Savoury pork bake

We are eating out of the cupboards at the moment as money is scarce. I always ration meat as it is so expensive. When I freeze it, I divide it into 4 or 5oz portions. This feeds both of us. Today I took out some of the pork that we had minced from a half price joint bought when they were on offer before Christmas. I had thought about making a Moroccan stew,  or lasagne out of it, but decided to do something different, for a change. A savoury pork bake was made instead.

I tend to get a bit more creative when the ingredients have to be used carefully.  A packet of paxo dated 2023 has been sitting on my shelf for ages. A remnant of a Christmas past. I have one shelf with lots of random dried ingredients on it that I never seem to empty.  This next few months I am determined to use them up. Most dehydrated food is fine after the best before date. It just loses some taste.

This pork savoury bake was so easy to make. It was based on something I had seen in a butcher’s window . That was a ball of pork with herb stuffing inside, and apple sauce on top. At the butchers they were £3 each, and only small. I decided to make similar into a kind of pie, and cook it in the air fryer (but would be fine in the oven). I used a dish which is about 6 inches across.

Ingredients.

Pork mince (I had 5oz but more can be used).

I packet of dried stuffing (or homemade stuffing can be used).

1 oz cheese. (Optional but adds taste).

Apple sauce or compote for serving.

Method

1. Put the mince pork into the oven proof dish and flatten it to cover the bottom.

2. Sprinkle the grated cheese over the meat.

3. Make the stuffing mix up with boiling water. I added a bit of dried rosemary and garlic salt to make it more tasty.

4. Cover the meat and cheese with the stuffing, and air fry or bake at 190⁰C.

Mine took 12 minutes to cook but it will depend on how much meat you use, and how big the dish is. We always use a meat thermometer when cooking in the air fryer. You can pick them up for around a fiver. We have found that we often don’t have to cook things as long as recipes say. Anything over 74⁰C is safe. It has therefore paid for itself in saved energy.

I only used half the stuffing and so cooked the rest as balls. These were frozen to stretch a couple of Toad in the holes at a later date.

I served ours with some foraged  apple compote that I had in the fridge. It really enhanced the flavour. Mr S asked if we could have this again in the future as he really liked it. I will probably do it as a frugal Sunday dinner, with gravy and veg. We wanted a quick meal today and so just did chips and beans. Weirdly the apple and that combination still tasted good. I must admit, I was pleased with how nice it actually was. It was so quick and easy to make, too. I felt like a proper British war time housewife with my rationed meat. We usually make Mediterranean, or Asian food. I don’t eat British type cuisine often, but will probably be eating more of it as my spices deplete.

What would you do with a packet of stuffing mix? I still have 2 left as I tend to make fresh stuffing now at Christmas.