Tuesdays with TT: Porchetta

According to Wikipedia, porchetta is a savory, fatty, and moist boneless pork roast of Italian culinary tradition. The body of the pig is gutted, deboned, arranged carefully with layers of stuffing, meat, fat, and skin, then rolled, spitted, and roasted, traditionally over wood. Porchetta is usually heavily salted in addition to being stuffed with garlic, rosemary, fennel, or other herbs, often wild.

According to me, porchetta is DELICIOUS! CT and I actually visited this tiny storefront in the East Village a little over a year ago during the Taste of 7th Street. Since we only had a palm-sized bite of the heavenly roasted meat, it was not a accurate representation of what the store had to offer. The way things went we never ended up going back for a second taste. Maybe it was due to the fact that it is more of a store than restaurant, since it is pretty much a take-out only place. Although I suppose we could have gone on a nice day and brought the food to Tompkins Square Park for a little picnic.

Fortunately, there was a Blackboard Eats 30% off deal announced for Porchetta a while ago, which was incentive enough to go. Of course, I waited until the last day of the offer to actually go. It was a slightly rainy Spring night which was perfect for some Italian comfort food. For CT and myself I decided to get two sandwiches and two sides.

The sandwich ($10) was about six inches long with one layer of porchetta inside and not much else. It was definitely the sad cousin to San Francisco’s Roli Roti. Luckily, the bread held up very well during the 20 min or so ride back from the East Village. Although on the smaller side, it was filling with all the meat and salt. I particularly liked the bits of crispy skin hidden in various parts of the sandwich.

I think it should be to requirement to order the crispy potatoes with burnt ends ($5). These potatoes are cooked underneath the porchetta so all the delicious drippings get soaked up. Due to the traveling, the potatoes weren’t as crispy as the originally were, but still quite tasty. They leaned towards the salty side, which was fine for my savory palate. The burnt ends were just pieces of super crunchy pork skin that fell off the porchetta. They provided a good contrast to the now soft potatoes.

To be healthy, I also got us a side of cooking greens ($5). These were also on the salty side of things(are you sensing a theme here?). I enjoyed the greens a lot too. Some nice roughage that was most likely sauteéd in pork fat. They were tender and easy to chew, which is not always the case with greens.

CT said: Although the portion looked a little small, they were more than enough food for us. Individually I really liked with of the items. The sandwich was juicy, and the meat was a definite star with it’s salty deliciousness and bits of crunchy skin. I liked the potatoes and greens too, however the whole meal became way too salty for me. Each of the dishes on it’s own, or even two out of three, would have been great. However, I went into salt overload and had a tough time finishing everything. Still, I was pretty happy with the sandwich and would happily go back for another one.

All in all, it was the perfect meal for a relaxing Friday night at home. Although I was worried I didn’t order enough food, we were both plenty full after finishing it all. Prices weren’t too bad considering all of the preparation work needed to make the porchetta. If I was ever in the East Village area during lunch, I would definitely put Porchetta in contention.