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Marks and Spencer

Everyone knows that Marks & Spencer doesn't do cheap food, but how does the quality compare to the independent producers? Food with Passion thought that we should carry out a product review rather than extolling private producers.

Outdoor bred pork: succulent boneless leg

Food with Passion loves pork. The pig is an extremely versatile beast with every part of it able to be eaten (bones excepted). It is however a beast that does not seem to benefit from hanging and unlike say beef, it can deteriorate badly if not butchered promptly.

Therefore there is no hiding place for good treatment of the beast whilst alive to ensure the finest quality meat.

The pork comes in the usual vacuum supermarket pack suitable for home freezing, which is exactly what we did with it to store for the Christmas period. The pack does not display the "Red Tractor" that has started to appear upon a lot of British produce, though it does state the producer's name (In this case it was Andy Buchan in Aberdeenshire, though I do not know whether he is a sole supplier.) I will endeavour to find out more from Marks and Spencer upon their selection criteria and their farmers. (Update 13 Jan 2008 - M&S have declined to comment without involving their PR department - no reply in over a week though)

After a day of defrosting the pork joint in the fridge, Food with Passion unwrapped it and followed preparation instructions ..... very simply to rub a tablespoon of salt into the fat cap, leave for 30 minutes and to then pat dry for the oven.

It is important to seal joints of meat to ensure that as much of the juices as possible are retained in the joint after cooking. Food with Passion sometimes takes a cooks blowtorch to a joint to achieve this quickly without cooking too deeply or alternatively to seal it in a searing hot cast iron skillet. However, on this occasion we adopted the recommended method of starting with the oven pre-heated to 230C. After 30 minutes, the oven was turned down to 170C.

It is important to understand that as meat is "organic" even if it is not produced in an organic way, and no two pieces of meat will cook in exactly the same way. Similarly, no two ovens, even from the same manufacturer will ever guarantee to operate at a well regulated temperature.

Therefore, you should always treat cooking times as a guide and be prepared to stop the cooking ahead of schedule. In our experience, most supermarkets are looking to avoid a law suit arising from food poisoning etc. that may be blamed on undercooked food caused by people following supermarket timings. Therefore supermarkets tend to err on the side of caution and often the food will not be at its best, being overcooked and drier if you strictly adhere to their timings.

Food with Passion were due to cook the meat for 2.5 hours overall, but tested with a meat thermometer at the 2 hour mark and realised that it probably needed only 5-10 minutes more at most. It is important to realise that whilst you rest the meat, the temperature inside the heart of the joint will continue to rise as the temperatures balance out throughout the meat.

Pork after cooking

Food with Passion rested the meat for around 45 minutes - DO NOT RUSH the meat to the table..... you need the resting time to have the most succulent joint with the juices distributing themselves back through the joint (during the fierce heat, the juices are driven to the outside).

As it happened, the joint still ended up slightly overdone as we would have preferred it to be slightly pink. One benefit of improved farming standards is that the old fears of eating undercooked pork are all but gone. We could probably have saved 30 minutes off the M&S recommended cooking time., reflecting my caution about only using cooking times as a guide, Food with Passion believes that the joint would have been completely ruined had we stuck by Marks and Spencer's instructions religiously.

Food with Passion is not fond of crackling, but I can confirm that the fat cap crackled nicely and would satisfy those that crave their crackling fix.

And what of the meat? Well, Food with Passion always believes that the seasoning on the outside of a joint never makes its way to the inside (unless you brine it - maybe the subject of a future article) and we are never offended by additional seasoning at the table. Once the slices of meat had a touch of extra seasoning, the flavour and texture was all it should have been.

The verdict: A winner!!

Congratulations from Food with Passion to Marks and Spencer and to Andy Buchan for producing a top tasting quality product, though it would be nice to host a dialogue over the welfare aspects.