How to braise a pork shoulder in cider with apples and prunes ( learn to truss and cook the meat)

welcome back everyone stefan here the french cooking academy and this week it's all about braising we're going to recap on some small techniques on how to braise a simple pork shoulder here we're going to touch base on some simple trussing technique but the big thing this week we're not going to be using any stock or wine for the braising we're going to start to explore some different ways we're going to be using cider and to bring lots of taste i'm going to use some apples some mushrooms and prunes that i have macerated in this amazing stuff which is a chestnut and apple liquor sounds very good let's go now let's start by having a quick look at the ingredients and what we're going to be using now one of the uh the thing i i've got recently i'm really breaking my head on flavors because i'm realizing it more and more i really really enjoy something that has got real full flavor and when you kind of make a roast or braise a piece of meat it's always the same it's always kind of stock and wine right and i thought you know what what can we do to kind of elevate that and take it to the next level a little bit so for the ingredients we're going to be using we're going to keep things very simple so i've got one onion i've been roughly chopped in a mirepoix two cloves of garlic a bit of creme fraiche a piece of thyme a bay leaf two apples these are just simple oyster mushrooms and of course the prunes now the prunes are the things that's really going to give you a lot of flavor because they're really really succulent they're very soft but i've marinated those in this liquor this is something from central france called le biolu it is an amazing thing which is basically apple and chestnut mixed together into a liquor right and it is sweet and it is so amazing because that taste of apple with the chestnut will go perfectly with this kind of meat so i hope that on this occurrence we're really gonna get some real strong flavor going so to start the recipe we're gonna start to see the trussing and the light stuffing i'm gonna do what i'm gonna do i'm gonna stuff this with some prunes and to make sure there's some taste into this all right so let's start with the prune and the prunes first you buy them from a supermarket they're in packet and they just macerated in that liquor that's what they look like so how do you go about if you want you can just place them like that if you can't be bothered and then you're going to be rolling the stuff but what you can do if you have a large piece of meat like this this is very very thick as you can see here well you can basically take a knife like that make some incisions and you make basically these little pockets and you're going to put your prunes in here all right so i'm going to put one here i'm going to put one there and so on and so forth so it's all the idea what i'm going to do is this little surprise prunes inside my roast and now every time i've got a fixed space here i'm going to add some in so i'm going to go ahead and do that i am done so as you can see i've got prunes in some cavities that i've done and there's some natural spaces where i just put some prunes in here now because it's very juicy because they were marinated and we're going to have to handle this by hand i'm going to use a paper towel here and try to dry as much and to avoid too many juices escape otherwise it's going to be very slippery when we want to do that trusting when i'm here or what i'm gonna do is a little bit of salt and a grind of pepper next we need to trust this or attach it so that it's not one big piece like this so look what i'm gonna do first is trying to gather things like that and i'm just gonna try to roll it in a kind of a shape that looks like a kind of a roast okay put it back on my plate that i've got here and then clean my board i'm gonna try to do some trusting right so for the thrusting we're going to be using the typical butcher string and just a word about trussing if your roast or your piece of meat is not looking perfect with all the string it does not matter at the end of the day all what matters is that your piece of meat kind of holds in one pack so when you cook it it's not gonna detach and go all over the place that's the whole purpose okay the rest is aesthetic so for me here basically i want to go the simple way all what i need is to have that piece of meat to stay kind of like this i'm taking a long piece of string you know a good meter and i'm just going to put this under my roast here i'm gonna put my string here and what i like to do is one by one kind of technique okay so i'm just doing one i'm gonna do a simple knot here to start i put a bit of extra string but it doesn't matter i'm gonna cut these and i'm gonna cut this all right so look at this without being a professional butcher or anything like that if you go bit by bit you can get something that is more than acceptable now i do have that little loose piece here so i think i'm gonna have to have a string going this is the same process you can take a string you can put your roast