The Hirshon Portuguese Roast Suckling Pig – Leitão À Bairrada

February 3, 2019 by The Generalissimo Leave a Comment

Leitão À Bairrada Image Used Under Creative Commons License From easyportugueserecipes.com

Citizens, we only have 2 last recipes in the week of the “Divine Swine”, celebrating the Chinese New Year of the Pig!

We have so far covered NC-style whole hog, Filipino, Maltese, Sardinian, and Mayan recipes to date, though many more styles of whole hog cooking remain untouched and sadly unknown. For example, you are probably familiar with the Spanish roast pig, but are you aware that its neighbor to the West has an equally spectacular recipe? Yes, I speak of the wonderful country of Portugal!

This recipe has especial meaning to me, as my wife’s grandfather just passed away a few days ago 3 weeks from his 94th birthday – he was of Portuguese descent via the Azores and I post this recipe very much in his honor.

This whole suckling pig recipe is one of the few that can be attempted in the oven, as the pig called for here is very small. Compared to the other recipes previously posted in this theme, it is much easier to make since there is no pit or outdoor cookery involved.

As noted in this fantastic (excerpted) article by the mighty Simon Majumdar in the Guardian:

Few Portuguese meals seem to pass without the transportation of pork from plate to lips.

But lording it over all of these dishes in the affections of the Portuguese is the leitão assado da bairrada, suckling pig roasted and basted until the flesh is creamy and the skin develops a prerequisite crunch.

Leitão assado is to be found on menus throughout Portugal but, if you want to experience the dish at its very best, you should head to the Bairrada wine region and in particular to the small town of Mealhada, about half way up the country around 10 miles from the coast.

At first sight, Mealhada appears an unlikely location for a food pilgrimage. It has a population of little over 5,000 and while its small network of streets and squares offers a pleasant enough diversion for the visitor, they give little clue as to why Portuguese families flock here every weekend, save an ornamental fountain whose blue tiled designs show a cook placing a suckling pig into a wood-burning oven.

But the garish signs and large car parks of the more than two dozen restaurants that line either side of the main road give a further clue, and the reoccurrence of the word leitão leaves you in no doubt what you’ll find in these places. Among the more well known are Pic-Nic Dos Leitões, Restaurante Rei Dos Leitões, Meta Dos Leitoes, Tres Pinheirros Dos Leitoes and, perhaps most famous of all, Pedro Dos Leitões, the restaurant which started it all.

Álvaro Pedro opened his first shop in 1943 to sell pork sandwiches to hungry truck drivers. By 1949, his business was successful enough for him to open his eponymous restaurant, which is still family run and has now grown to the point where it can feed more than 400 people in a sitting and prepare over 100 pigs a day. Its success led to the opening of rival restaurants, and soon Mealhada’s reputation as hog heaven was set.

The menu offered at Pedro’s is a short one and, while there are other items on the menu, there is very much a sense of “why would you?” as platter after platter of baby pig are carried out to diners.

The dining room is cavernous but begins to fill rapidly as soon as the doors open at midday. There are rows of tables covered in stiff, white tablecloths and, while the service was formal, it was also very friendly, the restaurant manager rewarding me with a gruff nod of approval as I asked for the speciality of the house.

There is also a short list of starters including olives, cheese and dense croquettes made with off cuts of pork, but these were little more than a distraction while I waited for my order. Before I had taken a second sip of local red wine, the uniformed waitresses were proudly placing a silver plate of suckling pig in front of me.

Pigs from the Bairadda region, which feed primarily on acorns, are considered the best in the country. At Pedro dos Leitões, the piglets are slaughtered on site when they reach four to six weeks. The meat is then rubbed with a blend of garlic, pig fat, coarse salt and pepper, and skewered on a 6ft steel pole before going into the oven for around two hours.

The ovens are fuelled initially with the wood of eucalyptus trees and then with wood pruned from local vines, which impart a subtle but definite flavour to the meat. These same vines also supply the Baga grapes from which many of the wines of the Bairrada region are produced.

The first bite of suckling pig was enough to convince me that the town’s reputation is well deserved. The golden skin gave way with a pleasing crunch at the first touch of the fork revealing a layer of deliciously creamy fat.

