Christmas Eve Rolled Center-Cut Pork Loin with Pan Sauce

Done right, a pork loin can be a wonderful cut of meat. The general public, and especially inexperienced home cooks, get scared by pork and so they don’t cook it nearly as often as they should. Something about pork is much more intimidating than other animal proteins, and I aim to change that. When home cooks do cook pork, many times, it doesn’t fit their expectations. Sorry to burst your bubbles, home chefs, but that’s on you, not on the pork. Pork can certainly pose a challenge, but with a little bit of preparation and good technique, a pork loin roast can be as good or better than any other protein you’re more used to preparing.

First, some anatomy. The pig’s loin muscle tapers at both ends. Therefore, the biggest, fattiest, best, and most expensive part of the loin is the center. A center-cut loin roast that weighs 3-3.5 pounds can comfortably feed 5-7 people. (The center-cut loin roast can get as wide as a desktop keyboard, and the whole loin roast can get to nearly twice that.) Be sure not to confuse a loin roast with a tenderloin roast. The “loin” roast lies on either side of the pig’s spine. Pork chops come from here, and the biggest, best ones come from the center as mentioned above. This is completely different from the “tenderloin” roast—the “pig’s chateaubriand” (you get filet mignon from real chateaubriand from cattle; the tenderloin is essentially that, but on a pig). The “tenderloin” roast rarely exceeds a pound or a pound and a half, so it only barely feeds two. To clear this up, for now, this recipe is covering the “loin” roast. The “tenderloin” recipe will come out in a few months, and when it does, I’ll hyperlink it here.

This loin recipe will require butterflying. This procedure is one of the reasons this particular cut of pork can be intimidating to anyone except those who have years of experience with it. But, taken step-by-step, butterflying is actually quite simple. The idea behind butterflying is simple: cut down 1/3 of the loin almost to the point of detaching it, but not quite. This makes a flap that then opens. One side is 1/3 the original thickness, and the other side is 2/3. Make another cut that opens up the 2/3 so there’s now one flat sheet of pork that opens up like a book. Each time, cut almost all the way through, but never actually all the way through. Use the flat side of a meat mallet to pound out this opened pork loin to roughly even thickness.

Lay the roast flat and open, fat-cap-side down. (If you roll it back up into its previous log-like shape before your butterflying cuts unraveled it, you’ll notice one side has a layer of fat. That’s the fat cap.) Make a few long, shallow cuts in each direction, creating a checkered pattern on the flesh side of the open, butterflied roast. Season it with salt and freshly cracked black pepper. Soften 1 stick of unsalted butter. Into that, mix the chopped leaves of one bunch each of sage, thyme, rosemary, and tarragon, and 4 minced cloves of garlic. Apply this compound butter all over the inside of roast. Roll it up so it looks like it did before you cut into it again and tie it together at regular intervals. Depending on the size and shape of your roast, you might use between four and six knots and equivalently many lengths of kitchen twine. Apply the rest of the butter to the outside of the roast. Once tied and buttered, place the roast in a baking dish fat-cap-side-up, and place that baking dish in a preheated 450-degree oven for 20 minutes. Drop the heat to 350 after 20 minutes and let the roast come up to 140 Fahrenheit in that oven. Remove the roast from the oven at 140, and it will come up at least to 150, maybe even higher, if you let it rest for 10 or 15 minutes. This “cooking after the cooking” is called “carryover” and is an essential part of the process for cooking large steaks or roasts like this one. If you do not allow the proteins to relax and the moisture to redistribute, you’ll end up with a bunch of dry, tense protein—the opposite of the desired moist, tender protein.

There seems to be a generational divide regarding the proper doneness for pork. I’m a part of Gen Z. The prevailing guidance for most of our generation’s experience (and that of Millennials before us) has been that slightly pink pork pulled at 145 is perfectly safe. Our parents and earlier (Gen X, Boomers, and the Silent Generation) were always taught by the USDA that the only way to make pork safe was to cook it all the way well-done. Now, the USDA says medium and medium-well are also perfectly safe. But depending on who you cook for, you may have to adjust to your parents’, grandparents’, etc., preferences. This preference for a higher degree of doneness isn’t irrational. Up until a few decades ago, when Millennials and Gen Zers were growing up, the prevailing wisdom was that trichinosis infection could result from undercooked pork. While still technically true that pork can carry trichinosis, studies have shown that not only is trichinosis exceedingly rare in the American pork yield, but also that 145 is a sufficiently high temperature to mitigate its effects. However, if other pathogens are common where your pork comes from elsewhere in the world, then please, by all means, cook it to 160 to be safe.

Some fond will certainly accumulate on the bottom surface of your roasting tray. Do not let this go to waste! A piece of pork the size of a whole center-cut loin should rest at least 15 minutes (no, it won’t go cold in that time)—the perfect amount of time to make a pan sauce. Into the pan go 2 Tablespoons each of flour and butter, over medium-low heat. Whisk together until a light paste forms, being careful not to burn either the paste (called a “roux”) or the pork fond. Gradually add 1 ½ cups of chicken, beef, or pork stock. Whisk constantly to make sure there are no lumps created in the stock by the thickening power of the roux. This deglazes the pan, i.e., it lifts off those sticky caramelized bits of porky goodness left on the bottom of the pan and dissolves them into the sauce, thereby seasoning it. When the sauce reduces by half, cut off the heat and whisk in another 3 tablespoons of cold butter. Serve alongside the pork loin.