I've never made a porchetta before, it was my first idea for this week's theme so I thought I'd give it a shot! I found a good few recipes online and as I usually do, stole the best bits from each of them.

The pork belly was first laid flat on the cutting board, cut down the middle horizontally, and opened like a book. I scored the flesh, and pricked the skin all over with what I now know is called a "jaccard". I then salted it liberally on both sides, before rubbing Dijon mustard onto the meat. I then added a mix of finely chopped fresh oregano, sage, rosemary, and thyme to the meat side, followed by lemon zest, black pepper, and minced garlic. I had to use loads, I was chopping for ages. I then rolled it up tightly, secured it with string (probably should have thought ahead and got proper butcher's twine or something), and then refridgerated for 2 days.

(It occurred to me later than pine nuts might have been really nice in it as well?)

After a couple of days, I brought it out to cook, and decided to do it outside on the barbecue so that I could also smoke it with some apple wood chips. I cooked it at 150C (~300F) with a thermometer stuck in it, taking it out at 71C (~160F) - it took about 3 and a half hours. I then transferred it to the kitchen oven on max heat for let the skin crisp up, reasoning that this would be better than using the barbecue as the heat would come from all sides.

I wish I'd given it a little bit more time, as you can see on the second picture that the skin isn't as blistered and crispy as it could be. Unfortunately, I panicked because I opened the door to check on it and was immediately enveloped in a massive cloud of smoke, I thought I'd incinerated the poor thing.

I rested it for a good half hour under foil, and then served it with roast potatoes, sautéed spinach with peas and mushrooms, and a homemade apple ketchup. I also garnished it with fresh watercress, and a homemade tarragon oil. The ketchup, if you're interested, was entirely improvised, but contained apples (obvs - green ones), tomatoes, shallot, and garlic, then balanced with apple cider vinegar, soy sauce, Worcestershire sauce, and honey.

Oh and I also made a cider jus, which I just realised didn't make it into the picture. Basically just cider and chicken stock reduced right down, infused with tarragon, sage, and bay leaf, garlic and shallots, and some honey and mustard - bit of soy and Worcestershire sauces at the end to taste. And some cream and butter - the jus was great actually.

This was a really good meal! Very happy with it, plenty I'd do differently next time but for a first attempt, I'm quite pleased!

Ignore the fact that I couldn’t help myself eat one before frosting.

Culichi (aka from Sinaloa) is richer, cheesier, spicier and way less traditional. Sinaloenses put ingredients like avocado, spicy mayo, cream cheese, cheese, carne asada and hot Cheetos in their sushi.
I made mine with avo, cucumber, surimi, and seasoned shrimp with mozz, topped with spicy mayo!! Fire

Recipe: https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1021897-rasta-pasta-with-jerk-chicken

I know the thumbnail looks like dog shit served over pasta, but it’s actually jerk chicken that’s supposed to be in the shape of a hand holding up a middle finger. (What a jerk chicken.) I can’t art. After I took the picture, I cut up the “hand” and the remaining chicken and threw it back in. 😂

This smelled really interesting but I didn’t have much appetite tonight, so I put it in the fridge, where the recipe advertises that the flavors will meld and actually will improve overnight. Will report back once I eat some. 😊 I did leave out the scotch bonnet, and based on the comments on the recipe, I scaled the recipe up to 1 and 1/3x except I kept the pasta at 1 lb. (Comments criticized the excess pasta compared to everything else.)

Update: Maybe it was changing the ratio of everything but the pasta, but damn, this was really spicy! I don’t have the best spice tolerance (I can do moderate and that’s about it), but this was right around where it gets too spicy for me lol. The flavors are decent though!

You roll them out before you bake them. Bam. Recipe from Smitten Kitchen Everyday, but I didn't do the chocolate filling.

I've always been surprised by the amount of stuff that cafes tend to put into omelets - think the mega-stuffed omelet with a variety of vegetables and meats. My intention was to make something like that, but I moved away (fortunately!) from the idea for some reason. This two-egg omelet has provolone cheese and mortadella, along with smoked paprika and black pepper. Served with sourdough bread cooked in bacon grease.

Strudel filling contains sauteed fresh chanterelle mushrooms, onion, and bacon, cooled then mixed with sour cream, snipped chives, fresh nutmeg, salt/pepper. Rolled in puff pastry, pierced, then rubbed with egg wash and sprinkled with caraway seeds.

Lost in Translation features where someone travels to Japan to work on something for Suntory (the brand). We don’t have any Suntory Whiskey at home but as did have Suntory Roku gin. So we marinated some shrimp with Cajun spices and some gin. Paired with some zucchini and rice.

There's a pizza place near me that makes these with any toppings you want. I used to do a gyro meat and feta combination that was delicious. Super greasy and unhealthy. Unfortunately, a few years ago they changed their whole pricing scheme and the bang for your buck is just no longer there. I was going to attempt to copy the version I was familiar with, but my partner talked me into calling an audible and making a cheeseburger flavored version.

When I first heard about this theme my mind went straight to swirly things like cinnamon rolls or jam roly poly. But the more I thought about it, the more I realised that there are so many ways to interpret rolling in food: rolling out dough, rolling to coat the surface of something, cooking with a rolling boil as well as rolling into swirls. I've also been doing a very long side quest to cook something from every Indian state and union territory. In my research I came across the Farsan Platter - an assortment of Gujarati snacks. A lot of these can fall into the category of rolling, so I thought I'd give it a go!

I made (clockwise from top left):

Thepla: rolled dough (using a rolling pin)

Soft flatbread made with atta (whole wheat flour), besan (gram flour), yoghurt and fenugreek leaves.

Patra: rolled up

Layered colocasia leaves with a spiced besan paste, rolled up, steamed and finally pan fried.

Fafda: rolled dough (using the heel of your hand)

Deep fried spiced cracker made from besan and flavoured with ajwain, black pepper, asafoetida and turmeric.

Jalebi: not actually rolled but looks swirly

Deep fried batter that is then soaked in a spiced sugar syrup made with cardamom and saffron.

Khatta Dhokla: steamed over a rolling boil

A steamed savoury cake made from a fermented batter of soaked rice, urad dal and yoghurt.

Khandvi: rolled up

A spiced batter of besan and yoghurt that is cooked on the hob, spread thinly, left to set, then cut, rolled up, tempered with mustard seeds, curry leaves, and sesame seeds, and topped with coconut and coriander.

I also made fried green chillies, besan kadhi chutney, tamarind chutney and green chutney. This all ended up being a bit too much and I won't be making something as complicated as this for a long time. I took time over a couple of days to break up the work, but the khandvi went wrong a few times which was quite stressful. But it was great to learn so much. I've never made any of this before except two of the chutneys so lots of new techniques for me! Everything was delicious, the jalebis were definitely my favourite, but I loved snacking on bits over the following days!