Schweinshaxe Recipe, Crispy Roasted Pork Knuckle or Ham Hock (Step by Step Pictorial Recipe)

Schweinshaxe Recipe Bavarian Crispy Roasted Pork Knuckle or Shank

Homemade Schweinshaxe, an easy and simple recipe with several tips a tricks to made it. Schweinshaxe is an ancient German (Bavarian) cuisine. Schweinshaxe  is a roasted or pork knuckle/shank or ham hock . It was speciall dish for it’s crispy crackling or charred and blisterred skin with tender and juicy meat. Get it right and there’ll be a fight for the last piece. A classic roast pork just dissapointed without it, that’s why you should following several tricks that i’ll share within this post. Schweinshaxe called Stelze in Austria, the only diffrence is the marinated pork shank is preboiled before roasted. Similiar recipe in philliphine called crispy pata, the pork shank is deep fried until the skin is crispy right after the pork shank is simmerred in soy sauce based broth, don’t even bother think about the cholesterol level within it for sure.

Recipe Schweinshaxe Crispy Crackling Roasted Ham Hock or Pork Knuckle

How to make a roasted pork knuckle or schweinshaxe ??? Well, creating the blistered and charred crackling basic recipe is sounds simple enough; score the fat on top of the meat, rub salt, spice and oil into it and roast it into a hot oven. It’s not that simple actually unless you’ve got rubbery and tought pork skin rather than golden brown, blistered and crunchy. There are a lot of theories about roasted pork rind crackling; salting the meat the night before and brushing the skin with vinegar are two basic treatment. Other method is to score the skin using a sharp knife and then rub with spice, oil and sea salt into the skin. Do it right, simply score it, not too deep or too shallow , simply lines, vertical or horizonal, you choose then simply oven roasting it . This is called a direct roasted schweinshaxe, you’ll get a crackling rind then, but you won’t get your meat pork knuckle tender, flavoursome and also fragrant. This is another inconvenients associated with direct roasted  schweinshaxe recipe.

Recipe Schweinshaxe Germany Crispy Roasted Pork Knuckle or Ham Hock

Authentic schweinshaxe recipe got a tender, juice, flavoursome and also fragrance meat. Beside that, crispy crackling is also important.  For making schweinshaxe, you should choose the right pork knuckle or ham hock for this recipe. Meaty pork shank from the back leg is preferred, the frontal leg pork shank is too lean and also meatless. I devided the instruction for making schweinshaxe into two steps, first step is to tenderized and spices infused the pork knuckle and then the second step is to crisp up the skin.  In the beginning, the pork knuckle is rubbed with spiced, lay on the bed of root  veggies. Liquid added into the roasting pan to steam the pork knuckle to made the skin and meat  tender. I suggest you to add a dark beer for the liquid, but you can use regular beer, wine or stock for it too. The whole roasting pan is totally covered and sealed with alumunium foil before put in 180°C oven to make sure there’s no steam lekeage and evaporated away from the roasting pan. This slow roasting steps rendered the fat partially while tenderized the meat and also break the collagen tissues.

Carved Schweinshaxe: Crispy Crackling Roasted Pork Knuckle with Tender and Juicy Meat

Now is the steps making crispy, crunchy pork knuckle rind crackling of schweinshaxe. Right after the slow roasted pork knuckle is fork tender, score the skin and the fat layer carefully, never pierce to the meat under the skins. After that, expose your pork knuckle with electric fan to completely dry the skin. Meanwhile, preheat oven t0 250°C while you waiting your pork knuckle skin dry. Once the skin is dry, put the pork knuckle into the oven. Watch it closely, it takes about 15-25 minutes until the crackling skin is crispy and blistered, but it depend on your pork knuckle size and skin dryness. Never leave the oven because it easily turn into  burned out due to the hight temperature.

