04 Jun beetroot tzatziki + pulled pork

These recipes first appeared in The Irish Independent’s Insider magazine on Thursday 29th May.

This week’s forkful recipes are our usual simple fare. Though neither require hard graft, both require a bit of cooking time. Spend some time on Saturday morning preparing our complimentary beetroot tzatziki and pulled pork recipes to serve up for lunch with friends or family without even breaking a sweat.

Beetroot Tzatziki

We recommend using fresh beets for this recipe because of the texture and flavour they bring to the finished dip. If you don’t have beets in your back yard, four of the small vacuum packed should do the job nicely too.

Ingredients

1 large fresh beetroot (about 350g)

3 heaped tablespoons of Greek yogurt

Zest of ½ an orange

1 teaspoon of red wine vinegar

Salt

Pepper

Method

Pre-heat your oven to 180c/160c fan/gas mark 4. Chop your fresh beetroot in half and wrap each half in tin foil. Roast in the oven for 45 minutes to 1 hour or until you can easily insert a knife into the flesh of the beet. Remove from oven and allow to cool before removing the tin foil and peeling off the skin. Use gloves if you don’t fancy having pink hands for the rest of the day.

Roughly grate the beetroot halves into a large bowl. Add the Greek yogurt, the zest of ½ the orange, the red wine vinegar and a good pinch of salt and pepper. Mix well until you have a beautifully purple dip. Feel free to add more yogurt if you want to make it go further.

We love serving this beetroot tzatziki with our pulled pork but you can also pair it with fried mackerel, roast chicken or a summer salad. This will keep in the fridge for up to three days so make a big batch and eat it over the weekend.

Orange Harissa Pulled Pork (serves 6)

Pulled pork is deliciously simple to make and we love the sweet heat brought to it by the brilliant combination of orange and harissa paste.

Ingredients

Vegetable oil 800g of trimmed pork shoulder, largely diced (ask your butcher to do this for you)

3 tablespoons of harissa paste

250ml of chicken stock

1 orange

1 cinnamon stick

Salt

Pepper

Method

Heat a drizzle of vegetable oil in a large heavy based casserole pot. Add the pork and cook for 10 minutes until evenly browned (you might have to do this in two batches depending on the size of your pot).

Add the harissa paste, stir well and cook for a further minute or two. Pour in the chicken stock.

Use a potato peeler to remove the peel from the orange. Add these strips of orange to the pork. Slice the orange in half and squeeze in the juice.

Add the cinnamon stick, season with salt and pepper and bring to the boil.

Cover and simmer for 1 and ½ hours until the pork breaks away easily at the touch of a fork.

Remove the pork with a slotted spoon and transfer to a serving dish. Use two forks to pull all of the pork apart into delicious shreds.

Serve it between two slices of your favourite bread, some crunchy salad leaves and a dollop of our beetroot tzatziki on top.