Well I tried to convince my family to forego the traditional Christmas dinner in favour of a 15 minute meal but sadly no one seemed too keen and so turkey it was. Credit must to go to the chef (who for once was not me) for a fantastic ensemble and even mother outdid herself with four or five palatable desserts. After a few days of eating and drinking to excess with the family though it was back to normality and we resisted the temptation of the pizza delivery man to crack on with a challenge which now requires me to cook 5 meals in just 4 days if I'm going to see it through.
Of the remaining meals, this was the only one which Lolz deemed satisfactory for tonights evening meal and it is definitely on trend - everyone seems to rave about Mexican street food these days - but I wasn't convinced these would hit anywhere near the high standards set by the likes of Wahaca. Nonetheless we set out for Waitrose and although many shelves were rather bare as a result of pre-Christmas shopping sprees, we managed to find everything we needed.
Now you might be thinking, how on earth can you cook pork belly in 15 minutes, when normally it would take up to 2 hours in the oven. Well the answer of course is that you chop it up into very small cubes which you then pan fry on a high heat - a solution which, like some other pork meals, seemed like it might be one shortcut too far. It turns out that the chopping of the pork belly (and indeed removing it's layer of fat) was a more laborious task than the book gives credit for, but once in the pan it was smelling pretty good (fennel seeds ommitted at Lolz's request) and I thought maybe, just maybe, this would defy my expectations.
Sadly it did not. The pork cooked in such a way is just too tough and no amount of spices and flavourings can mask that. It was also a bit too bean-heavy which just made the filling a bit sloppy. The standard lazyman salad was ok, but nothing special. Lolz, no stranger to a bit of naughtiness, would have liked the tacos to be a bit more naughty, maybe some cheese, sour cream and guacamole rather than the healthy natural yoghurt accompaniment.
One of many food themed Christmas presents was Jamie's latest book, Save with Jamie, which also includes a pork taco recipe... I look forward to seeing how that goes.
Lolz gave the dish 7/10. Difficulty rating 3/10.
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