Schweinshaxe Recipe with Crispy Crunchy Crackling Skin and Tender Juicy Meat

The basic spice for making schweinshaxe is juniper berries and caraway seed, this two combo is must have spices, unless it’s not schweinhaxe enought. In Indonesia, juniper berries can be purchased in several imported gourmet supermarkets like Kemchicks, Ranch Market or Food Hall, but if you can’t access any of it, you can buy it online from trusted online groceries store RumahSegar.Com. Beside juniper berry, also pick up my truffle oil for making Homemade Smoked Salmon Ravioli Pasta with Fresh Greens and Truffle Oil,  then your groceries send all the way to Palembang  in the next day.

Recipe Crispy Crackling Roasted Pork Shank Knuckle (Schweinshaxe)

To serving schweinshaxe, the authentic bavarian kitchen usually made Spätzle (potato and egg dumplings) and Rotkohl (braised red cabbage) or Sauerkraut (pickled cabbae). The schweinshaxe is carved by inserting your knive beetween the two long bone in the middle of your roasted pork knuckle. But today i served my schweinshaxe with deep fried sweet potato and brown gravy sauce that i’ve made from the roasting liquid. The roasting liquid dripping and the rest of the veggies is processed into smooth and sauteed with a roux into a thick brown gravy sauce

Schweinshaxe Recipe Bavarian Crunchy Roasted Pork Knuckle with Juniper Berry, Caraway Seed and Dark Beer

Recipe Schweinshaxe (Germany Crispy and Crunchy Roasted Pork Knuckle or Ham Hock:

Ingredients:

• 1 meaty pork shanks or ham hock
  
• 1 tsp juniper berry
• 1 tsp caraway seed
• 1/2 tsp blackpeppercorn
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
• 1 cup (250ml)  dark beer or chicken stock
• Mixture of large chuncy  veggies (sweet potato, celery, carrot, leek, scallion) for laying the pork knuckle

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe Instruction:

• In the night before, pat dry your pork shank or ham hock

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe : Pat dry the meaty pork knuckle

• Mix the juniper berry, salt, caraway seed and black pepercorn  and process it into coarsely ground. Rub your pork shank with the spices mixture, let it refrigerated overnight

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe :Rub with mixture of juniper berry, caraway seed, black pepeprcorn, garlic and salt

•  Firstly in the morning, preheat oven to 180°C. Place the veggies in the bottom of baking tray and lay the pork knuckle over it. Pour the dark beer into the vegies without touching the pork shank

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe : Put the veggies and lay the pork shank over it, put the dark beer!

• Cover  and seal the entire baking tray with heavy duty aluminuim foil and let and roast for about 1 and half hour.

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe : Cover and seal the entire baking pan/tray with heavy duty alumunium foil!

• Once the pork knuckle is fork tender, score the skin and the fat layer under the skin with a sharp knive. Never pierce into the meat.

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe : Score the skin and expose it with electric fan to dry out the skin!

• Expose the pork shank to the electric fan, let the skin is dry out. Once the skin is dry, roast it in 250°C for about 15-25 minutes, NEVER LEAVE THE OVEN and WATCH IT CLOSELY ! Once the pork crackling rind is popping out and blistered, put it out from the oven

Step by Step Schweinshaxe Recipe : Roast it in high temperature until the skin is crispy and blistered!

• Let the schweinshaxe resting before carving
• Meanwhile, save the sweet potato and deep fried it until golden brown, set aside
• Proces all the remaining gravy in the bottom of the baking tray into smooth

Brown Gravy Sauce Recipe:

• Remaining roasting dripping
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1 tbsp all purpose flour

To make a brown gravy sauce :

• Proces all the remaining gravy dripping in the bottom of the baking tray into smooth paste
• Heat up 1 tbsp butter in the heavy botto sauce pan in a low heat, add the flour and sautee it until slighly brown to make a roux
• Pour the processed gravy into the sauce pan and let it boil, add more liquid if necessary, simmet and let it thicken a little bit
• Serve the schweinshaxe with the deep fried sweet potato and brown gravy sauce

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