The moist meat below leaked clear juices as I shredded it apart on my plate and was rich enough to need only a plate of batatas fritas and a simple salad as an accompaniment, along with a few slices of orange to add sweetness.

You will want to special-order the cleaned suckling pig from your friendly neighborhood butcher, per these instructions:

”I want a whole dressed hog about 12 pounds delivered, fresh killed within a week of delivery, never frozen, skin on, hair scalded off, head, ears, trotters, tail on, all glands removed, tendons cut at all the ankles, and pleura/silverskin all removed. Please cut through the backbone and breastbone and crack the hip joints so it will lie flat. Please remove the spinal cord. Save me the liver, kidneys, and tongue, on the side please.”

To achieve the proper smoky flavor indoors, you should order some dried grapevine cuttings to use in the oven in the drip pan – you can buy them here.

Citizens, please enjoy this recipe in honor of my grandfather William Joseph Breda – he served his country with distinction and bravery through combat in World War II, Korea and Vietnam in both the Navy AND the Army. A truly amazing man who will be sorely missed.

William J. Breda, age 86, at my wedding 8 years ago

Battle on – The Generalissimo

The Hirshon Portuguese Roast Suckling Pig – Leitão À Bairrada

Rate this recipe

1 ratings

Ingredients

1 whole suckling pig (10-15 lbs), washed and cleaned per the instructions in the TFD BBQ God post
4 ounces salted butter
½ cup top-quality softened lard
¼ cup fresh oregano + ⅛ cup fresh parsley, minced/crushed in a mortar and pestle with sea salt, to taste
6 garlic cloves, crushed
freshly-ground black pepper, to taste
3 bay leaves
1 cup white wine
***
Melted lard for basting
Grapevine chunks for smoking

Instructions

Soften butter and ½ cup of the lard.
Mix in oregano, parsley salt, crushed garlic and pepper. Rub butter/lard mixture over and inside the suckling pig, reserve any leftover paste for basting. Place bay leaves inside pig.
Wrap marinated suckling pig in triple-bagged plastic bag and refrigerate. Let marinate for at least 5 hours.
Bring marinated pig to room temperature. Heat oven to 250°F. Remove pig from plastic bag, place stomach-down in oven pan on a rack. Place the pig on a rack with a dripping pan under it. In the dripping pan, place a few small chunks of dried grapevine, well-soaked so they produce smoke. Drizzle with white wine. Roast until pig reaches 130°F (test with cooking thermometer – likely to be a couple of hours depending on the size of your pig).
Do this in a kitchen with open windows - the smoke from the grapevine chunks will escape when you open the oven door to baste!
Every 30 minutes, remove it quickly from the oven, close the door and gently clean its skin from any moisture it has, baste with melted lard and any remaining herb paste, then place it back in the oven turning it into different positions each time. Replace the soaked grapevine chunks periodically.
When the pig reaches 130°F, turn up the heat to 400°F to get a crispy exterior, making sure you turn the pig once to distribute the crispiness.
Tip: If the pig is browning too quickly, cover it with aluminum foil to protect against burning.
Internal temp should reach 160°F. Remove from oven and let cool on cutting board. Serve it hot or cold with orange slices all around it and preserve the drippings if anyone wants to add over the meat
Serve with a brut (dry) sparkling wine, preferably espumante.

https://www.thefooddictator.com/the-hirshon-portuguese-roast-suckling-pig-leitao-a-bairrada/

The Hirshon Yucatecan Whole Roast Pig – Cochinita Pibil

February 3, 2019 by The Generalissimo Leave a Comment

The Hirshon Yucatecan Roast Pig - Cochinita Pibil

Cochinita Pibil Image Used Under Creative Commons License From pinterest.com

Citizens, we are now in the final throes of the week of the “Divine Swine” in honor of Chinese New Year – the year of the Earth Pig! As such, there is no more apropos recipe to include than this King of recipes from the Yucatán in Mexico, where a whole pig is – wait for it – cooked in an earthen pit! 🙂

I have previously posted a recipe for this, but one that was adapted to using only a pork shoulder and cooked in the oven – this is for its Big Daddy – the whole pig itself – as was originally made by the Mayans!

