Recipe: The Caqhuse

Name: The Caqhuse
Prep time: 10 min
Cook time: 120 min
Total time: 130 min
Yield: 6 servings
Ingredients: 1 pork wheel (fresh ham slice with central bone) weighing 1.8 kg (4 lb); 800 g (28 oz) sweet onions, thinly sliced (Roscoff style); 8 cl (0.3 cup) good alcohol vinegar; Salt and freshly ground pepper; A little butter and oil

By chef patrick Asfaux 4.9/5 (7 reviews) · 🍳 4 made it

Prep 10 min

Cook 120 min

Total 2h10

Servings 6 serv.

Recette The Caqhuse - Chef Patrick Asfaux

Ingredients for 6 servings

Adjust for

servings

1 pork wheel (fresh ham slice with central bone) weighing 1.8 kg (4 lb)
800 g (28 oz) sweet onions, thinly sliced (Roscoff style)
8 cl (0.3 cup) good alcohol vinegar
Salt and freshly ground pepper
A little butter and oil

Step-by-step directions

1 In a large skillet, sear the pork wheel in butter and oil for three minutes on each side. Salt, pepper, and set aside.

2 Preheat your oven to 170 °C (340°F) (gas mark 6).

3 In an earthenware or cast iron terrine (Le Creuset style), place half of the finely sliced onions, salt and pepper. Then add the pork wheel, then a second layer of onions, salt and pepper. Add the vinegar and 4 tablespoons of water or stock. Cook covered hermetically or with a seal for 2 hours in the oven. To serve, cut the pork wheel like pie slices so each guest gets meat and skin, and serve the exquisite onion compote underneath. This very old recipe can be eaten hot, warm, or cold.

Chef Patrick's Comment

This recipe is not quite the original one. In the authentic version, the onions and raw pork wheel were layered, then topped with a second layer of onions. It was covered with knobs of butter, vinegar, and stock, then cooked in a caquèuse, a kind of round earthenware dish. But as you'll see, the pork wheel renders a lot of fat. That's why I sear it briefly before cooking it, the goal being to remove some of that fat. And that's also why I don't add butter, since there's already plenty of fat present.