Let's Eat Some of This Stuff

I finally got around to actually serving and eating some of the many, many (way too many) preserved/salted/larded meats. And here they are! Along with a few other good things I can highly recommend.

Here's the gunaciale, now ready to be sliced and served in a way that I cannot recommend highly enough.

Take some dates . . .

 . . . slice them open and fill them with grated parmesan . . .

  Then wrap them in thin slices of the guanciale, and bake them (medium oven) until the pork is cooked.

Here are the various confited meats - pork belly on the blue plate, duck breast on the white, the guanciale-date-parmesan (aka Devils on Horseback) on the pink.  Fat, salty goodness each.

One more, non-charcuterie item, again can't recommend it strongly enough: Pernil.  A pork shoulder (this was the Boston Butt, not a Picnic) marinated in adobo, orange, lime, orange and lots and lots of sliced garlic overnight.  Then cooked in a hot oven (450º) for 30 minutes, followed by 225º for 12 hours - or more.  It was so meltingly tender, I pulled the bones right out, and served it with a spoon.  I need more excuses to make this.