Photo image from Pinterest
Porchetta is a beautiful thing to see and an even more delicious thing to eat. Porchetta is an Italian Pork Roast. Not just any pork roast, but a pork on pork roast stuffed with lots of garlic, herbs, fennel, citrus zest, sometimes dijon mustard, definitely red pepper flakes and the most important ingredient of all is love.
Porchetta is popular in the whole country of Italy, but porchetta originated in central Italy. Once only considered a celebratory dish is now served as common street food. It can be served in a panino or sandwich or as a filling for pizza Bianca. It is also eaten by families as part of a picnic.
Porchetta found its way to America in the early 20th century. Italian immigrants especially from Abruzzo referred to it as Italian roast pork or just roast pork. Luckily for us, they brought this masterpiece of a dish with them.
Porchetta is popular in NY, Philadelphia, and the surrounding area in the form of a sandwich on an Italian roll with broccoli rabe and sharp provolone. Porchetta is also a tradition in Bridgeport, CT. Porchetta sandwiches were served in taverns that date back to the first wave of Italian immigrants. Now porchetta is popular everywhere in our country and is widely popular in Ontario as well.
So what is it anyway you may be thinking? Modern porchetta is a pork roast that has been butterflied open and rubbed with garlic, herbs, red pepper flakes, lemon, fennel, and whatever else the cook wants to put in. I say modern because porchetta’s used to be stuffed with different parts of the pig. Nose to tail eating at its finest.
The porchetta is then rolled up in a slab of pork belly. The cook ties both pieces of pork together tightly. It is roasted until the outside of the porchetta has crunchy cracklins and the inside is up to temperature and is tender, juicy, and flavorful.
The porchetta is cooled so it can be sliced thinly for sandwiches, or can be served hot, sliced thicker, and eaten as a main course at a Sunday dinner or celebration.
I’ve been wanting to make porchetta for years and finally made one last Christmas Eve. I took the year off from our traditional seafood Christmas Eve to give it a try. The roast itself cost an arm and a leg, luckily the butcher was a nice and butterflied the roast for me. Free of charge…what a guy!
I decided that instead of making traditional porchetta I was going to make one wrapped in high-quality bacon. The thought of rolling it in pork belly would be legit, but over the top, not only in expense but silly for only 4 people. I felt more comfortable trying it with bacon since it was my first go at it and not expensive.
I found the freshest herbs and fennel I could find and wanted to follow a recipe to the letter. I wanted to get the real flavor, the real thing. As I looked at different recipes they were all freakin’ different! Which one should I pick or trust?
Below is a link to the Bacon Wrapped Porchetta recipe I used. I added the zest of one large orange to mine, which isn’t in the recipe but I think a key ingredient.
https://www.food.com/recipe/bacon-wrapped-porchetta-512583
I read many blogs and articles about porchetta before I made it and decided on one recipe. True to form I added a couple of ingredients that were in most recipes but not others. This is the story of my cooking life. No one writes one complete recipe as I have it in my head, so I make up my own.
I must say that it came out like a work of art. It was one of my proudest cooking achievements to date. When we tasted it we were all like, “Oh my God! Oh wow! Holy shit, this is good!” It was that good. Would I make it again? Sure, but for more people next time. We ate it for a couple of days, froze the rest and when we defrosted it we had it as sandwiches, it was still amazing.
For Marty’s birthday dinner the other night I wanted to make something special. Something I don’t make very often. The porchetta wasn’t an option, but I did a plan. After I looked at what I had in the freezer and refrigerator I decided to make a weeknight porchetta.
I was going to make a prosciutto-wrapped pork tenderloin using all the herbs and flavors that I used in my traditional porchetta. It literally took less than 20 minutes to prep it and about 35 minutes in the oven. I crisped up the prosciutto under the broiler for a minute and let it rest. Later I looked if there were any recipes for weeknight porchetta and sure enough there were. Of course, none were exactly how I made it, but close enough to share with you guys so you get the idea and if you want to make your own.
Here is the link to the Weeknight Porchetta recipe that is close to the one I made. I added lemon zest to mine because I didn’t have an orange, I think the citrus adds another layer of flavor.
https://www.kitchenkonfidence.com/2015/02/porchetta-pork-tenderloin
While this weeknight porchetta wasn’t as grand as the holiday one, it came pretty damn close with little effort or money. It sliced beautifully and was so juicy and flavorful. I served it with mashed potatoes and maple-glazed carrots. It was a hit! Marty and my son Noah loved it, so I was very happy. It was such a successful birthday dinner. Yay, it’s what I live for!
The good news is if you have never had or even heard of porchetta you can make this weeknight version and it will be so close in taste, it will be like having the real thing!
By the way those mashed potatoes I served with the Porchetta, the leftovers are being transformed tonight into Loaded Potato Soup.