on top of the string like this and we're basically gonna go over like that and i'm just gonna attach the same way i'm gonna attach my string at the bottom here and make sure i make a knot and this is optional you don't really have to do it this is for me just to make sure it's straight like this okay i'm gonna tie this up and that's it i am done boom and now for the browning of the meat you're gonna have all the use stencils ready i'm using a small thread a piece of meat a pair of tongs a cast iron pot with a little bit of oil now what is braising by definition to braise in french cooking is something we've seen in our course and get started with french cooking it is the action of cooking a piece of meat that has been previously seared on all sides it's been colored and it's being and then you're going to have to cook it in a short amount of liquid meaning it is not fully submerged it is only barely submerged halfway through with liquid of any kind can be a stock it can be wine or it can be anything once the meat is cooked you then create a sauce that is called the fun the breasage the braising stock that happens on the end and that happened to become the sauce you're going to be serving with the meat so by definition it has to be seared before you cook the meat so what we do medium to high heat nice sizzling oil and i'm just going to put my roast here sorry my piece of meat and i'm gonna color it without moving it on each side okay so remember the order you always brown the meat first before you put the garnish so that's been here for a few minutes up on the other side all right now let's do the sides up all right so my piece of meat is brown i'm gonna put it out of the pan we're gonna put the garnish in just the onions onions goes in i'm gonna mix the whole lot and this is happening on low heat now you don't want to really burn anything and we're just gonna catch all the caramelized juices and then add the garlic and the rest of the ingredients now immediately we're gonna add the bay leaf the thyme and the garlic and some mushroom now when you do a braise and you don't use stock you want to have this coloring in the pan this is going to be very very important to give flavor to your dish okay now it's been a few minutes you will notice that i still have my brown here it's not overly brown and i'm going to deglaze now of course with my cider good glass and i'm gonna catch all the juices it's bubbling away all right so it's boiling that's all what i want i'm gonna turn my heat down to low i'm gonna add just a few prunes in here now that i've got extra now you can be generous on the pool it's up to you if you like prunes or not and then put my meat on top before i put the meat in i've turned my heat off totally and i'm just gonna grab my my roast here keep on skipping a roast but it's not a roast and i'm going to place this in there now as you can see there is not too much liquid in here i'm just going to top up with the rest of the cider that i've got to clean that that meat here and that's it it is now ready to be braised in the oven now it's been 50 minutes in and i just want to check my meat to see first off if i've got enough liquid and i want to turn my meat over but i wonder how far i am so a piece of pork has to be 70 degrees celsius which is about 160 i think fahrenheit so what i'm going to do is use one of those fermenter i'm going to plant it in wow look at this surprise 50 minutes in and it is already almost cooked and the sweet spot is 70 degrees celsius i'm at 66. so what i'm gonna do here i'm gonna remove that turn my meat over and cook it for another 10 15 minutes just time for us to prepare the garnish for the garnish is going to be very simple a pan with a little bit of butter and i'm going to pan fry the rest of these things called oysters mushrooms with a bit of salt and pepper my mushrooms already just a little bit of golden color that's it i'm going to reserve this in a bowl and we're going to pan fry some apples okay hold on so all what we want is a little bit of coloring we're not making a puree of apples that's it i'm turning my heat off here and i'm gonna reserve this with my mushrooms and we're gonna take the meat out of the oven look at this beautiful piece of pork so what i'm gonna do i'm gonna take it out of the sauce reserve it in a tray here cover it with foil and let it rest while we finish the sauce and now let's talk about the front braisers the fundraisage is the braising stock it's the cooking juices you've got here but we've used to cook the meat so this is infused with prunes mushrooms onion cider and of course the taste of the meat always taste first it's very nice very sweet actually with the cider and the prunes so i'm just going to reduce it a little bit it's a little bit liquid if you want from here you can adjust the seasoning and to make just a home style sauce or what i'm gonna do after a bit of production is to add some creme fraiche into the mix and we'll be done now if you want to go further i'm gonna do it but you don't have to it's the glazing i'm using basically the leftover liquor that i had to macerate the prunes here and