Festive porchetta & trimmings on a wooden board

Festive porchetta & all the trimmings

Name: Festive porchetta & all the trimmings
Cook time: 300 min
Total time: 300 min
Yield: 8 plus leftover porchetta
Ingredients: 1 x 5kg higher-welfare boneless pork loin, with belly attached and fat trimmed to ½cm-thick, skin removed and reserved (ask your butcher); 50ml Vin Santo or sherry; 4 carrots; 1 red onion; 2 sticks of celery; 1 heaped teaspoon fennel seeds; 2 tablespoons plain flour; 1 heaped tablespoon cranberry sauce, plus extra to taste; STUFFING; 200g free-range chicken livers, cleaned, trimmed; 250ml milk; 4 red onions; 4-5 slices of higher-welfare smoked pancetta; olive oil; 50g unsalted butter; 1 heaped teaspoon fennel seeds; 3 bay leaves; 1 bunch of rosemary (20g); 1 bunch of thyme (20g); 200g mixed dried apricots, cranberries, raisins, sultanas; 50g pine nuts; 1 whole nutmeg, for grating; 250ml white wine; 200g stale breadcrumbs; POTATOES; 2.5kg Maris Piper potatoes; 1.5 litres organic chicken stock; 1 bulb of garlic; a few sprigs of fresh rosemary; MIXED VEG

Stuffed rolled pork loin & crackling

5 hrs plus resting

Not Too Tricky

serves 8 plus leftover porchetta

About the recipe

Give traditional turkey a run for its money with this decadent festive porchetta. Packed with a herby, caramelised onion and pancetta stuffing, rolled and roasted, this is a truly special celebratory dish.

nutrition per serving

Calories

57%

Fat

83%

Saturates

100%

Sugars

12%

Salt

23%

Protein

129%

Carbs

36%

Fibre

of an adult’s reference intake

Recipe From

Jamie Cooks Christmas

By Jamie Oliver

FIND OUT MORE

Ingredients

1 x 5kg higher-welfare boneless pork loin, with belly attached and fat trimmed to ½cm-thick, skin removed and reserved (ask your butcher)

50ml Vin Santo or sherry

4 carrots

1 red onion

2 sticks of celery

1 heaped teaspoon fennel seeds

2 tablespoons plain flour

1 heaped tablespoon cranberry sauce, plus extra to taste

STUFFING

200g free-range chicken livers, cleaned, trimmed

250ml milk

4 red onions

4-5 slices of higher-welfare smoked pancetta

olive oil

50g unsalted butter

1 heaped teaspoon fennel seeds

3 bay leaves

1 bunch of rosemary (20g)

1 bunch of thyme (20g)

200g mixed dried apricots, cranberries, raisins, sultanas

50g pine nuts

1 whole nutmeg, for grating

250ml white wine

200g stale breadcrumbs

POTATOES

2.5kg Maris Piper potatoes

1.5 litres organic chicken stock

1 bulb of garlic

a few sprigs of fresh rosemary

MIXED VEG

6 parsnips

1 swede

4 small turnips

10 small carrots

a few sprigs of woody herbs, such as rosemary, thyme, sage

4 cloves of garlic

4 fresh bay leaves

2 tablespoons cider vinegar

Top Tip

I’m always looking for ways to make my roast potatoes even better, and I think I may have found it! Parboiling them in chicken stock (then using that starchy stock to make my gravy) really takes them to the next level.

