Arista di maiale al latte (roast pork in milk)

This recipe is not for the faint hearted- vegetarians look the other way!  I was surprised when I first learnt of this method of roasting pork- cooking meat in milk?  It truly is wonderful, and I suggest next time your think of roasting a leg give this recipe a try.  Not only was the meat super tender and filled with flavour, the table were engaged with talk about how this result was achieved.  This particular leg of pork was a whopping five kilos, but was served to a large table of fifteen.  The general rule of thumb is to cook one litre of milk to one kilo of meat. The milk adopts all the flavours of the meat, vegetables and herbs, the carrot helps to colour the sauce and the potato helps to thicken- creating a perfect natural gravy. Serve the roast pork with the 'milk gravy', roast potatoes and a side of buttered spinach! It is also nice to have some roast meat left over for the next day. I used the remaining meat to fill homemade focaccia's with rosemary...so good!!! 

What you need (remember one litre of milk to one kilo of pork):
leg of pork (I used 4.8 kilo..HUGE)
four litres of milk
1 onion roughly sliced
two carrots roughly sliced
two cloves of chopped garlic
one potato chopped roughly
fresh sage and rosemary
two tablespoon butter
one tablespoon olive oil
rock salt and cracked black pepper

How to make:

1: Pre-heat oven to 160 degrees.

2: Put the pork in a deep pan baking pan

3: Warm the milk and butter and add to baking pan, the pork should be half submerged in milk

4: Add the remaining ingredients loosely around pork

5: Rub rosemary, rock salt, garlic and cracked pepper in pork (get in all the creases)

6: Place pork covered in tin foil in oven, mid shelf

7: If you are cooking a large pork, then keep covered until the last one hour, then remove foil.  Or if you a cooking a standard size pork of one kilo, there is no need to cover at all.  The general guideline is to cook in a low oven, one hour per kilo of meat.

8: Remove the meat from oven, cover in tin foil and allow to rest for 20 minutes- keeping all the lovely juice inside!

9: Strain the remaining milk juices into a small saucepan, ensure all fat is skimmed and chunks removed.  Passing it through a sieve will ensure a creamy, smooth gravy

10: Carve slices of meat and serve generously with gravy!

Buon apetito!