Easy Roast Pork with Perfect Crackling

Easy Roast Pork and Perfect Crackling

1. Remove the pork from the fridge approximately 30 minutes before cooking (2 hours before you wish to serve the pork).
2. Preheat your oven to 240C / 220C fan / gas mark 9 / 475F.
3. Using a very sharp knife, score the rind with deep scores in a diamond pattern (or ask your butcher to do this), then pat the pork dry using kitchen paper.
4. Sprinkle the salt and pepper over the rind of the pork and work it in to the cuts using your fingers.
5. When the pork has been out of the fridge for 30 minutes, and the oven is at the correct temperature, place the pork on a rack in a roasting dish and put it into the oven for 30 minutes.
6. After the pork has been in the oven for 30 minutes, turn the oven down to 200C / 180C fan / gas mark 6 / 400F and continue cooking for 50 minutes.
7. Remove the pork from the oven and leave to rest for 10 minutes before carving.
8. For ease of carving, remove the crackling first (it should pull away quite easily), then carve the pork into slices and cut up the crackling into chunks.
9. Serve with Yorkshire puddings, roast potatoes or mashed potatoes, plus apple sauce, pork gravy and all your favourite roast dinner vegetables.

Roast Pork Gravy

1. To make a delicious gravy to go with the roast pork, simply mix 1 tablespoon of cornflower with a small splash of cold water in a jug until you have a thin paste.
2. Add the hot chicken stock to the jug and stir to combine.
3. Tip the contents of the jug into the roasting tray and stir gently to mix the stock with the pork juices and to release the stuck-on bits from the bottom of the pan.
4. Tip the gravy through a sieve into a clean saucepan and gently heat until the gravy starts to bubble and thicken. Take off the heat when the gravy is your preferred thickness. (See note 2.)