Braised Pork Ragout Recipe

Dress a boring braised pork into Franco-Italian outfit then serve on potato cubes. Ragout with a slice of bacon and a bit of garlic that never disappoints.

Ragu is a good thing to happen in the kitchen. It means Italian food, and for some reason Italians know what tasty food is like. They also have style, Ferrari and coffee for equally no apparent reason but we aren’t going on that route now.

Ragu is however a French word coming from the 18th century, meaning “to revive the taste” and spelt ragout. Italians used the word and the meaning to revive pasta by slow cooking meat thus dressing the dish with amazing flavors.

But still by definition this dish isn’t really a true ragu rather than a ragout. It sounds like this thing getting complicated but it’s not.
Ragout is a french stew made of chunks of meat and/or vegetables. While ragu is the same but it’s Italian and cooked or processed to the level where the true identity of meat and vegetables are lost to the unknown (and of course served on pasta).

The Bolognese sauce is an excellent example of this dish, simply called ragu in its homeland with a myriad of varieties in existence. There are ragus made from beef, veal, or any other meat, imaginable like in this case pork.

Pork doesn’t need 4 hours of cooking like beef does though, so we are well inside the magical 90 minutes cooking realm. In fact, pork needs about 40 to 60 minutes to give up its collagen bonds and melt in the mouth like butter in the summer window.

Until it cooks ready, we can prepare a soup, dessert and the side dish as well. For some reason hidden in the complicated nature of flavors, this recipe doesn’t require pasta to fully shine its possibilities though.

It needs potato and the most evil type of that, the deep-fried ones. Serving a ragu with deep fried potatoes will probably blow this dish out of the ragu and with that from the Italian food category, but never mind.

The term French fries is carefully has been left out as the meat isn’t served with carefully horizontally sliced deep fried potatoes. To match the pork in shape and style the potato needs to be diced up to similar shape and size as the meat.

Frying potatoes is an easy task any kitchen newbies can do but we are taking the process one level higher here. We aren’t just throwing the potatoes carelessly into the hot oil and wait for them to cook ready like a buckwheat.

There is an art in French fries, making that should be fully absorbed and applied by anyone who is serious about potatoes. It is a process that requires potatoes to be cooked almost ready on low heat first, then drained and fried ready on high heat.

This two-step process ensures that we have a soft inside and crunchy outside potatoes with lovely golden-brown color. This crunchiness doesn’t last long especially for the ones unlucky enough to be at the bottom of a big batch so we have to be quick serving them.

Not as crunchiness would last long when the braised pork ragout is poured over but it makes an enormous difference having crunchy bites of potatoes with soft melting pork.

The reason this dish wouldn’t fit well with pasta is found in the bacon that is used to yield the fat for sautéing. Those pieces will characterize the whole dish with their occasionally smoky flavor while tipping their hat to the potatoes at each bite.

Not as it is unimaginable food with pasta but the flavor of bacon may be spread across the surface of the pasta too widely without any mellowing effect from the pastas inside. This may leave a kind of harsh rough taste in the mouth, bite after bite. Without some dampening neutral flavor, the taste buds would tire out quickly leaving them without excitement for the rest of the dish.

Serving the meat with thin sauce and salad only is a feat worth exploring. It will open up some new exciting routes that will provide plenty enough excitement for meals to come.

 

Ingredients

• 3 oz / 85g Pork belly or Bacon (sliced)
• 17 oz / 500g Pork (diced ¾” / 2cm)
• 2 Onion (medium) (sliced)
• 2 cloves Garlic (diced or crushed)
• 5 piece Black pepper
• 1 cup Water
• 1 Tomato
• ½ teaspoon Paprika (optional)

How to make Braised Pork Ragout

1. Saute the pork belly or bacon stripes until it yields the fat out for about 2-5 minutes then take them out. Add the diced pork into the hot fat.
2. Saute until all sides turns golden brown. It takes about 10 – 15 minutes
3. Add the onion, garlic and black pepper. For a more characteristic flavor ground black pepper can be used.
4. Stir and saute the onion until it gets a glassy / translucent look for about 2 – 5 minutes.
5. Add water until the ingredients are half immersed then add tomato and the optional paprika.
6. Place the lid on then cook it ready on low heat for about 40 to 60 minutes.
7. Check the water every now and then and refill if necessary otherwise the dish could burn down. It doesn’t need too much as that would produce a flavorless sauce and soak the potatoes as well.
8. After 40 minutes of cooking check the meat for tenderness and start reducing the excess water if necessary by taking the lid off and increasing the heat under the pan.
9. Add the bacon back on and mix it well.

 

Optional

Serving with deep fried potatoes or rutabaga fries on low carb diet.

1. Fry potatoes in two stages first by cooking them in low temperature oil until half soft.
2. Take them out then fry them ready on high temperature until golden brown.

 

Enjoy!

F.A.Q.

What does it mean to braise pork?

Braising means to brown the meat in hot oil then cook it in small amount of liquid on low heat until the meat gets tender.

What cut of pork is best for braising?

The best cut for braising pork comes from the shoulder of the pork known as pork butt or Boston butt.

Why is braised pork belly tough?

Any part of the pork needs a fairly long time to be cooked tender and pork belly is no exception to that. Pork belly needs 1 ½ hours in simmering water or about 3 hours in the oven to be cooked nice and tender.

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