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Petit Sale aux Lentilles
Home-cured pork simmered over slate-green Puy lentils — the Auvergne's Sunday lunch; cure the pork three days ahead and the rest cooks itself
- Prep
- 20 min
- Cook
- 150 min
- Serves
- 6
Ingredients
- Pork belly, skin on — 800 g
- Pork knuckle or shoulder — 600 g
- Cure: coarse salt 60 g, sugar 20 g, thyme 4 sprigs, bay 2, juniper 6 berries
- Puy lentils — 450 g
- Smoked sausage (Morteau-style) — 1 (350 g)
- Onion, clove-studded — 1 (150 g)
- Carrots, thick rounds — 300 g
- Leek, sliced — 150 g
- Garlic — 12 g
- Bouquet garni — 1
- Black pepper — 2 g
- Dijon mustard — to serve
- Red wine vinegar — 15 ml
- Flat-leaf parsley — 10 g
Method
- Rub pork pieces with the cure; refrigerate 48–72 h, turning daily. Rinse well; soak 2 h in cold water.
- Cover pork with fresh water; simmer at 90 °C, skimming, 1.5 h.
- Add the whole sausage; simmer 30 min more, until all meats are tender.
- Meanwhile simmer lentils with studded onion, carrots, leek, garlic and bouquet in 1.2 L of the pork cooking liquor (taste — dilute if too salty), 25–30 min until just tender.
- Season lentils with pepper and vinegar only (the pork brings salt); discard onion and bouquet.
- Slice the meats thickly.
- Serve meats over the lentils, moistened with liquor, parsley over.