If you like pork – and we know you do – you’ll want to dine at Maplewood’s Monarch Restaurant and Edwardsville’s Erato on Main soon. Chefs Joshua Galliano and Kevin Willmann have started working with their respective halves of a locally raised Red Wattle, a heritage breed pig making its area debut. The beef-like meat, Willmann reported, is amply marbled.
Galliano will be serving dishes like boudin noir with mashed potatoes and roasted apples topped off with a crème fraîche-mustard sauce. Pork loin is likely later on. Willmann will likewise have loin chops seasoned with apple-cider brine along with a cold-smoked, Louisiana-style andouille sausage with hefty pork chunks. Also watch for bacon, ribs, hocks, snout, fatback – the works. Having weighed in at about 220 pounds, this big Red Wattle promises to go a long way.
– Photo courtesy of Marian Van Beever of Five Ponds Farm
This article appears in Feb 1-28, 2009.