Paleo Braised and Glazed Pig Trotter
Pig’s trotter aka pig’s foot is a well-known and very delicious food in lots of cuisines and can be made in many ways. One of the most famous 3-Michelin-star French chef, Pierre Koffmann created the best stuffed pig’s trotter in the World, it became to be his signature dish. His recipe is a challenge for me, I definitely want to make it once, check that off my to-do list. Do you know the movie Julie and Julia? Julie wants to make the whole duck recipe of Julia Child and practices every day to reach her goal of being able to make it by the end of the year. Koffmann’s recipe is same for me.
In Hungary we are making an easy, tasty, sticky stew from pig’s trotter. My grandma made it a lot of times, but I made a Chinese glazed one now. I use coconut aminos instead of soy sauce which is a great substitution.
I know pig’s trotter is a very weird food for some people, I agree it is not really pretty, but it has rich flavor. One of the reasons why it is healthy, is because it contains very little meat and fat, but plenty of collagen which is needed for healthy skin, bones, organs and connective tissue. Unfortunately, it’s not possible to buy it anywhere in The Netherlands, I have to order it from my butcher, because it is not part of the Dutch cuisine.
Nose-to-tail eating, we could say is a new philosophy what became a trend in 2018, consuming many different parts of the animal. This way nothing goes to waste and it’s economically and environmentally friendly way to deal with food.
I think we need to rediscover our grandmothers’ recipe books, because they knew exactly how to use each part of the animal and return to some classic recipes with a modern boost. We can transform the old time-consuming recipes, because we have great, modern kitchen machines to reduce time, like pressure cooker what I used in this recipe.
Paleo Braised and Glazed Pig Trotter
Equipment
- Instant Pot
Ingredients
- 4 pig trotters ask your butcher to cut half them breadthwise
- 1 onion halved
- 1½ tsp salt
- 150 ml dry white wine Chardonnay
- 10 peppercorns
- 3 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp honey
- 4 spring onion sliced
- 4-5 cm ginger sliced
- 2 tsp ginger crushed
- ½ tsp Chili pepper flakes or more if you like hot
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 star anise whole
- 4 tbsp coconut aminos
For serving
- 2 spring onion finely sliced
- 1 chili paprika deseeded, cut membranes out, finely sliced
- 1 bunch cilantro cut
- 400 gram Zero Carb noodle from konjac flour
Instructions
- Clean the pig trotters, remove all hairs, rinse in running water and cook them in boiling water for 5 minutes to remove strong pork smell.
- Rinse them under running water.
- Put pig trotters to Instant Pot (IP) or other type of pressure cooker, add sliced ginger, halved onion and wine, 1 tsp salt then fill IP up with enough water to cover pork.
- Cover it, and set IP “Manual”, “High Pressure”, 20 minutes. Naturally release after cooking. (You can cook it on stove too, of course, but it takes longer time, you have to check it after 2 hours and if it is not soft enough, add more time, and check it again.)
- Heat 2 tbsp olive oil up in a Dutch oven (casserole dish or iron pot) and add sliced spring onions, crushed ginger, chili flakes, bay leaves, star anise, 1 tbsp honey, 2 tbsp coconut aminos, 1 tsp salt, stir them and sauté for a minute then add pig’s trotters into it.
- Add broth from pressure cooker until pig’s trotters are almost covered and turn to high heat.
- When it is starting to boil, reduce to medium heat and simmer for 25-30 minutes, stir it frequently otherwise the gelatinous pig’s trotters will burn on the bottom of the pot.
- When the sauce is starting to thicken, you have to stir it more often.
- If your pig’s trotter is soft, but the sauce is not thick enough, reduce the sauce and simmer on high heat. But! Add a bit of broth in it if the trotters are not soft enough and your sauce is thickened.
- Mix 2 tbsp coconut aminos and 1 tbsp honey and add to the thick sauce, stir and simmer for 2 minutes until pig’s trotters are glazed.
- Prepare noodles during cooking of pig’s trotters. Rinse noodles under cold running water in a sieve for 2 minutes.
- Heat oil in a pan, add noodles, warm it for 2 minutes.
- Place noodles into a serving bowl, place pig’s trotter to the top and sprinkle with finely sliced spring onion, chili and cilantro.