Method

Get your meat out of the fridge and up to room temperature before you cook it. Place the chicken livers in a bowl, cover with the milk and set aside to soak.
To make the stuffing, peel and roughly chop the onions. Finely slice the pancetta, then place in a large frying pan on a medium-high heat with 1 tablespoon of oil, half of the butter, the fennel seeds, bay leaves and 2 generous pinches of black pepper. Cook for 3 minutes, stirring regularly, while you pick and roughly chop the herb leaves, and finely chop the dried fruit, then add to the pan along with the onions and pine nuts. Turn the heat down to medium and cook for 10 to 15 minutes, or until softened and starting to caramelise.
Make a well in the middle, add the remaining knob of butter and the livers, discarding the milk. Grate in half the nutmeg, season with sea salt, pour in the wine and allow to cook away. Remove from the heat, pick out and discard the bay leaves, stir in the breadcrumbs, then set aside and allow to cool (you can roughly chop the livers at this point, or keep them chunky).
Place the pork loin, fatty-side up on a board, score diagonally at 1-inch intervals, then season generously all over with sea salt and pepper. Pour over and massage in half the Vin Santo, then flip the pork, pour over and massage in the remaining Vin Santo, then set aside.
Lay out several lengths of butcher’s string at 1-inch intervals on the board. Place the pork fatty-side down on top, with the loin furthest away from you, then lightly score the flesh 3 or 4 times at 1-inch intervals along the belly, pack the stuffing tightly on top across the centre underneath the loin, then roll up the pork, patting on and compacting the stuffing as you go – you’ll end up with around 10 stuffing balls’ worth of leftover stuffing (see tip). Sit it with the seam underneath and tie with the string to tightly secure it.
When you’re ready to cook, preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF/gas 4.
Make a trivet: scrub the carrots, peel, quarter and break up the onion into petals, halve the celery sticks, then place into a large roasting tray. Sit the porchetta on top.
Score the underside of the skin and season generously with sea salt and the fennel seeds. Flip it over and score again randomly. Place the fat skin-side up on the top bars of the oven, with the porchetta on the shelf beneath, so the rendered fat drips onto the pork. Cook for 3 hours, or until the meat is really tender, basting now and again, removing the crackling after about 1 hour, or when golden and crisp.
Peel the potatoes, cutting any larger ones so they’re an even size – you want them quite chunky (roughly 8cm). Heat the stock in a large pan, add the potatoes and parboil for 14 minutes. Drain into a colander over a large bowl to catch the starchy stock – this will make an incredible gravy later. Steam dry, then shake the colander to chuff them up. Add to a large roasting tray with the unpeeled garlic cloves, rosemary and a pinch of salt and pepper.
Scrub the remaining root veg well, keeping the skin on. Trim and cut the parsnips and swede into rough chunks, cut the turnips into sixths (or eighths, if large), and trim the carrots, keeping them whole. Add to a large roasting tray, season with salt and pepper, pick over the herb leaves, add the unpeeled garlic, bay and vinegar. Set aside.
Transfer the cooked porchetta to a board, cover with tin foil and a tea towel, then leave to rest for 1 hour 30 minutes.
Carefully spoon a few tablespoons of pork fat over each veg tray (use olive oil, if you’d like to keep them veggie), toss well, then place all the veg in the oven and roast for 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes, or until golden.
Skim away the remaining fat from the porchetta tray into a jar, leave to cool, then place in the fridge for tasty cooking another day. To make your gravy, place the porchetta tray over a medium heat on the hob. Stir in the flour, mashing the carrots and scraping up all those gnarly bits from the base. Stir in the cranberry sauce, then add 700ml of the reserved starchy stock and simmer until it’s the consistency of your liking, stirring occasionally. Strain the gravy through a coarse sieve, pushing all the goodness through with the back of a spoon, then season to perfection, tweaking with a little extra cranberry sauce, if you like.
Carve up the porchetta, and serve with the gravy, roast veg, crackling and all your favourite trimmings.

Keeping the skin on my roast veggies is my favourite thing to do, giving them incredible flavour and it’s less work, too.
Porchetta is traditionally made with the belly loin, but you can make it a lot cheaper by using pork belly, which you can stuff and roll in exactly the same way.

Prep the porchetta 1 to 2 days ahead – it’ll keep happily in the fridge. Just make sure the stuffing is cooled down to room temperature before filling, then cover and refrigerate.
Prep the root veg the day before if you like, then throw them in the oven while your porchetta is resting.

Bake your leftover stuffing balls alongside your roast potatoes in an oiled baking dish in an oven preheated to 190ºC/375ºF/gas 5 until golden and gorgeous.