Spanish Style Pork Stew - As Served At The Slow Food Feast, Ludlow Food Festival 2025
Main Course
Feeds 4-6
Cook Time: 3-4 Hours (or 2 Hours with Pressure Cooker)
Difficulty: Medium
A flavour packed banger of a dish that I served at The Slow Food Feast at Ludlow Food Festival 2025.
This was a celebration of the most wonderful locally sourced, ethically reared pork from Muckleton Meats with some wonderful surplus ingredients from The Shrewsbury Food Hub.
Muckleton Meats is run by Jan, a true legend! She so kindly donated the pork shoulder and the bacon trim that made this dish so wonderfully flavourful. Her story was magnificent to share. She was there during the birth of this particular pig, she cared for it throughout its life and was even there at the end to ensure it had the best, most peaceful send off possible. These are the stories I love to hear and they are so important when it comes to sourcing meat.
When it comes to the bacon, use what you like. Smoked, unsmoked, it’s up to you. I got to use some of Jan’s bacon trim which is all the outside part of the cured joint - so it’s packed with extra salty flavours but being freshly made bacon, it lacks the overpowering saltiness - its a lovely addition to this recipe.
Its comforting, warming and familiar without being too rich and overbearing.
You can make this in a pressure cooker if you like to save some time but for me, best results are in a casserole dish in the oven. The slower cooking seems to marry the flavours well and allows all those gorgeous ingredients to get to know each other a little better.
If you haven’t got a casserole dish with a lid, you can use a large saucepan before transferring to a deep oven tray and covering with foil when it goes in the oven.
Roasting the veg separately helps add some extra roasted flavour into the dish, if you prefer a simpler route, add the chunks of veg when you add the pork and braise in the stew as a one pot wonder.
I used an amazing salt, Droitwich Salt Coastline for this - the additions of lemon verbena, dulse and fennel seeds add such a lovely freshness to the dish. Of course, using standard salt is still going to result in a lovely lovely dish but if you get a chance, give the Droitwich Salt Coastline a go, you won’t regret it.
At the feast, I served this with some ‘Gildas Cabbage’ (you can find the recipe on my page) and some crusty bread but this would go beautifully with any sort of potatoes and veg. It also goes brilliantly well with some cous cous and pickled onions.
INGREDIENTS:
3 Tbsp Olive Oil
1.5-2kg Pork Shoulder, skin off and fat trimmed (leaving some on), cut into 2-3cm chunks
500g Bacon, lardons (we used some surplus bacon trim)
2 Onions, peeled and cut into wedges
1 Courgette, thinly sliced
4 Garlic Cloves, minced
4 Tomatoes, Cut into chunks (or 1 Tin Chopped Toms)
200ml Sherry (or White Wine)
1 Tin Chopped Tomatoes
0.5L Chicken or Pork Stock
Pinch Droitwich Salt Coastline or Salt
Pinch Black Pepper
1 Lemon, Juice
1 Courgette, 1cm chunks
1 Red Pepper, de-seeded 1cm chunks
1 Red Onion, peeled, cut into wedges
Pinch Dried Oregano
METHOD:
Pre-heat the oven to 160C
Heat 2 Tbsp olive oil to a casserole dish on high, add the bacon lardons and fry until golden and the fats rendered.
Remove the bacon from the pan and set aside.
Season the pork with some salt and pepper before adding the chunks of pork shoulder to the pan and quickly brown on all sides before removing from the pan and setting aside - do this in batches if needed, try not to over crowd the pan.
Reduce the heat to medium-low, add the sliced onions and sliced courgettes, place the lid on a cook on low for 15 minutes until well softened and almost jammy.
Add the fresh chopped tomatoes and keep cooking on a medium-low heat, lid on, for another 10-15 minutes until really well reduced, soft and almost jam like.
Add the sherry or white wine and reduce by 1/2 or until the smell of alcohol fades.
Add the bacon and pork chunks back into the pan with the tin of tomatoes and the stock with a pinch of salt and pepper. Bring to a simmer before placing in the oven and cooking for 1-1.5 hours until the pork is just tender.
While the pork stew is cooking, add the red onion, red pepper and courgette to a roasting tin, coat in 1 tbsp of olive oil and a pinch of dried oregano with a pinch of salt and pepper.
Roast in the oven for 20-30 minutes until golden and nicely roasted.
When the pork is just tender, remove from the oven, add the roasted veg and gently stir through. Replace the lid and leave to rest for 20 minutes.
Add a good squeeze of lemon juice and adjust the seasoning with salt and pepper.
Serve in bowls with side dishes of you choice and plenty of bread for mopping
