This autumn why not settle down with some hearty food with this hot pot that incorporates some of Dorset’s best local ingredients? This hotpot takes the traditional tastes of the famous dish, but with a few modern elements making it a unique and totally delicious meal!
Ingredients:
4tbsp olive oil, try this from here.
1KG diced pork shoulder, take a look at our meat providers here.
20g butter
4 leeks
4 garlic cloves
3tbsp plain flour
500ml cider, there are loads of great cider producers in Dorset, see some here.
400ml stock
1/2 bunch parsley
5 sage leaves
200ml single cream (Dorset is also home to amazing dairy producers!)
400g potatoes
400g sweet potatoes
Method
Start off by heating half the oil in a deep pan or casserole dish, dice the pork and fry it over a medium heat in batches until it is seared all over. Transfer the meat to a plate and leave it aside.
Prepare your veg by chopping your leeks and crushing your garlic cloves. Before adding them to the pot, pour in a table spoon of oil with a little of the butter and fry up half the chopped leeks for ten minutes or until tender. Add the garlic, fry for a few minutes and then stir in the flour.
Pour in the cider a little at a time, stirring continuously, add the stock, bay leaves and seared pork and then simmer, half covered with a lid for an hour and a half. At this point the meat will be just about tender – this is good, it will start to fall apart in the oven.
Next, pre heat the oven to 200C. While it’s heating up, uncover and simmer the ingredients for a few minutes, stir in the parsley, sage, the remaining leeks and the cream.
While the sauce is the reducing, peel both types of potato and cut into slices that are around 2 mm thick. Alternate the layers of potato and sweet potato in circles over the pie. Dot the cubed butter over the top and bake for a further 1-1.5 hours until the potato is tender. When you’ve reached the last ten minutes, brush in a little oil and continue cooking. Leave the pie to rest for ten minutes or so before serving.
While this does take a bit of time (you could always prepare it the day before), it is well worth the hard work. If you give this a go this autumn, let us know!
