Hi Everyone, One of the main reasons I like to cook roast pork is just so that I can make and eat the cracklings. Done right, there will be a fight for every piece.
Crackling is the rind or skin that sits above a layer of fat and meat of roasting pork. There are various names and methods associated with cracklings – from Europe to Asia to Latin America. Some of you may be more familiar with Mexican or Puerto Rican chicharrón –fried pork fat with skin found just above the meat. This is also known as crackling. However, the crackling that is the subject of this column, refers to the skin on top of the fat and meat that once roasted, becomes crisp and hard to the touch but crunchy to the bite. You know the crackling is done perfectly right when you can easily lift the crackling away from the meat and the fat has melted.
Just like a roast chicken, there are numerous recipes, suggestions and ways to roast pork so that the skin is cooked in such a manner that it becomes crackling, while at the same time, the meat becomes fork tender with succulent morsels. A lot of recipes and suggestions involve more than one method of cooking. Some require the meat to be boiled or blanched first then roasted. Others suggest starting the cooking on the stovetop and then finishing it in the oven.
My craving for homemade crackling got started when
