous-vide-pulled-pork-recipe

Experiment Day 1


LAMB BRAINS, SWEET BREADS AND CALF LIVER

What can I say other than this was fun! I am all for trying new things so when my cooking buddy suggested that we try a recipe from “The Complete Nose to Tail” by Fergus Henderson and Justin Piers Gellatly I knew what we were in for.  So when Matt said we should try lambs brains I thought why the hell not. Then off we went to Torre Butcher in Northbridge, Perth. These guys are awesome, we were expecting the offal to be frozen but it all came out fresh which made it even better.

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INGREDIENTS

– 2 Onions, Peeled

– 2 Carrots, Peeled

– 2 Leeks, Peeled

– 2 Sticks of Celery

– 1 Whole Head of Garlic

– Black Peppercorns

– Bay Leaf

– A Bundle of Fresh Herbs

– 6 Lamb Brains, Rinsed in Cold Water

– Plain Flour, Season with Salt and Pepper

– 4 Eggs

– Fine Dry Bread Crumbs

– Vegetable Oil for Deep Frying

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METHOD

Place all stock, vegetables and herbs into a pot of water and bring to a simmer for fifteen minutes. Gently lower the lamb brains into the pot, let them gently cook for six minutes. Remove the brains with a slotted spoon and leave to cool on a tray. When they have cooled enough and have gone firm you are then to separate the lobes.

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Meanwhile prepare 3 bowls. The first with the seasoned flour, the second with the egg whisked and the third with the bread crumbs. Then you want to heat the oil in a pot – you don’t want to let the brains get to soggy.

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Next you want to dip the brains into the flour, then the egg, into the breadcrumbs and then onto a plate lined with paper towel ready for frying. Once you have completed crumbing the brains and the oil is hot, pop them in until crisp. This will take a matter of minutes. Drain on a paper towel and serve hot with your desired sauce. We had them with some Home Cooked Heston spicy ketchup and lemon wedges.

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New to the Home Cooked Heston Blog is beer matching. My good friends at Mane Liquor here in Perth are going to start matching the beer and my cooking buddy Matt Power will be matching the wine. I will make a new category for the different types of beer and wine to match different foods. This week for the brains they have matched La Sirène Wild Saison and the Cullen Estate Sauvignon Blanc 2008

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Lastly because it was an experiment day, we also tried sweet breads, which we crumbed and deep fried some calf liver which we sautéed in a hot pan with some lemon juice and some of Torre’s nice big Italian pork sausages which were tasty.

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Full credit for the brains recipe to Fergus Henderson and Justin Piers Gellatly. Credit to Australian Wine Journal Blog for the Cullen photo I forgot to take one.

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PS. This book will be the death of me!