Marvin’s Five Episode 6: Pork with Fig Jam, Walnuts and Port 🐷

This week Chef Marvin Gauci returns to our Fino kitchen to work his magic on a gorgeous pork fillet and port recipe. The FoodBlog twists this week; fig jam and crushed walnuts! 🍷

All ingredients for Episode 6 of Marvin’s Five can be ordered for delivery through Arkadia, via Wolt - just as Chef Marvin did. 🚴

Read on to find out how you can replicate this dish at home with 5 simple ingredients:

Recipe

Get hungry! This is the treat you're in for!

Ingredients

Apart from the basic ingredients of cooking oil, olive oil, salt, pepper, chilli, garlic and butter*. The following 5 ingredients will be needed for this dish. 

• 650g pork fillet, trimmed
• 100g walnuts, roughly chopped
• 2tbs fig jam
• 80ml port
• ½ a white onion, finely chopped 

*Please note that garlic and cooking oil were not used in this Episode’s dish.

Method

1. First things first, roughly chop your walnuts on a clean chopping board. These will be needed to create a crunchy and nutty crust on the pork. Once you achieve a crumble-like consistency, place them on the side. You could also use a food processor and gently pulse your walnuts until they crumble. 🔪

Chop up those nuts for a great texture bonus!

2. On the same board, finely chop half an onion. To create the finest cut, firmly place your halved onion on your board, flat side down. Trim the onion as necessary - if you’re a beginner in the kitchen, or require more control of the onion, leave the bottom root intact to hold the onion in place while chopping.

Creating the perfect cut, one knife stroke at a time.

3. Gently run your knife along the width of the onion, creating segments, while keeping the onion attached. You could choose to chop your onion now and create a thicker cut, but if you’re looking for a finer result, cut through the onion, horizontal to the board but slightly tilted downwards, as seen in the video. Chop your onion into fine, delicate pieces. You could also use a food processor. 🧅

Dice up your onions for a super fine result.

4. Place onions on the side and start trimming your pork. Your target here is to remove all the silver skin off the pork, exposing the flesh to create a juicier and more succulent dish. Use a paring knife to trim away the silver skin, store for future use or discard accordingly. 🐷

Gently trim the silver skin off the pork fillet - be careful not to remove too much meat.

5. Heat a pan, add olive oil and seal your pork fillet in the hot oil. This should take around 2-3 minutes - turning on either side to ensure you create a nice barrier for the juices to stay inside the fillet. 

Always allow your pan to reach temperature before you place your meat in the oil.

6. To add more flavour, in the last few minutes of sealing you can add a knob of butter. This will infuse some more richness into the fillet. Allow your pork to seal for another 1-2 minutes. 

You can never... ever... go wrong with butter.

7. To prepare your fig sauce, add 2tbs of fig jam, 100g of chopped walnuts and seasoning of salt and pepper and mix in a bowl. 🥣

The sweet and nutty flavours give this pork dish its FoodBlog twist.

8. Once your pork fillet is done sealing, deglaze your pan with some port and set it alight! This will remove any flavour boosters off the pan and transfer them back into your dish, the aroma of the port will also infuse into the pork once it is flambéd.

If you were planning on drinking your port this Christmas, it seems you were wrong!

9. Transfer your pork onto an oven-proof dish and pour some of the port from the pan onto the pork. Allow it to soak up as much of the liquid as possible. 

The port reduction adds so much flavour here - do not skip this step.

10. While your pork fillet rests and absorbs all that port goddess, add olive oil into your pan, throw in your chopped onions and turn up the heat. Once the onion is cooked to a translucent texture, pour in the remaining port to create a sauce. 🥘

This is where you start building your sauce.

11. After the pork has rested, top it with the seasoned walnut and fig mixture and pack it down with the back of a spoon. Your pork is ready to enter a 220°C oven for about 25-30 minutes. 

Pack the mixture down to allow a crust to form.

12. Get back to your onions, once they’ve cooked down, add the remaining reduced port to the pan and allow it to combine with the onions. Empty the contents of the port bottle into the dish, add the remaining walnut and fig mixture to the pan and season your sauce with chilli, salt and pepper. Allow to reduce on a low heat for about 10-15 minutes while the pork finishes off in the oven. 🧂

Get that port in the pan and allow it to reduce into a thick sauce.

13. Once the sauce is thick and luscious, your pork should be ready too. Remove the pork fillet from the oven, and drain any juices that might have come out of the fillet, directly into your sauce - bringing the dish’s flavours together instantly. 

Take every opportunity to pack in more flavour - here Chef Marvin made sure to add all the pork juices into the sauce.

14. Allow your pork to rest for 5 minutes, slice into generous chunks and lay them onto your serving plate. Drizzle some port and onion reduction around your pork and finish with some more salt. The sweet and nutty tones of the sauce work so well with the iconic Maltese pork flavour and texture profile, while the port seals the dish with that added touch of class and robust notes.

Plate your dish with a generous portion of meat and a ladle or two of sauce. Bon appetite.

Go on, give it a try and let us know what you think in the comments below! 👇

Tune in to Episode 7 of FoodBlog’s Marvin’s Five next week where Chef Marvin Gauci will create yet another fantastic dish with only 5 ingredients.