Crispy pork belly gyros of many traditions

I guess somebody was in a street food mood lately, yeah I think so.


This round of Velveteers has been brought us by the eclectic mind of Asha from Fork Spoon Knife. Amidst her blog birthday and the plethora of guest posts she managed to put together for the occasion, she came up with the idea of challenging us in making Gyros ourselves....
What is Gyros? Come on, you know that! Oh wait, you might know it as Doner Kebab perhaps. In effect they are essentially the same thing and that is a huge conical pillar of meat roasted vertically on a skewer.
If you didn't know that Germany is famous for its sausages and sauerkraut, you would call Doner (contraction from Doener Kebab) the national dish. You find a "Doener Haus" almost every second corner around here and I would bet that 1/3 of the middle-aged to young part of the population almost entirely survives on it. If well done this fast-food item can be in effect quite a balanced meal.

Home sweet home

Almost one week ago I finally arrived in Sicily. Right out of the plane, my home land welcomed me with a warm sunny embrace, relaxing and comforting.
It has been a few years since I last visited my family during the summer season. I had forgotten the mood, the still atmosphere, the crave for that breeze in the evening, the blinding sun, the suffocating heat, the singing cicadas, the sleepy cats spread over the shadowy ground; I had forgotten the Sicilian summer symbolon.

Already the day after my arrival it was farmers’ market day in my town. Sacrificing few hours of sleep, I joined my mother for a walk among the various stands. The day was sunny and not too warm; after a ride among the flock of innumerable cars all slowly approaching the city center with their occupant, we reached the market area. The first stalls to welcome us were those of clothes, shoes and other bric-a-brac. After finalizing few errands, we entered the food area inside the old soccer stadium.

Working around Rice Noodles

Since when I decided to avoid wheat, I started experimenting with rice noodles.

What is great about them? They do not need to "cook" just soak in warm water and since they do not leek much starch, they do not clump together if soaked in a tight environment (see glue like pasta in this same condition) you can directly soak them in their sauce!

Recently the guys from the blog Ideas in Food (aka Chef Aki Kamozawa and Chef Alexander Talbot) have translated this soaking method also to wheat pasta.
Their point of view is that, when you cook pasta you are just re-hydrating it and swelling the starch granules. Now, the hydration part does not need heat so it is possible to soak dried wheat pasta in a cold solution (for some hours actually) before cooking its starches (once soaked the cooking will take a matter of few minutes).
From here, the great new versatility of the pasta medium.

Here there are a couple of my experiments (one has already been posted extensively):

- Rice noodles in clove scented oriental soup with chicken, fava beans and peas (read past post);

Tonight's Dinner – Penne rigate with Pork Belly in Spicy Tomato sauce

Here we go! Just finished dinner :) Tonight I had a quintessential Sicilian pasta!

How to proceed if you wish to try this at home? Nothing more simple.
Have a nice piece of pork belly in your fridge (my piece had bones and weighted roughly 300g), cut it in thick slices (removing first the bones if there are any, but do not throw them away!!). Take away the skin from the meat and put it with the bones in a hot pan to roast for a while.
While skin and bones are browning, cut the meat in chunks and add them to the pan. Sear well the meat and add some olive oil. Add then 1/2 teaspoon of red chilli flakes (depends how spicy you want your sauce) and stir. Skin and chop a few garlic cloves (more or less 1 per person) and add to the meat. Be careful not to burn the garlic, the oil in pan is fairly hot, so stir the mixture carefully.
After a few minutes add some tomato purée (250ml for 2 people) and the same amount of water. Lower the heat, cover and let reduce. In the meantime boil some salted water for the pasta (I always taste my water to judge how much salt I need). When ready, cook the penne.

Tonight's Dinner – Duck Panzerotti with Juniper Hazelnut-Butter and Bitter Almonds

Yesterday, a very good friend of mine gave me a few fresh Panzerotti pasta filled with duck. What’s best for tonight’s dinner! I had to cook them.
I decided to use Bitter Almonds and Hazelnut-Butter, I had only to figure out how these things were going to work together.
Time to start cooking! :D
Once put the salted water for the pasta to boil, I started browning a nice chunk of butter over low heat.
In a small saucepan, the butter started melting, the milk solid create an opaque white mass that floats inside the clear yellow liquor. Foam starts forming, the smell becomes warmer and more complex and slowly the whole turns a nice hazelnut color. When the temperature reaches 145deg C the hazelnut butter is ready!