Slow-Roasted Pork Belly with Roasted Carrots & Apple Sauce

Ingredients

• 1 kg pork belly, skin scored
• 2 tsp fennel seeds, roughly crushed
• 6 carrots, peeled, cut into batons
• salt and black pepper
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• 2 tbsp garlic-infused olive oil
• 3 spring onions, green tops only, sliced
• 1 tbsp sugar
• 2 tbsp butter
• 3 cooking apples, peeled, cored, chopped
• Roast potatoes, to serve
• Fresh thyme, to serve
• Steamed seasonal greens, to serve

Method

1. Heat the oven to 220°C/fan 200°C. Pat the pork skin bone-dry with kitchen paper — any moisture is the enemy of crackling. Rub the crushed fennel seeds, smoked paprika and a generous pinch of salt all over the skin and into the flesh, then drizzle with the garlic-infused oil and work it into the scores.
2. Sit the pork skin-side up on a rack over a roasting tin. Roast for 30 minutes at high heat, until the skin is starting to blister and pop into crackling.
3. Drop the oven to 160°C/fan 140°C and roast for a further 1 hour 30 minutes, until a knife slides into the meat with no resistance and the skin is shatteringly crisp.
4. For the final 40 minutes, toss the carrot batons with a tablespoon of olive oil, season well, and tuck them into the tin around the pork to soak up the rendered fat.
5. Meanwhile, make the apple sauce. Tip the apples into a small pan with the butter, sugar and a splash of water. Cook over a low heat for 10 minutes, stirring now and then, until the apples collapse into a glossy, fragrant sauce. Taste and adjust the sugar.
6. Lift the pork onto a board and rest for 10 minutes — listen for the crackling crackling as it cools. Carve into thick slices.
7. Pile the pork onto a warm platter with the burnished carrots alongside, spoon over the apple sauce, and scatter with spring onion greens, thyme leaves and a heavy crack of black pepper.