JAMAICAN PORK RIB ROAST CALYPSO (for eight)

a bone-in pork roast (5 to 6 pounds), chine bone removed, at room temperature

½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground ginger

½ teaspoon ground cloves

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 bay leaves, crumbled

1 cup dark, dry Jamaican rum

2-½ cups chicken stock

½ cup dark brown sugar

1/3 cup lime juice

 

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1. Have the butcher saw through the chine bone (the backbone or spine) of the pork loin. Score fatty side in a diamond pattern. Mix the pepper, salt, ginger, cloves and garlic and rub well into the scored surface. Sprinkle crumbled bay leaves on top.

2. Preheat oven to 425*.

3. Place pork, fat side up, on a rack in a roasting pan. Add ½ cup rum and ½ cup stock to the pan and roast 15 minutes. While the pork roasts, combine the brown sugar, lime juice and remaining ½ cup rum. After 15 minutes, baste with the rum mixture, reduce oven temperature to 325* and roast 1 hour and 15 minutes, basting the pork 3 or 4 times with the rum sauce. Add more stock to the pan during cooking if necessary.

4. When roast is done, remove bay leaves, set meat on a platter, tent with foil and let stand 20 to 30 minutes.

 

adapted from Elizabeth Lambert Ortiz, The Complete Book of Caribbean Cooking