We are going on Day Three of the entire family being wiped out by Tiny G’s cold. It’s a killer, and demands comfort food so the first night we ordered extra spicy Thai curry, the next it was chicken noodle soup, and then today I threw an 8-pound pork butt into the oven and slow roasted it for almost seven hours. I used another flawless recipe from Bruce Aidells that ran in Bon Appétit last year. There was pretty much zero prep other than throwing a few things into the food processor to make a garlicky salsa verde to spoon over. Quite by accident [read: I was totally spaced out on cold meds and not paying attention], I tripled the garlic in the salsa verde. You don’t need to do that. But I’m certainly breathing [fire] a lot better now. You won’t believe how easy and how satisfying this is. Just rich, decadent goodness topped with a bright, fresh Italian parsley salsa. Total prep time for pork and salsa? Maybe 10 minutes. Tomorrow night I’m thinking pulled pork sandwiches for dinner, maybe with some mostarda if I’m up to swinging by Mozza2Go….we’re happily going to be eating pork for days to come.
The pork gets a spice rub (chopped rosemary & sage, some garlic, salt and pepper), and then goes into a 450-degree oven for 20 minutes. Then you cut the heat to 300 and roast until a thermometer reads 185 degrees.
As for the salsa verde, throw some chopped Italian parsley, garlic, anchovies (I didn’t have any so used a healthy squirt of anchovy paste), lemon juice and zest and some more rosemary and sage into a food processor, along with some red wine vinegar. Then, while food processor is running, add a stream of olive oil and THAT’S IT. Huge payoff, next to no effort. And sure to get the troops back on track.
