Thanks to this months edition of the Year of Meat I now have a beautiful hunk of Pancetta, and it is time to decide what to make. 
My wife is making a huge lasagna for my parents, aunt & uncle who are all coming for dinner. Now this lasagna is already going to feature a homemade Italian sausage my son & I made, and my wife’s lasagna on it’s own is quite the treat, but why not make it an affair to remember.
I lived in Wisconsin for a few years, and one of the big things up there in the restaurants is a hot bacon dressing that is served over a spinach salad. So why not a pancetta dressing over a spinach salad with lasagna?
First we will cut a section length wise.
Then we will cube it, and toss it into a cast iron skillet
Let the pancetta cook on medium low for a bit, as to what we are really wanting is that rendered fat from this meat. We will of course achieve browning of the meat as well, but the pig nectar aka pork fat, is the base to our dressing. So after we have a nice pool of rendered fat in the bottom, I am going to drain.
The resulting drippings equals roughly two tablespoons. We are going to put these drippings, into a slow cooker, and add the following:
- 2 cups Red Wine Vinegar
- 2 cups White Vinegar
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon of brown mustard
- The chopped, cooked and drained pancetta
Let this mixture cook for several hours at a very low heat.
Abo
out 30 minutes before you serve, turn off the heat, and let it rest until it is time to serve.
I served the dressing in a gravy bowl (with grated Asiago cheese melted on top) so the guests could put as much (or as little) of the dressing and chunky pork toppings as they wanted.
It was beyond fantastic!!
Sir Porkalot
