Pork Roast With Pan Gravy

I was thinking some kind of pork when I went to the store.  I was looking over the chops when one of the butchers came over and plopped a huge bone-in pork roast to clear for $3.50. Not per pound, that's for the whole thing. I'm far too cheap to pass up a special like that!

As soon as I got home I put the roast in a brine of 

Pork Brine - per cup water

1 tbsp salt

1/2 tbsp sugar

1/2 tbsp molasses

Immerse pork in brine and refrigerate as long as possible, up to 2 days. I gave it 3 or 4 hours. To roast I laid 5 bay leaves on the roast, a couple of sprigs of thyme and 3 sprigs of rosemary.

I only had 2 potatoes left and 3 diners so I made rice, which Ryan likes better anyway.  I picked some peas in the garden, about half I podded and the rest I cooked in the pod.  Still didn't have enough so I added the rest of my frozen green peas.  Still not enough!  I added some frozen corn and that finally looked like enough fibre for 3 people.

I slowly mixed 1 cup water into 1 tablespoon of flour to make a smooth suspension.  Then I poured that into the roasting pan on a med-low burner.  I had taken most of the fat off the roast so there wasn't as much as in the past. Pork fat tastes great but too much is just greasy. That wasn't enough flour so I put another teaspoon or two in a dry spot in the pan and whisked it into the gravy.  Drawing the gravy up to the flour and mixing on a dry spot worked great, no visible lumps.

There was no slicing or carving around the bones in the meat so I just hacked off hunks of meat.  I spooned a bit of gravy over the meat on the plate and added the rice and vegetables. A spoon of Fern's Ketchup beside the meat. The frozen peas and corn didn't detract too much from the rest of the meal The half fresh peas lifted the frozen a notch. It's definitely home cook plating but it had four star flavour! I wanted to say Michelin flavour (not the tires) but I've never eaten in a Michelin star restaurant so I wouldn't know when my food gets there, if ever.