Hello guys! Hope you had a wonderful Christmas celebration and long weekend. rif and I had a pretty good time celebrating the occasion with both our families and a few close friends.
Christmas kisses from little Natasha
Dinner at my parent’s
It is also the first time we’re celebrating without my mother and while that sucks, I was determined to make sure our Christmas Eve dinner tradition continues. Ordered a turkey from Mezze for dinner at my parent’s place and for lunch, we went over to rif’s sister’s place for a simple meal with his family.
Sister in-law made a rich chocolate cake
On Christmas Day itself, we hosted a simple lunch for our friends where I made a rosemary and garlic roast pork while rif prepared his specialty – lasagna. For those of you who want to attempt making the roast pork, here’s how I did mine:
- Pork belly (1.5kg to 2kg)
- Salt
- Fresh rosemary
- Garlic
First, you will need to dry the meat using a paper towel to remove as much moisture as you can. Then stab holes on the skin surface – this is to ensure the skin crisps up in the oven.
Christmas day lunch at our place — we had lasagna, garden salad, roast pork and truffle mash potato with coddled egg
Roast pork with rosemary and garlic
I basically made incisions in the pork belly and stuffed garlic and rosemary all over for flavour and aroma. Don’t you just love the smell of roasted garlic? Once you’re done with the garlic and rosemary, turn the meat over (skin side up) and rub salt all over the skin surface to season and dehydrate the skin. I don’t put salt onto the meat because the roast pork would become really salty.
Let it sit in the fridge overnight and pop it into the oven two hours before you plan to serve. Turn the heat to 250c and roast it for about 40 minutes (if you’re making it with a smaller slab of pork belly, adjust the time accordingly) and then bring the temperature down to 180c to finish. By then, the skin should be crispy and nice.
Don’t worry if the skin blackens or char in certain areas. Just use a knife to scrape away the charred bits and you’ll be fine. I used the siew yuk method that my mother in-law taught me but with different seasoning because she’s been making the best siew yuk all this while and I don’t like feeling like I’m second best lol. 😛
So I made this rosemary garlic version instead. If you prefer the traditional siew yuk, just skip the rosemary and garlic step and rub 5-spice powder onto the meat.
Dessert, after all that feasting!