With two different work Christmas dinners to go to I should have been looking forward to trying two different celebratory meals. It turns out, however, that my colleagues organising the celebrations both had the same idea and both will take place in Jamie Oliver’s Italian restaurant 🙂 It turns out that the only thing on the Christmas menu that I find suitable for a main course is Jamie’s take on the Italian classic pork roast porchetta. Never mind, it’s one of my favourite roasts so I am happy to have it twice. Here is my butcher’s version. Pork belly rolled around a pork loin stuffed with garlic fennel and rosemary.

I salt the skin well and rub it in to the scoring to help the skin crisp up. It’s a large joint – this one weighed 2 kilos – and so needs slow cooking. This one took 3.5 hours.

Here is the finished roast. I like to strip the crispy skin off and serve it separately with the slices of full flavoured meat. Buon appetito!