CAJUN PIG ROAST (COCHON DE LAIT) - ACADIANA TABLE

Steps:

• For the rice, in a rice cooker or pot with a tight-fitting lid, add the rice, chicken stock, and seasoning. Stir to combine and cook on low heat until the rice is fully cooked. Keep warm.
• For the sofrito, in a large pan or Dutch oven over medium-high heat, sauté the onion, pepper, and garlic in olive oil until the onions turn translucent. Add the chorizo and sauté for another five minutes. Add the tomatoes, bay leaf, and white wine and cook for 10 minutes. If the sofrito seems dry, add some chicken stock.
• Combine the cooked rice and sofrito in a baking dish or paella pan and cover with a tight lid or aluminum foil.
• Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Place in the oven until heated through, about 20 minutes.
• Keep warm until serving.
• In a heavy skillet over medium heat, add the bacon grease, sausage, onion, celery, and bell pepper, and cook until the sausage browns, about 8 minutes. Sprinkle the flour over the pan and stir it into the remaining grease to make a roux. Stir the flour until it begins to turn a beige color. Add the stock, stir until it thickens, and add the green beans. Stir to combine and season with white pepper, granulated garlic, black pepper, and salt. Stir in the heavy cream and combine. Lower the heat and let simmer and thicken for 15 minutes. Turn off the heat and keep warm.
• The day before, move the pig to a cutting board and season the inside of the pig liberally with Cajun seasoning or have your butcher pre-season the meat.
• Using an injector needle, fill with the apple cider solution (cider, salt, pepper, and garlic powder) and inject the meat all over until you have penetrated all the major meat muscles. Pour any of the leftover marinade into a metal loaf pan. Wrap the pig and return to a large ice chest and cover with ice. Let chill overnight.
• Early the next morning, remove the pig and let come to room temperature.
• Thoroughly clean and prepare a Cajun microwave cooker with coals (charcoal and wood chunks) until the internal temperature of the box comes to 250ºF. Place the pig in the box skin-side down (rib cage facing up) and place the pan of leftover marinade in the box for added moisture as it evaporates. Place the hot coal-laden cover on top and let cook for 4 hours. Be sure to watch your thermometer and keep the temperature to a consistent 250ºF by adding more charcoal or wood chunks to the fire.
• After 6 hours, uncover, remove the foil, and with the help of a friend and using heatproof gloves, turn the meat over skin-side up. The second half of cooking is when the skin and back-fat crisps and cracks, so be sure to keep the temperature up to 250ºF. Replace the cover and cook for an additional 6 hours until the skin crisps and the meat is pull-apart tender. Check periodically during cooking and if the pig is cooking too hot or you detect burning, loosely cover the meat with heavy duty aluminum foil.
• After the full 12-hour cooking time, remove the pig, cover and keep warm with aluminum foil, and let rest until serving.
• According to Max, the universal truth of cooking a whole pig is: you must observe and adapt, and repeat until the mission is complete.
• To serve, use a sharp knife or cleaver to cut through the crispy skin and remove it in chunks to a pan. Cut down through the backbone and ribs to expose the meat. Pull the meat apart into pieces discarding any excess fat.
• Serve your guests family-style with the green beans and paella rice on the side.