Roll Of Roast Pork Stuffed With Pistachio Nuts And Thyme ©

An excellent Sunday roast or an alternative to Turkey at Christmas.

This is a roll of pork stuffed with pistachio nuts, pine nuts and crushed fennel seeds.

It is marinaded in orange juice, white wine and brandy and surrounded by dried apricots, cranberries and rosemary.

Easy

Serves 6

Preparation Time: 30 minutes


Ingredients

1-1.5 kilos of pork for stuffing
50 g pine nuts roughly chopped
50 g pistachio nuts roughly chopped
2 tbs fennel seeds ground
4 tbs Dijon mustard or enough to cover meat inside and out
16 dried apricots
4 tbs dried cranberries
4 tbs fresh thyme leaves, stalks removed
6 small sprigs of rosemary
Juice two oranges and the zest
3 cloves garlic
4 whole star anise
A generous drizzle of olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper


Method

1. Gather all your ingredients together to prepare the marinade.
2. Lay meat out on a roasting tin or an ovenproof dish.
3. Using 1/2 the Dijon mustard, spread over the meat.
4. Sprinkle with salt and freshly ground pepper.
5. Toast fennel seeds lightly in a frying pan and grind in a pestle and mortar.
Sprinkle over meat.
6. Roast nuts until golden and chop roughly. Place a line of nuts down the centre of both pieces of meat.
7. Sprinkle over the thyme leaves.
8. Carefully tie together each piece of meat with kitchen string.
9. Pour over orange juice, white wine and brandy. Season with salt and pepper and cover with remaining mustard.
10. Place a line of chopped garlic along the top and decorate with sprigs of rosemary.
11. Evenly distribute the dried apricots and cranberries around the pork.
12. This can all be done the day before and placed in the refrigerator to marinade.
13. Important: One hour before cooking time, remove from fridge to come to room temperature.
14. Place in pre-heated oven 200.C and roast for 1 to 1.5 hours, basting regularly and adding a little more orange juice, so sauce doesn’t dry up. When it is nicely browned on top, cover with a sheet of grease proof paper and leave for the rest of the cooking time.
15. Allow 15 minutes to rest, remove string carefully and cut into slices.
16. Garnish with thyme sprigs and serve.

Apricots and cranberries

Roasted pistachio and pine nuts.

Grind roasted fennel seeds

Lay each piece of meat out onto roasting tray and season.

Grind fennel seeds

Roughly chop roasted nuts

Sprinkle meat with fennel and thyme leaves

Pour a line of nuts down the centre of each piece of meat

Roll meat up and tie with kitchen string

Add the rest of your ingredients

Roast in preheated oven at 200.C for over an hour until cooked. Baste every 20 minutes and cover with grease proof paper, if it gets too brown. Have a little extra orange juice on hand so that surrounding sauce doesn’t dry out.