Pork roast done right has a crispy top and a moist interior. Lucky for me, pork no longer needs to be cooked to shoe leather for it to be safe. An internal temperature of 145℉ and a three-minute rest, and it’s all good. I needed a good dinner! I was on a roll…downhill. I had a string of cooking fails that was getting uncomfortably long. Nothing inedible, mind you, but there were eight dishes in a row that either needed significant reworking or complete reinvention. No complaints from the peanut gallery, but my husband never complains about anything I serve. Personally, there was one night in that string I was sorely tempted to make a PB&J. But if my husband can eat it, so can I, doggone it.

Still, I wanted some good food. Pork roast to the rescue! It’s such a simple dish that it almost doesn’t warrant a recipe….almost. Only two ingredients, and ridiculously easy prep, but it’s still nice to have a quick place to look to check times and temperatures.

When I was a kid, our family tradition was that you got to choose the menu for your birthday. My sister always chose roast turkey, but my favorite was roast pork. My mother never once complained about having to turn the oven on in the summer for my pork, but there was that one unfortunate year when she forgot to take the decorated birthday cake out of the oven first. She liked to hide the cake so that the birthday girl didn’t see it until it was time to blow out the candles. The cold oven was a great choice until it was time to preheat for the pork roast. I think she was more upset than I was!

As long as there’s no birthday cake in the way, roasting pork is remarkably consistent. A few minutes more or less if the roast is thicker or narrower, but that’s about it. And I’m happy to report that of the eight failed dishes, two are now amazingly delicious (did you make Chicken & Wild Rice Soup yet?), two have been successfully reworked, one was just a series of distracted mistakes, and I’m pretty sure how to fix the rest. Nothing like an old favorite to get a cook back on track. Even better, we got more than three meals out of the one roast! One night we made sandwiches with Bourbon Bacon Jam on some excellent rolls (stay tuned for that post, too), and another night I made Vindaloo. Same roast, three very different dinners!

What was your most memorable cooking fail?
What is your favorite way to use leftovers?
Let me know in the comment section below.

Ingredients:

1 (3 pound or 450 g) boneless loin pork roast, fatted & tied. Ask the butcher for the rib end, it tends to be more well-marbled.

Lawrey’s salt

Directions:

1.) Preheat the oven to 450℉ (232℃). Sprinkle the roast liberally with the Lawrey’s salt. Place fat-side-up in an oven-safe pan.

2.) Put the roast in the oven and immediately reduce heat to 350℉ (177℃.) Cook 20 minutes per pound (9 minutes per kilogram), or until a quick-read thermometer registers 145℉ (63℃) in the center of the roast. Remove from oven, and let rest for 3 to 5 minutes before carving.