I made this in my pizza oven in a clay pot but you can make it in a casserole dish in your oven without any problems.

Serves 6

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 small brown onion – sliced
• 1 small red onion – sliced
• 3 cloves of garlic – crushed
• 6 pork spare ribs – each cut into three pieces
• 3 sticks of celery – chopped
• 2 medium carrots – peeled and roughly chopped
• 250 grams of Jap or Kent pumpkin – cut into large cubes
• ¼ of red cabbage – cut into 3 chunks
• ¼ of green cabbage – cut into 3 chunks
• 330 mil bottle of Scotch Ale
• 250 mils of chicken stock
• Salt and black pepper

Method

Preheat oven to 140 fan forced or allow your wood fired oven to cool down (after you have made your pizzas of course) you are looking for a floor temp of around 200°c.

If cooking in a wood fired oven you will need to pull the clay pot out to add an ingredient and then put it back in the wood fired oven so as to cook it then pull it out each time you add an ingredient or stir it. If you are cooking in a casserole dish the first part of the recipe is done on the stove top and then the long cooking is done in your oven with a lid on.

Heat your pot in the oven or heat you casserole dish over medium high heat add the olive oil and onions and cook for several minutes stirring then add the garlic and cook until fragrant.

Now add in your pork and give it a good stir and allow to cook for about 8 minutes stirring often.

Put in the carrots and celery stir and return to the heat for several more minutes. Once you have some nice smells coming out of the oven and a little bit of colour happening toss in the pumpkin, the cabbages, the beer and the stock and give it all a stir then season with the salt and black pepper give it one more stir and put the lid on the clay pot and put back in to the middle of the oven.

At this stage if cooking on a stove top you now put your casserole dish in to the oven and leave it there to cook for 3 hours – checking it every hour. Check the clay pot after 20 – 30 minutes if it is boiling quite a bit pull the clay pot forward towards the opening of the wood fired oven so that the heat is less intense and it just has a nice easy simmer.

Keep the lid on and cook for 3 or so hours or until the pork is fall apart tender.

Serve as is or serve with some boiled potatoes and steamed green beans.

I used Red Hill Scotch Ale but you could use a Belgian ale such as Leffe Brune, or something dark, high alcohol and interesting from your local microbrewery.

Like this recipe? You can get more in Paul Mercurio’s excellent Cooking With Beer.