Pork Belly Ravioli

Would you believe I got lost in the grocery store for the past 5 months? Okay 50+ hours a week at the restaurant did not leave a lot of time for writing. But hey I do have a good stockpile of recipes now that I have tested.

Everywhere you turn these days I feel as though you see Pork Belly this and Pork belly that... If you don’t want to see another Pork Belly recipe, look away now.

The current Pork Belly hype is all for very good reason. It is a relatively easy cut of meat to cook, and you get some amazing results. I fully admit that this is not the dish to prepare if you are on a low fat diet, but I have never been accused of being on a low fat diet, so there.

This recipe started when I was watching TV the other night, and an idea for a dish to prepare for a client came into my head (we will cover that one on another day). I was thinking about the protein for the dish, and thought "wow, this would be nice with pork belly." This thought meandered to “wow, I would love some pork belly ravioli.” No one I know makes it, so I researched it and decided to just make a batch and see how it came out. The results were pretty damn good. The only down side was I knew this particular client would never approve the dish for their menu, but I ate well that night!

Stuffed Pistachio Crusted Pork Loin

"At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us." - Albert Schweitzer

This is a quote in the front of one of my favorite books The Flavor Bible. It is really an amazing book to be able to cross refrence flavors when compling a dish. But I was stumped about exactly how I wanted to do this dish. I had a conversation with one of my favorite chef's who also happens to be my best friend. I trust her judgement and she brought the random thoughts into a cohesive dish.

Pork Chili Verde

So when I gave my recipe for the tomatillo sauce, it generated a couple of questions. Could it be used as a base for a Chili Verde. As a big fan of this dish I thought about it and decided to see what I could do. I know this is not an authentic New Mexico Chili Verde recipe. I do not claim it to be. I do claim that it is authentic Anthony Messina Chili Verde. That is what I will stand by.

I started out with getting a definition of Chili Verde:
Pigonaspit.com says it is "Stew or sauce usually made from chunks of pork that have been slow cooked in chicken broth, garlic, tomatillos, and jalapeño peppers." while dictonary.com says it is "a stew of beef or pork, or both, flavored with hot green peppers." I had both of these covered.

I started with slow roasting my pork in my favorite dry rub with the peppers for added flavor and mde my stew based on this. I purposly cooked more pork then I was going to need so I would have plenty of drippings to add back in.

The six peppers looks like it is going to be very spicy but it has a very nice rounded flavor when complete.

Pork Chili Verde

The time it takes to roast everything adds to the flavors. You could probably just skip this and cube the pork and brown it. Remove it from the pan, roast the peppers then start the chili in that way, but that is not the way I like to do things. Respect the Pig. Allow it time to generate the flavors and you will be rewarded. My personal choice for rubs is a variation of the Perini rub from the book Texas Cowboy Cooking.

5 lbs Pork But bone in
¼ cup Favorite Dry Rub
1 tbsp cumin seeds
2 ea Jalapeno Peppers
2 ea Poblano Peppers
2 ea Anaheim Peppers
2 ea Medium Yellow Onion
8 ea Garlic Clove
salt and freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup Olive Oil
1.5 lbs Tomatillo, Fresh Rough Chopped
4 cups Chicken stock
3 tbsp Apple Cider Vinegar
3 tbsp lime juice, or to taste
1 bunch Cilantro tops

Oven Temperature: 200°F


To Cook the Pork:

1 Place Pork in a deep Roasting Pan.

2 Sprinkle with dry rub and cumin then massage into pork.

3 Place in center of pan, fat side up.

4 Peel an quarter one of the onions and place in bottom of the pan.

5 Place whole peppers, and garlic cloves around the pork in the pan.

6 Sprinkle liberally with salt and pepper and cover tightly with foil, making sure that the foil is not touching the meat.

7 Place in oven at 200 Degrees and allow to cook for 12 hours.

8 Remove pork from pan and set aside, strain juices from pan.

9 Set peppers, garlic and onion aside, and allow juices to separate.

10 Shred pork with fingers or 2 forks to desired size.

Assemble the Chili Verde:

1 Heat pot over medium heat, and add olive oil.

2 Chop remaining onion and add to pot, cook till starts to brown.

3 Turn heat down to medium and add Tomatillos cooking for about 5 minutes stirring occasionally.

4 Remove stems from cooked peppers, and add to pot along with onion and garlic that was cooked with pork.

5 Skim fat from reserved juices and add up to two cups to pot.

6 Allow to simmer for about 30 minutes.

7 Using a standing or immersion blender puree the mixture.

8 Stir in pork till you have the amount you would like to use, ( I used about 2/3rds)

9 Return to a simmer and add lime juice to taste.

10 Stir in chopped cilantro and adjust seasoning.

Serve over rice if you would like and enjoy! This makes quite a bit so have a few friends around to help you eat it.