Nicest thing about pork- its price. I was thinking about lamb shanks, but bloody hell, 14 quid?!! I have tried a beautiful pair of jeans on and DID NOT buy them, so I continued to be good and bought some pork shoulder steaks instead, for £4. Pat, pat. 🙂

I marinated my pork chunks in a mixture of soy sauce, about 4tbsp, same amount of rice wine, or mirin, half a chopped red chilli, some root ginger and a clove of garlic  and tossed it in the fridge for a couple of hours.

Upwarmed the oven to 160, gas mark 3, I fried a handful of chopped spring onions, another half of the chilli, more ginger and 2 garlic cloves, added the pork, its marinade and browned it all over. I added a good tsp of five spice, 2 tbsp of sugar and some cinnamon. Then transferred  it all to the casserole, poured hot chicken stock in, added a tbsp of tomato puree, stirred and put in the oven, covered, for over an hour.

The second part of the braising involved some plums, quartered, which thickened the whole thing nicely, as it was uncovered in the oven for another 1,5 hour( or until when Florek gets home! ) 🙂

It had 44 good reviews in Good Food, I think I’d do it again, but with sweet, very ripe plums, cause mine were not fantastic. But we ate the whole thing, served with rice and finished with more chopped spring onions. Decent. 7 out of 10.

My dessert this evening looked great, but tasted okeish. Florian said I should not have used salted butter for the base( that’s the only one I had), which I baked and then topped with a cream cheese, strawberry and icing sugar mixture. Pretty, but not particularly memorable.