gennaro's stuffed porchetta

Ingredients

3 kg boned higher-welfare shoulder of pork, butterflied and skin on

sea salt

freshly ground black pepper

For the stuffing

2 onions, peeled and finely diced

olive oil

200 g higher-welfare chicken livers, cleaned and roughly chopped

200 g higher-welfare pork mince

75 g pine nuts

100 g raisins

½ bunch fresh sage, leaves picked and roughly chopped

½ bunch fresh flat-leaf parsley, leaves picked and roughly chopped

1 wineglass red wine or mulled wine, plus a bit extra for the stuffing

8 carrots

Method

Preheat your oven to full whack. Lay the boned shoulder of pork on a board, skin-side down, and season well with a few really good sprinkles of salt and pepper. Massage this seasoning all over the meat.

Put a large pan on a medium heat and fry your diced onion in a lug of olive oil for about 10 minutes and when it's softened but not coloured, turn the heat down to low and add the chopped chicken livers and pork mince. Use a wooden spoon to break the mince up a bit and mix everything together. Add the pine nuts, raisins, chopped sage and parsley, then season with a good sprinkle of salt and pepper. Pour in a splash of red or mulled wine, give everything a good stir then take your pan off the heat. You don't want to cook the meat now, you just want to get a good mix of flavours going so you have a delicious stuffing.

Put the stuffing in a bowl and put it to one side to cool down. Once your stuffing has completely cooled, spoon all of it down the middle of the opened shoulder. Roll the meat up quite tightly then tie it up as tightly as you can with 4 or 5 pieces of string. Drizzle all over with olive oil, season with salt and pepper and rub the seasoning all over the skin to help it turn into delicious crackling. Lay your carrots across the middle of the roasting tray and put the meat on top. Pour your glass of red or mulled wine and a glass of water in the bottom of the tray then put your meat in the oven. Turn the heat down immediately to 180°C/350°F/gas 4 for about 3 ½ to 4 hours until lovely and golden. Once it's out of the oven carefully remove the skin and put it to one side. Slice the pork then serve it with some tasty bits of broken up crackling, lovely potatoes and a few greens or a nice salad. Absolutely gorgeous.