Cochinita pibil (also puerco pibil or cochinita con achiote) is a traditional Mexican slow-roasted pork dish. Preparation of traditional cochinita involves marinating the meat in strongly acidic citrus juice, seasoning it with annatto seed which imparts a vivid burnt orange color, and roasting the meat while it is wrapped in banana leaf.

Cochinita means baby pig, so true cochinita pibil involves roasting a whole suckling pig. The high acid content of the marinade and the slow cooking time tenderizes the meat, allowing otherwise tough pieces of meat to be used.

The Yucatecan recipes always employ the juice of Seville or bitter oranges for marinating. In areas where bitter oranges are not common, juice of sweet oranges combined with lemons, limes, or vinegar are employed to approximate the effect of the bitter orange on the meat.

Another important ingredient in all pibil recipes is achiote (annatto), which gives the dish its characteristic color and adds to flavor. It is usually eaten with side dishes such as: corn tortillas, red pickled onion, refried black beans and habanero chilies. Traditionally, cochinita pibil was buried in a pit with a fire at the bottom to roast it.

The origin of the word pibil is unclear as to whether it comes from the Mayan noun for roasting or the verb ‘to roast’ as these are the same word pib.

Cochinita pibil finds its origin in the fusion between the Mayan culture that lived in that region and the European customs and ingredients introduced by the Spaniards in 1521. Some condiments, such as the achiote, have a Pre-hispanic origin, while the tradition of eating pork meat was a European tradition.

When you visit the buffets of Yucatán, you’ll recognize cochinita pibil thanks to the dark orange broth that bathes the meat and the banana leaves that cover it together with some red onion slices.

The puerco pibil is a recurring element of the movie Once Upon a Time in Mexico directed by Robert Rodriguez, where it is the favorite food of a CIA agent played by Johnny Depp, who orders this dish every time he enters a Mexican restaurant and urges every person he has lunch with to taste it. He will go as far as killing a cook because his puerco pibil is “too good”.

Rodriguez also includes a recipe for puerco pibil and demonstrates how to prepare it in the special features section of the DVD.

I am truly indebted to Chef Rick Bayless, whose TV cooking show set in the Yucatán first turned me on to this fantastic recipe. The cooking method and pit creation instructions are all his, but I use my own recado rojo (red seasoning paste) recipe, based on one I found at los-dos.com. My changes to that recipe are noted, as always. The sides are mine as well. To make this recipe, you MUST use Mexican oregano, NOT Mediterranean! If it doesn’t say Mexican oregano, it’s not. I like fresh in this recipe – you can buy Mexican oregano plants here.

This recipe is a trip back to an ancient time, one where hard work was rewarded with a legendary meal truly fit for the Gods! As such, I wish you (and many friends, this recipe easily serves 30+) Godspeed and good eating! As always for the recipes in this week of whole pig, please read the master recipe on how to cook a whole hog here.

Battle on – The Generalissimo

The Hirshon Yucatecan Roast Pig – Cochinita Pibil

Rate this recipe

1 ratings

Ingredients

For the pit:
Tape measure, stakes and string for mapping out the pit area
Shovel (and lots of energy)
Bricks
A steel or corrugated metal sheet to cover the pit
***
35 lbs whole pig, cleaned and prepared per the BBQ God post
20 ounces Recado Rojo (recipe below)
3 1-pound packages banana leaves, defrosted
Pickled red onions, for serving (recipe below)
Habanero salsa, for serving (recipe below)
***
Achiote Paste - Recado Rojo:
2 cups achiote seeds
2 cups juice of naranja agria (Also known as Seville or sour orange. Substitute: 2 parts lime juice, 1 part each orange juice and grapefruit juice)
24 whole allspice berries
8 Tbsp whole, fresh Mexican oregano leaves or 4 Tbs. ground dried Mexican oregano
2 tsp cumin seed
2 Tbsp whole black peppercorns
40 cloves garlic, ½ peeled and roasted over an open flame, the rest left as is (TFD change - original recipe was all roasted) (TFD Note: Asian supermarkets frequently sell already peeled garlic cloves in bulk - these will make your life much easier)
4 Tbsp Maggi Seasoning (TFD change - original recipe used coarse sea salt)
1 tsp freshly-grated nutmeg (TFD addition)
½ tsp freshly-ground cloves (TFD addition)
1 cup juice of naranja agria
***
Pickled red onions:
2 medium to large red onions, sliced into thin rings
1 cup pineapple vinegar (if unavailable, use white vinegar)
1 generous teaspoon dry oregano (Mexican if possible)
1 teaspoon salt
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
***
Roasted habanero salsa:
8 medium (about 3 ounces total) fresh habanero chiles
2 large garlic cloves, unpeeled
2 tablespoons fresh lime juice
Salt
***
Corn tortillas
Cilantro

