Goan Pork Sorpatel (Made by an Anglo Indian :) )

I have had a major hankering for Goan Sorpotel.

Stanley would order a kilo or two from a lady who would cater in Dubai and we would package it off and stick it in the freezer for times when we just didn’t want to step in the kitchen and cook. The next authentic alternative was to bring some over with us from Goa on one of our holidays.

Once I went to the extent of buying the clay ‘chatty’ to make an authentic sorpotel (with the liver, heart and kidney, minus the blood) and while it came out really well based on a Goan recipe book – it looked orange and some how didn’t mellow quite enough, failing to hit the spicy and sour combo and lacking the heavenly Goan vinegar fragrance that completely envelops the house with a tight Goan squeeze.

So when we moved to Australia and with a brand new baby to boot, I put my cooking on the ‘back burner’ so to speak and stuck to quick meals with tons of veggie to keep our energy levels up, the aim was to subtract from my kitchen time and add to my ‘Lauren’ time :). 

With Lauren almost hitting the one year mark, I decided to treat ourselves to Goan Sorpotel but didn’t know which recipe to use – after a bit of tapping into Mr Holmes’ investigative skills I came across a wonderful blog by Helene D’Souza called Masala Herb; her Goan Pork Sorpatel http://www.masalaherb.com/blog/2012/12/goan-pork-sorpotel.html looks divine and has that rich, maroon, masala laden look with the red emulsion of oil, vinegar and pork lard. Oh heavens …. if my go at the recipe even came out looking a little worse off I’d have been thrilled. What I loved about her recipe is that it’s tried and tested and the best of all , it has been shared by her mom in law! Yay! 

That was music to my ears and I was particularly happy that it didn’t use the offal which might have health implications.

When I showed Stanley the recipe, being the die hard Goan that he is indignantly said, “If it doesn’t have the pork heart, kidney and liver it isn’t Goan Sorpatel!” I retorted, “This is Goan Sorpatel, cooked by a die hard Anglo Indian and if it turns out well you aren’t getting any and I will lick my fingers in front of you!”

I followed Helene's recipe pretty well down to a ‘T’ but went on a couple of detours along the way, if you know me, you know I love me my onions so I used 5 large onions instead of 4 medium ones. Garlic paste and ginger paste as I didn't have any fresh ginger and didn't want to use all my raw garlic in one go! I adjusted the heat level as well with two teaspoons of brown sugar (Stanley said use honey and as an after thought I realized I had Stevia in the pantry that I could have used – Darn!). As a method changer I boiled down my pork broth to about a quarter of it’s consistency and really gave the meat a good fry in the masala before adding the broth. The house smelled so good, we didn't even wait for the masala and the meat to mature and were eating spoonful’s of it with whole meal bread last night – it tasted so good I was driving Stanley bonkers licking my fingers and being the good cook that I am, I gave him a share! Yummmmmmmmmmmmoooooooo!!! Unfortunately I didn't have a peg of feni to add! But it tasted great all the same .... so if you want a good 'go to' Goan Sorpatel recipe this is the one! Just get an Anglo Indian to cook it for you *wink*wink*!!!

I must say that the main ingredient in the sorpatel is the coconut vinegar and while it's near to impossible to get it across the border in Australia, the Goan Pickles website does sell it under the 'Goana Foods' Brand - give it a go and let me know it turns out!