Ain’t no jive turkey at our house at Thanksgiving.

Robyn is not a fan of the tasty bird, therefore, this year I decided to make an intimate Thanksgiving day dinner for 2, with a delicious Pork Shoulder Roast as the centrepiece.

I started out by blending a rub for the pork. I used a simple italian seasoning, but kicked it up with a bit of sage to invoke pleasant memories of the typical turkey stuffing. As an approximate measure, I’d say 5 parts Italian seasoning to 1 part ground sage. I let it marinate in the seasonings for a couple hours, then seared it on all sides and popped it in a 325 degree oven uncovered for 1 hour/pound. Don’t forget to baste often and roast it fat side up.

Anytime I roast meat, I want Yorkshire Pudding. I don’t care that it’s typically a roast beef thing… I want it. Yorkshire Pudding? I say Porkshire Pudding. So, I figured who better to copy a yorkshire recipe from than Gordon Ramsay? So that’s what I did.

This recipe is so simple, and worked like a charm.

Gordon Ramsay’s Yorkshire Pudding- makes 12

4 large eggs

1 1/2 cups whole milk

1 1/4 cups A.P. flour

1/2 tsp salt

4 tbsp oil or meat drippings

Blend all ingredients except the oil/drippings and refrigerate at least a half hour. After you pull the roast out of the oven, crank it up to 425 degrees. Add a teaspoon of meat drippings to each muffin tin and heat until very hot on top rack of the oven. Quickly fill each muffin tin 3/4 full with cold batter. Cook in the oven 15-20 minutes, until golden and crispy. Don’t open the oven door until right near the end of your yorkshire puddings will collapse. 

The gravy for this roast is pretty simple, since a lot of the flavouring has been taken care of thanks to those seasoned drippings. I’m never sure how much fat to leave in the gravy, so this time I cheated. Even though there was a LOT of fat in the pan, I added a couple tablespoons of flour and made a roux in the pan. I deglazed with a half cup of white wine, and added about 1- 1 1/2 cups of water. I seasoned with salt and pepper to taste, and thickened. I then poured it into a measuring cup (yeah, that’s what I use for a gravy boat) and skimmed the excess fat from the gravy.

Don’t worry, it’s still going to taste amazing.

I spent a lot of the weekend really missing my mom and her delicious holiday turkey dinners, and all the pictures flooding my Twitter feed wasn’t helping.  But this dinner, complete with Yorkshire Puddings a good English woman like my Mom would be proud of, was exactly what I needed.

Porkshire Puddings