Name: Ofellae Apician Style
Cuisine: Italy
Ingredients: 150 ml passum or half plain wine and half raisin wine; 1 level tsp ground ginger or galingale; 1 tbsp olive oil; 60 ml fish sauce; 1 kg slab of belly pork, boned; 2 tsp cumin seeds; generous freshly ground black pepper; ½ tsp lovage seeds

Preparation info

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Cooking Apicius

By Sally Grainger

Published 2006

About

This version of ofellae is associated with the gourmet Marcus Gavius Apicius himself and may have been a favourite of his. The belly pork is roasted and finished in a sweet oenogarum flavoured with pepper, lovage and a root known as ‘sweet rush’ (Cyperus esculentus). I have been unable to find this root in spice merchants, although it is available in France under the name amande de terre (and known in English as chufa or tiger nut). I have experimented with ginge