RealGravy

American Style Gravies

Philly Roast Pork Gravy

A thin garlic and oregano pork jus from a slow roasted shoulder, barely thickened, meant to be soaked straight into a roll rather than poured over a plate.

  • Contains meat
  • Dairy free
  • pork
  • sandwich
  • jus
  • garlic
Illustration of Philly Roast Pork Gravy
Prep
15 min
Cook
4 hrs
Total
4 hr 15 min
Serves
8
Difficulty
Medium

The Philadelphia roast pork sandwich is a better thing than the cheesesteak and almost nobody outside the city knows it. The pork is roasted with a lot of garlic and oregano and the juices become a thin jus that the roll gets dipped into. It is barely thickened at all, because a thick gravy sits on bread instead of going into it.

Ingredients

Makes about 800ml, enough for eight sandwiches

Scale

Kit

  • Roasting tin
  • Fat separator or jug
  • Sieve
  • Small bowl
  • Wide saucepan

Method

  1. Mix the garlic paste, oregano, fennel seeds, black pepper and olive oil into a rough rub and work it all over the pork, pushing it into every crevice of the rolled joint. Leave it in the fridge overnight if you have time, or an hour at room temperature if you have not.

  2. Heat the oven to 160C (fan 140C, gas 3). Sit the pork in a roasting tin, pour 300ml of the stock around it, and cover the tin tightly with foil.

  3. Roast for three and a half hours, checking once an hour that the tin has not run dry and topping up with a splash of water if it has. The pork is ready when a fork twists in it with no resistance at all.

  4. Take the foil off, turn the oven up to 220C (fan 200C, gas 7) and give it twenty five minutes to brown the outside. Then lift the joint out and let it rest for half an hour under loose foil.

  5. Pour everything in the tin into a jug and let it settle for ten minutes. Skim off the fat, keeping two tablespoons of it, and put the tin back over a hob ring on a medium heat with that fat in it.

  6. Whisk the single tablespoon of flour into the fat and cook it for a minute, scraping the base. This is a deliberately tiny amount of flour, just enough to stop the jus running straight off the meat.

  7. Pour in the reserved juices and the remaining 400ml of stock, whisking as you go, and let it simmer for eight to ten minutes. Strain it into a wide pan and check the consistency. It should be barely thicker than stock and should not coat a spoon.

  8. Taste and season hard, because this liquid has to carry an entire sandwich. Slice the pork thin, dunk it in the hot jus, pile it into a roll with sharp provolone and greens, and spoon more jus over the top.

Tips worth knowing

  • Resist the urge to thicken this. It is a jus, not a gravy, and its job is to soak into the bread. A tablespoon of flour across 800ml of liquid is all it wants.
  • Broccoli rabe is the traditional green and it is almost impossible to find here. Purple sprouting broccoli or chard, blanched and then fried hard with garlic and chilli, is a very close stand in.
  • Sharp provolone is worth hunting down in an Italian deli. If you cannot get it, a mature Cheddar is the wrong flavour but a young pecorino is closer.
  • Save the sliced pork in the jus rather than on a plate. It keeps the meat wet and it makes the jus taste more of pork with every hour it sits.

Change it up

  • Add a splash of dry white wine to the tin before the stock for a brighter jus, or a tablespoon of white wine vinegar and a little extra stock for the same effect without alcohol.
  • Stir a teaspoon of dried chilli flakes into the jus for a hotter version that stands up to sharp provolone.
  • Roast the joint on a bed of sliced onions and blitz them into the strained jus for a thicker, sweeter sauce if you would rather have gravy than a dipping liquid.

Keeping and reheating

The jus keeps four days in the fridge with the sliced pork sitting in it, which is the best way to store both. It freezes for three months. Reheat gently in a pan until steaming, never boiling, or the pork toughens.

Questions people ask

What is a Philly roast pork sandwich?

Slow roasted garlic and oregano pork, sliced thin, piled into a long roll with sharp provolone and garlicky greens, with the meat juices spooned over. It is the older and, in Philadelphia, the more respected of the city's two famous sandwiches.

What can I use instead of broccoli rabe?

Purple sprouting broccoli, chard or even kale. Blanch it for two minutes, drain it well, then fry it in olive oil with sliced garlic and chilli flakes. Broccoli rabe is more bitter than any of these, so a squeeze of lemon at the end gets you closer.

Should the gravy be thick or thin?

Thin. The whole point is that the roll soaks it up, and a thick gravy just sits on the surface and slides out of the sandwich. If yours has thickened too much, let it down with hot stock until it pours like single cream.