Roadside Meal - Chicheron - Crispy Pork Belly

There are a lot of things I do not understand. Well, that is only natural, because there are a lot of things that is going on on this planet and beyond and if I would be able to understand all that I would have an IQ of above 200. Hm ... interesting ... I haven't checked that lately though, but I don't want to give an hypothesis of how high my IQ actually is nor do I want to give any suggestions regarding that right now.
That wasn't going to be the subject anyway. We are trying food here and supposedly from around the world. Going back to the do not understand part. For example there is this scandal going on at the moment with eggs and a chemical called Fipronil. On the one hand they say you should through this eggs away or bring them back to the supermarket and on the other hand an adult could eat seven of those eggs in a day and it won't happen nothing. Who is eating seven eggs a day?
Anyway, how can they put prices in the supermarket and write it is a special offer, when it's in fact the same prize as always or even higher.
How does it come that our fridge is always empty again so quickly. Well, for that one there might be an explanation ... eh ... it seems we are drifting away from the subject. Just to give an idea of where we want to get here ...

... maybe the might help to focus. That is one crispy pork belly or as they would call it in the Dominican Republic: Chicheron.
There again we get to the point I originally wanted to talk about when I said 'do not understand'. Over there in the Dominican Republic for example you find shops that sell chic heron at the roadside. Here it comes ... the curious part ... in one spot there are for example four shops next to each other that sell Chicheron. Then in another place there are four shops together that sell fish and no shop of Chicheron. Or four shops that sell fruits and no shop of Chicheron or fish. Again I could go on for hours, but that's how it is.
Anyhow, the way I put it on the picture is not the way you have it locally it rather might look like this ...

You might just stop with your car, taste a bit of what you are interested and then buy a loadful of it and hit the road again or ...

... you might eat it on sight with some hot sauce and yuca and bananas on the side. Well that looks just like a little snack for me, you might think, but ... no I didn't eat it all.

Well, when you are blogging about food, you even might do some other things, when you are around, but those images might be too hard for some to see, so only read ahead when you are absolutely sure you can take it ...

You had your chance, but you had to click ahead. Now there is no way back, you have to read on and see what there is to see ...

Well, that is what I call a food psychopath ... yes, the one with the knife. Yes indeed, that is what you call a knife ...

While you might travel to the Dominican Republic and search the roads for the right shop that sells you the right delicious Chicheron, you might as well ...

... have your own crispy pork belly.

Ingredients

Pork belly

Olive oil

Salt, pepper

3 cloves of garlic cut in half with peel

Sage leaves

Dried chillies

400 ml coconut milk

200 ml water

1 tbsp fennel seeds

Method

Get yourself an oven proof dish ready and through in the pot belly ... nicely. Rub it with some olive oil. No a massage won't be necessary. Make incisions into the skin of the pork belly. Just make sure they are deep enough. 

Season with salt and pepper and put the dish into the pre-heated oven at 240 °C for 25 minutes.

What possibly can you do with 25 minutes of free time? Well, that would be enough time to watch an episode of for example 'How I met your mother' or 'The Big Bang Theory'. Of course that would only be something for you if you were into any of those. You could also do some cleaning up, although on the other hand we didn't make a mess yet in the kitchen. However, you could already think about with what other things you might make a mess in the kitchen. It's totally up to you.

Let's assume the 25 minutes are over and you did one of the aforementioned things.

Now you would add the coconut milk, the water, the garlic, the sage, the chillies and the fennel seeds to the ovenproof dish. 

On the picture you can already see where the incisions weren't deep enough. That give you some extra work to ... eh ... rework the incisions.

However, that isn't your only problem, for the whole thing goes back to the oven at 180 °C for one hour. Yes, one hour. Here you might watch an episode of 'The Flash' or 'Chuck'. That would leave you with some extra time, though. Once again it's all up to you whether you are into watching such things. Apart from that there still isn't any mess in the kitchen because of me. What you did, though, is written on another piece of paper.

Speaking of another piece of paper ...

You know where that is? Of course it is in the Dominican Republic, but where?

Never mind, after that one hour at 180 °C we turn up the heat to 250 °C and leave the Chicheron for another 10 minutes in the oven. Now don't ask me what you can watch in these ten minutes you series junky. Go figure it out for yourself.

The pork belly is ready and crispy and maybe you notice the rework of the incisions as well. What did you do in the meantime, all the time while the food was in the oven? Did you watch some episodes or did you prepare anything to eat on the side?

I reckon I was a bit lazy on that side for we have only some untypical things on the side such as bread and a mint raita. I won't call the chillies and lemons on the side ... eh ... side dishes or any like that.

Have a piece or another or whatever. I really love that crispy part of the pork belly. When you do it all right and it tastes awesome ... good for you.

Well, that here was good for me, too. Although I wouldn't mind so much, we can't always fly over to the Dominican Republic to have some Chicheron, but we can have it more easily 'en casa'. However, over there you can have it at a roadside meal, but ...

... have I already told you what I do not understand?