Finishing off a slow cooked pork joint in the oven?

nicoc

Hi All,

Hopefully a quick question here. Apologies if I'm being incredibly thick here but just want to check my thinking.
I've got my parents coming down to stay for the weekend, I'll get home from work about 7pm and they will more than likely be on my doorstep, hungry and waiting for me
I really want to use up a huge pork crackling joint I got reduced in Mr S from £9 down to £2.50 as its way too big for just me and OH.
However it will take too long to start roasting it when I get in.
Thought maybe I could do it in the slow cooker during the day in cider, apple and onions and then just bung it in a high over for blast to try and crisp the crackling when I get in. Then try and fashion a gravy out of the juices?

My question is, do you think this will work? My dad loves crackling so would be a shame to waste it but I've never shoved something in the oven after slow cooking so no idea if this genius 4am thought of mine will work!

Any advice would be appreciated!

maman

nicoc wrote: »

Hi All,

Hopefully a quick question here. Apologies if I'm being incredibly thick here but just want to check my thinking.
I've got my parents coming down to stay for the weekend, I'll get home from work about 7pm and they will more than likely be on my doorstep, hungry and waiting for me
I really want to use up a huge pork crackling joint I got reduced in Mr S from £9 down to £2.50 as its way too big for just me and OH.
However it will take too long to start roasting it when I get in.
Thought maybe I could do it in the slow cooker during the day in cider, apple and onions and then just bung it in a high over for blast to try and crisp the crackling when I get in. Then try and fashion a gravy out of the juices?

My question is, do you think this will work? My dad loves crackling so would be a shame to waste it but I've never shoved something in the oven after slow cooking so no idea if this genius 4am thought of mine will work!

Any advice would be appreciated!

It sounds OK in principle and maybe others can advise. I suppose it's the same as boiling a piece of ham and then putting it in the oven with cloves/marmalade or whatever to caramelise.

Personally I'd never experiment with something I'd never done before when I have guests. If your parents are coming for the weekend, why not have something else on Friday night that's easy to pre-prepare and have the pork on Saturday. Personally I love Jamie Oliver's recipe for slow roast pork.

dandy-candy

Could you leave a key for your parents with a neighbour or hidden somewhere so they could let themselves in earlier and bung it in the oven for you? If you have it all prepared and ready to go then I don't think it would be rude to ask.

HappyMJ

If you put it in the slow cooker the fat will melt away and you won't have much left for the crackling. You could try cooking it seperately from the rest of the joint....

Absinthe_2

HappyMJ wrote: »

If you put it in the slow cooker the fat will melt away and you won't have much left for the crackling. You could try cooking it seperately from the rest of the joint....

I always remove the rind, and cook separately for crackling, so seems a good idea. It should only take approx 1/2 an hour to do the crackling separately. So could pop it in, as soon as you got home.

I'd be tempted to get a take-away the first night though as will still take up your time.

kittycat204

i agree about taking it off the joint and cooking separately. really don't think it will work otherwise.

http://aww.ninemsn.com.au/living/772817/crunchy-pork-crackling

rachbc

nother vote for taking the rind of and crackling it in the oven - make sure you get a good layer of fat underneath it too or it won't crackle

Diflower

If you could do the pork on Saturday or Sunday I'd go for that anyway, as you'll still have a fair bit to do after you get in.
But if that's not an option then agree, take the skin & crackling off to cook separately.

One question - does your oven have an auto-timer? I keep forgetting mine does!
That way you could have the pork on fairly low with a covered dish of Dauphinoise-type potatoes (or just layered with stock), then when you get in turn the heat up to crisp it, check the potatoes, uncover or take out to keep warm.

nicoc

Thanks for all the advice!

It's mums the birthday the following day so we're all going out to the Tower of London and then for a curry on brick lane so I felt I should cook really given the next day we'd be eating out......though the multiple take away suggestions are very tempting!

Sounds like if I do persevere on being the dutiful and perfect daughter quest then definitely the way to do it is remove the fat before slow cooking and deal with that separately. For some reason it hadn't occurred to me that the fat would melt away in the slow cooker but of course it will, good to tell it was a 4am thought!

Thanks so much all, plenty to think about but knew you'd be able to help