The Lone Gent's Pork Belly

Today, inspired by a discussion/bragging session in work and the pork belly in my freezer, I decided to buy some (more) pork belly.  A while back I attempted a recipe by Stefan Gates involving a lot of garlic, bay leaves, star anise and very low temperatures followed by a brief bout of very high temperatures.  This wasn't entirely successful as the fat never really got to a pleasing level of crackling that I guess is the highlight of the meal.  So after mentioning this I was advised by a trusted source that the only correct way to do this was by subjecting the belly to the hot temperature first before lowering the heat until the it is properly cooked.  This was the method I used this evening although the belly I purchased had very little fat on the top making the appearance of proper crackling as unlikely as ever.

To begin with I had to mash up the paste for the top.  I decided not to follow the recipe and just guess at what should be in it as I didn't want to find it and not have everything (bay leaves!).  I used garlic, star anise, ginger, cinnamon, salt, cardamon pods and pepper with red palm oil mixed in.

Next I rubbed the paste on the pork, I will say it looks pretty foul but that's the risk to achieve the Maillard Reaction, and it's mostly garlic that I didn't cut and didn't mash very well.

So these went under the grill for a few minutes and were then taken out so the veg could cook while the oven cooled down to 70.  I drained some of the juices to make the gravy and put it in a frying pan with corn flour, soy sauce, pepper, ginger and cinnamon.  Cooked these for a bit with some of the onions and it looked like this slop:

 After about 45 minutes in the at 70C it was done and I ate it and I enjoyed it (even the veg) with a dose of Dixon and Jawdin on 90210.  Closing opinion of the method would be that with such a thin layer of fat on top the pork couldn't be grilled long enough to get enough crisp in the crackling, I found with a spare bit that another 3 minutes and it was good but then the rest of the pork was very leathery.  Luckily I can try again with the thicker bit in my freezer and see!  Concerning news is that my tummy hurts and is making bad noises but I don't reckon pork worms could have grown to a size in me to make such noises yet so hopefully it is not slow cooked pork related.

I definitely recommend Stefan Gate's book, Gastronaut, for a lot more some would say stupid and excessive recipes, from the simple bum sandwich to pineapple in a lot of sugar and he also recommends music to have with his meals.  My brother hates any mention of it though, so be prepred for much doubt.