Belly pork is the lazy cook’s ideal roast pork, giving you crisp crackling and tender meat without any fuss and bother. You can even roast potatoes under it at the same time. Serve with watercress, and quince sauce (recipe follows).

Ingredients
Feeds 4. Takes 1 hour 20 mins plus resting time.

1.3kg piece belly pork
1tsp sea salt
500g medium-sized floury potatoes, eg, desirée
1tbsp olive oil
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 bunches watercress

Preheat the oven to 220C/Gas mark 7. Score the skin of the belly pork at 1cm intervals, right to the edges (the best tool for this is a scalpel or a Stanley knife; second best tool is your butcher). Rub sea salt all over the skin and the meat. Set aside in the fridge for an hour or two.

Place a sheet of kitchen foil on the bottom of the roasting tray. Peel the potatoes and cut into quarters. Toss with olive oil, sea salt and pepper, and arrange on the foil. Place the pork on a rack set above the foil, and roast for 20 minutes.

Reduce the oven temperature to 200C/Gas mark 6 and roast for a further 45 minutes or until the skin crackles.

If the crackling browns too quickly, cover loosely with a sheet of foil. If it isn’t crisp enough, increase the temperature again and give it another ten minutes, watching carefully. You may need to turn and baste the potatoes once during this time, and even drain off some of the excess fat.

Wash and dry the watercress and trim off the stems.

To serve, turn the pork upside down on a chopping board and cut out any bones. Turn the pork skin-side up and cut along the score lines into 1cm slices. Serve with roast potatoes, watercress and a bowl of spiced quince sauce.

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