From Anik’s Kitchen: Pork in Puff Pastry

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Just in time for the weekend, the local gourmet temple had pork fillet on sale – the perfect opportunity to crack the Condesa de Leganza we brought from Spain in May. Since the pork was excellent, it didn’t need much company: I opted for a puff pastry wrap with a herbs-and-feta-cream. Dead simple (unless you want to make your own puff pastry), but it never fails to impress the guests, while it gives you enough time to think up a more elaborate dessert. Or skip dessert altogether.

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Pork in Puff Pastry

Ingredients (for two, plus a bottle of red wine)

• 2 pieces of pork fillet, about 150g-200g each
• 3 slices of frozen puff pastry (about 225g)
• 75g feta cheese, diced
• 3 tbsp. sour cream
• 1 tbsp. assorted herbs (at this time of year, I use the frozen kind – “Provence” or “Italian”)
• 1 tbsp. butter
• half a head of lettuce (I used Lollo Bianco)
• 2 tomatoes
• half a cucumber
• olive oil, white wine vinegar and herbs (or your premade salad marinade of choice)
• a piece of aluminum wrap
• a sheet of baking paper

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 175°C (350°F)
• Defrost the puff pastry (works great on top of the oven that you just switched on)
• In a mortar or kitchen machine, blend the feta, sour cream and frozen herbs into a smooth paste.
• Set the butter to heat in a pan.
• Pad the pork fillets dry, and then place them in teh pan when the butter is sizzling. Brown them for two or three minutes on all sides.
• Take the fillets out of the pan and pour the mix of butter and meat juice into the feta cream, stirring it in well.
• To keep the fillets tempered, I place them in a piece of aluminum foil, but not for longer than a few minutes.
• If you have single sheets of puff pastry (like I do) place them on the counter with the edges lightly overlapping.
• With a rolling pin (or a wine bottle), roll out the puff pastry some more until it is one homogeneous piece and has gained about a third in size. Cut it into two parts (I tendo to split it diagonally into triangles).
• Place the baking paper sheet on a tray and transfer the pieces of puff pastry there.
• With the back of a spoon, spread the feta cream evenly onto the puff pastry. Leave a rim of about 2 cm free.
• Set a pork fillet in the middle of each puff pastry piece and wrap the pastry around the mean until you have neatly wrapped packages without an opening (to fix the rims and keep the from opening in the oven, dab them lightly with water and smooth them out well and with enough pressure).
• Almost done! Put the tray into the now preheated oven, second row from the bottom, and let the pork stew itself to perfection in about 30-35 minutes, depending on your stove. When the puff pastry browns lightly, the dish is ready to be consumed.
• While the meat is in the oven, whip up your salad of choice (you can add in the leftover feta, if you bouth a bigger package) – I tend to use Lollo, tomato and cucumber with a light oil/vinegar dressing, since the meat and the puff pastry are heavy enough and can use a lighter counterpart.

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~ by Anik LaChev on November 17, 2008.