Pork Balchão

Serves	4
Prep time	20 minutes
Cook time	1 hour, 15 minutes
Total time	1 hour, 35 minutes
Meal type	Lunch, Main Dish, Snack
Misc	Freezable, Pre-preparable, Serve Hot
Occasion	Casual Party
Region	Indian
By author	Karen S Burns-Booth

Pork Balchão is a classic recipe from Goa in the western part of India; the pork is cooked in a chilli, tomato and vinegar sauce, and as the pork is almost pickled when cooked in the vinegar based sauce, it keeps for up to a week in the fridge once cooked. Traditional Pork Balchão uses a dried shrimp paste called "galmbo", but I have omitted the paste as it is hard to find outside of the Indian sub-continent.

Ingredients

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 tablespoon fresh ginger root (finely diced)
1 tablespoon crushed garlic
1 x cinnamon stick (broken into pieces)
1 to 2 teaspoons crushed dried red chillies (to taste)
4 cloves
2 1/2 teaspoons cumin seeds
12 black peppercorns
700g cubed leg of pork (trimmed of all fat and skin)
1 large onion (peeled and thinly sliced)
1 teaspoon ground turmeric
200ml warm water
2 tablespoons tomato puree
1/2 teaspoon chilli powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon caster sugar
3 tablespoons cider vinegar

Note

Directions

Step 1	Heat the oil in a large wok or deep sided frying/saute pan and add the ginger and garlic; fry for 1 minute.
Step 2	Grind the next five ingredients in a pestle and mortar until they are roughly broken, but not powder, then add them to the pan and fry for a further minute, stirring all the time.
Step 3	Add the pork, onion and turmeric and turn the heat up slightly - fry for 5 to 6 minutes or until the meat starts to release its juices, stirring all the time to avoid sticking.
Step 4	Add the water, tomato puree and chilli powder and bring to the boil; cover the pan and simmer gently for 35 to 40 minutes.
Step 5	After 35 to 40 minutes, add the salt, sugar and vinegar to the pork, stir well, cover and simmer for a further 30 to 35 minutes until the pork is tender. Remove from the heat and serve with rice, naan breads and assorted sambals.
Step 6	NB: Pork Balchão will keep in the fridge once cooked for up to a week, before re-heating it, bring it to room temperature and add a little water if necessary when re-heating. Freezing: once cooked and completely cold, it can be frozen for up to 3 months - defrost in the fridge overnight and re-heat as above.