Pork Baked in Foil with Eggplant and Mushrooms
Pork neck (the well-marbled cut sold as pork shoulder in the US) is baked sealed in foil with eggplant and mushrooms, cooking in its own juices so it stays moist without extra fat. Garlic goes between the layers, and soy sauce with oregano lends a deep umami note edged with something Mediterranean.
The whole trick is the tightly sealed foil, which traps the steam: the vegetables give up moisture, the meat drinks it in, and a concentrated juice pools at the bottom. That juice, thickened with a little starch, becomes the sauce — nothing wasted.
A few cook’s notes
Pick a piece with thin veins of fat so it won’t dry out in the 20 minutes at 180°C (350°F). Salt the eggplant ahead and let it sit 10 minutes to shed bitterness. Want a browned top? Open the foil for the last 5 minutes. Oyster mushrooms stand in nicely for button, and since soy sauce is already salty, go easy salting the meat.
Part of Ukrainian cuisine — 464 more recipes in the section.
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Ingredients
Instructions
Cut the pork across the grain into 3 pieces and pound lightly. Slice the eggplant into rounds about 5 mm thick and the mushrooms into thin slices.
Brush a sheet of foil with oil. Lay down a piece of meat, season with salt and spices, then top with half the eggplant, the mushrooms, and a couple of garlic cloves. Cover with the next piece of meat and repeat the layers.
Drizzle the top layer of meat with soy sauce and oil, and sprinkle with oregano. Seal the foil tightly and bake at 180°C (350°F) for 20 minutes.
Remove the cooked meat from the foil, pour off the juices and strain them. Thicken with starch, stir in oregano, and pour this sauce over the meat.
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