what i'm gonna do is to baste my liquor that is very sweet and i'm gonna put this under the grill to glaze the meat and to give it a shine and to crisp up the top a little bit so it's not soggy so it's nice and crispy before we cut it cut it open but that's totally totally optional my meat is out of the oven and the glazing is finished as you can see it's bubbling away it's got a nice crispiness to it so i'm going to reserve it on the side and we're going to finish the sauce after 10 minutes of reduction it's nice and and syrupy in here this is still a bit liquid i'm going to add a little bit of creme fraiche maybe a good spoon now you can also use a whisk it's a bit better and if you don't have creme fraiche you can also add i'm going to show you add a bit of creme fraiche but if not you can use normal cream a little bit of it and we're not going to render this too white and we're gonna keep that brown color how sauce is finally done i've added some cream is some nice color the last test of course you taste the sauce i think a little bit of salt and that's it you correct the seasoning and then you serve now for the service usually when it's a braised meat and you you put the sauce on the side and you put the meat on there but because that's a bit blend what i'm gonna do i'm just gonna add a little bit of that sauce and i've left all the mushrooms and everything in there so just a base layer so i can put the meat on top and i'm gonna sprinkle some garnish over all right so let's grab the meat conveniently with the string for now all right so sorry little change of scenery here i've added some white background because the light today is terrible i am so what we do we add a little a few apples on here okay and then some mushrooms and we're gonna finish with some with some prunes all right so just family style if you want you can add a few uh prunes here and there in the dish or what's left over if you like that you don't have to but as i said you can use apricot if you want and that's it to finish of course when you want to cut the meat you can easily snap them off and pull them off like this one by one now of course to finish i'm sure you want to see we want to see inside so i don't know exactly where we can go which side we can go this side that's a bit untidy so maybe this side here is easier so i'm just gonna use a fork and just gonna slice through this make a few incisions and then we're gonna see look at that and this is how it is inside nicely cooked and now you've got the nice prunes showing on the inside it's a bit like a stuffing so i'm just going to cut a piece for me and try it out all right so i've cut a few pieces but i'll take a piece of prune from here a bit of sauce and try that first mmm tender wow the sweetness you can really feel the prunes in there it's a nice sweet sauce but you know what that technique the meat let me try the mushroom nice you see the sauce nice sauce oh that glaze one really really nice so let's recap for a simple home dish i think it's really great that technique with the braising honestly works super well and the meat is nice and tender it's perfectly cooked and this addition of prunes if you like prunes it's really special because it's different than just the salty thing with stock and you really have this apple intonation flavor and with that chestnut and apple liqueur that is taking that dish to a whole new level but all in all an absolutely superb recipe but all in all that's it guys this is how you braise a pork shoulder that has been stuffed with prune you can use apricot as well and as you can see on the picture the way to serve it usually and it is more the piece of meat in the dish with the garnish and you got the sauce in a sauce boat on the side so people can help themselves either one sauce or some people don't like too much sauce it is really up to you and i hope you enjoyed this video you've learned something today now if you have any questions use the comment section in this video and to drop me a comment and if you make this dish or anything that is braised like this share your pictures on instagram hashtag frenchcookacademy and you can always also register on our facebook page and become a patreon on our patreon page and if you want to learn more about culinary techniques french techniques don't forget our course get started with french cooking link in the video description that's it for me i'll see you all next week for another french recipe take care all bye [Music] [Music] you

Channel: French Cooking Academy

Views: 32,271

Rating: 4.9707837 out of 5

Keywords: french food, french food recipes, french cooking video, how to braise pork shoulder, pork shoulder with apples and prunes, pork shoulder with prunes, how to stuff pork shoulder, pork recipe with prunes, easy pork recipe, how to truss pork shoulder, french cooking academy, culinary school, culinary lessons, culinary techniques, how to braise, pork shoulder, How to braise a pork shoulder in cider with apples and prunes, cooking with cider, braised pork in cider

Id: 3whz41vgoGI

Length: 15min 54sec (954 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 05 2020