I want to buy a pork roast on the evening of 23d December, and eat it on the lunch of the 26th (here it is).
It is a crispy crackling roast, the skin will inevitably harden in the fridge. What is the best way to reheat it?
It is quite a big piece of meat, so I'm afraid to dry it. An option might be to put the roast for some time in the oven (say, at 150°C), then, turn on the grill and crisp up the skin again.
Could this work? Do you know of a better option?
There are a couple of issues here - you want the roast re-heated (without being dry and/or tough), and you want the crackling crunchy. Unfortunately, these two things don't necessarily go easily together.
As I see it, there are a few options:
Reheat the roast as a whole in 1 step, covered. To prevent being dry and over-cooked, you will need to cover it to prevent water loss. No matter how you reheat it (microwave, regular oven...), this will mean a loss of the crisp crackling, but the meat should remain tender.
Reheat as a whole, uncovered. This is basically just re-roasting the meat, but for a shorter time. This should allow crisp crackling, but will probably make the meat dry and tough.
Reheat in parts - remove the crackling, wrap/cover the roast and heat as desired. Reheat the crackling separately under a grill/broiler to re-crisp. This should result in tender meat and crisp crackling, but you lose the visual appeal of the whole roast package.
Combined options 1 and 2. Cover the whole roast, reheat partially, then remove the cover to crisp the crackling. The trick here is to get the timing right - too short a time uncovered and the crackling is soft, to long uncovered and the meat dries out. This is the most technically challenging option, get it right and it is good, but very easy to get wrong. It is possible to salvage if you have too short an uncovered time though - simply revert to option 3 and remove the crackling for crisping.
Slice the meat/crackling and reheat in portions. A couple of sub-options here - reheat dry (risks being tough/dry) or reheat in a gravy (retains moisture, but loses flavour of meat often). I would keep the crackling separate here. This is my least preferred option
Have the meat cold. Cold roast pork is delicious. This tends to lose the crispness of the crackling, but you can remove and crisp that up if wanted.
See if you can buy a portion of uncooked skin for (extra?) crackling. I don't know about in Germany, but it is an option from many butchers' shops in parts of the world. Crackling the skin is easy on a flat slab - simply score in a grid pattern, rub in salt and oil, then grill/broil until puffed and crisp.
