Long Time Gone

I was devastated when I heard that Fuzio Universal Pasta closed it's Dupont Circle location a few years back. I loved this chain restaurant while in grad school and the early year's of my career when a night out at Fuzio yielded a bill of about $25 for wine, entree and dessert vs the same at twice the price somewhere else. Often I would find myself sitting at the 'bar' overlooking the kitchen. The restaurant was smallish, but always busy. I have to assume that they just couldn't pay the high rent for that location, it's really too bad because it was a fun place to go with a group of people, where everyone in the group was likely to find something on their small menu that they would like, from veggie to meat eaters, most everyone was always pleased.

That said, I often would get the exact same thing when I went to Fuzio. 90% of the time I would order their one of their specialties, Fuzio Firecracker Pork Fusilli.

Corkscrew pasta with tender ginger-braised pork, firecracker-hot habanero pesto and sour cream-give it a stir to mingle heat and flavors together.

Well, since the restaurant closed, I have been thinking about this dish. I had tried internet searches yielding nothing. This past week I was ready to try to recreate the dish even if I had nothing to go on. I tried a few more variations of the google search and got a few ideas, includingon saying to be the exact recipe...I pulled them all together to see what I could come up with.

To start, the recipes called for Pork Tenderloin as the meat cut of choice. Great! Except the two stores I went to either 1) didn't have it or 2) had it in restaurant size $50 quantities! Not on my budget! So I went with a butt roast. We'll see how it works out....let's move on, I'll be back to the meat.

The meat needs to be marinaded for 24 hours. The marinade I put together in the food processor was: 9 cloves of garlic, about a 5 inch piece of ginger, sliced up, 1 full bunch of cilantro, with the root end removed, 1 bunch of green onions (from the tip up about three inches), 1/2 a regular onion. Give that a whirl for a few seconds until it comes together. Then add 12 oz of pineapple juice and 6 oz of soy sauce. I used "lite" soy sauce. Whirl this all together and prepare the meat.

As I said previously, I used a butt roast. There is a lot of fat and connective tissue in this meat. It is really important that the final product be really tender. To help this process along, I chopped the meat into large chunks and then cleaned it up by removing some of the fat and as much of the connective tissue as possible. I have to say, this process (making the marinade and fixing the meat) took an hour. I really will try to get a pork tenderloin next time.

Once the meat is prepped, but it in a zip top bag placed inside a large bowl (to catch any spills or leaks), then pour in the marinade. Zip up and place in the ice box for 24 hours.

Long story short, I didn't marinade for 24 hours, more like 18 hours. Don't tell the food police! See, when I went to the store earlier in the day to get everything, I did...except the pork. *DUMBASS*

The dish is supposed to take 2 hours of cooking time. So two hours before you are ready for dinner, pre-heat oven to 300, get a large pan out and on the stove over high heat with a thin layer of oil. Remove the meat from the marinade--do not discard the marinade--sear the meat on all sides in the pan. Do this in steps if you need, don't over crowd the pan. If you have to do this in batches, during the final side of the final batch, pour in the reserved (and strained) marinde. Bring all to a high simmer, cover and throw into the oven, check in and hour and turn meat!

Prior to serving, prepare your Habanero Pesto. To start, find the peppers. I don't know if I have Scotch Bonnets, Hungarian Wax or Habanero peppers. They all look pretty similiar in photos on the web and the Giant only had them listed as "hot" peppers, so I don't know. I grabbed some Jalapenos, just in case.

In the food processor, add a full bunch of cilantro, 2 Habanero peppers and 2 Jalapenos, a small handful of pine nuts and parmesan cheese, a pinch of salt, grind of pepper...whirl until it just comes together. Start drizzling in olive oil, until you get the desired consistency.

Serve the Ginger-Braised Pork with a shapely pasta and top with a dollop of the pesto and sour cream. Swirl it all around in a bowl to combine flavors and enjoy!


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