Instructions

Prepare the pit:
The day before, find a flat area in your backyard that's not too near your neighbors with no low hanging tree branches.
Measure and stake out an area that is about 8 inches larger all around than the pan you are planning to use, and about 8 inches deeper. For this recipe, the roasting pan I use is a heavy gauge aluminum roaster that measures about 21 x 17 1/2 x 7 inches; it's made by Vollrath and can be purchased at most restaurant supply companies.
If your pan matches mine, you'll be measuring and staking out a rectangular pit that's 37 x 33 inches. Dig the pit to an even depth of 16 inches, working to keep the sides straight and even all the way down. Keep the excavated dirt in a pile beside the pit.
Next, line the bottom of the pit with bricks, fitting them tightly together, then line the sides up to the top, packing the bricks tightly against the earthen sides.
Build the fire(s): To warm up the bricks and ground around them (and also to "season" a newly-dug pit), build a bonfire in the pit for 7 hours or so the day before you cook the cochinita pibil.
Early on the day of cooking, build another huge fire in the pit and let it burn for about 5 hours, adding logs regularly to keep the temperature up at around 700 or 800 degrees. (If you put your hand near the edge of the fire, it should be so hot that you'll have to withdraw it instantly.)
About 2 hours before you'll be putting in the pig, stop adding wood; let the fire burn down to ash-covered embers. Set the steel or corrugated metal sheet beside the pit.
For the pickled onions:
Combine all the ingredients in a medium bowl with enough water to cover the onions, and marinate for 5 hours.
Serve at room temperature with the Yucatan pork.
For the salsa:
In an ungreased skillet over medium heat, roast the chiles and garlic, turning regularly, until they’re soft and darkened in spots, 5 to 10 minutes for the chiles, 15 minutes for the garlic. When cool, slip the skins off the garlic.
In a blender or small food processor, add the garlic and roasted chiles plus the lime juice and enough water to give it a spoonable consistency, usually 2 to 4 tablespoons. Blend until smooth. Taste (gingerly) and season with salt, usually about ½ teaspoon. This salsa will last several days.
For the Achiote paste:
In a spice mill or coffee grinder dedicated to the purpose, grind the achiote seeds in batches until fine. Transfer to a fine sieve held over a plate or bowl; tap and shake the sieve until all that remains at the bottom is coarse residue that looks like sand.
Return the residue to the grinder and repeat the process one more time. Continue until all of the achiote has been ground. Discard any residue that will not pass through the sieve.
Cover the ground achiote seeds with the 2 cups of sour orange juice, and stir to mix thoroughly. Allow to stand at room temperature as you continue with the remaining steps.
In a cast iron skillet over high heat, quickly and lightly toast the allspice, whole oregano (if using ground oregano, add in the next step) and cumin until fragrant and just beginning to smoke. Immediately remove them from the skillet and allow to cool 2-3 minutes.
Place peppercorns and the toasted spices in the spice grinder, and process until it becomes a fine powder. Strain powder through a sieve held over a plate as you did for the achiote seeds; repeat and discard any residue that remains.
In a blender, process garlic, Maggi seasoning or salt and 1 cup juice until puréed. Add the achiote paste and the ground spices and all remaining ingredients – process until you achieve the consistency of a very smooth thick paste, about 3-4 minutes. You will probably need to do this in a few batches.
Divide paste into eighths, wrap each portion well with plastic wrap or place in resealable plastic bags. Refrigerate until ready to use, up to 3 weeks. Recado Rojo may also be frozen indefinitely.
Marinate the pig. Line your roasting pan with 2 packages of banana leaves leaving a 6-inch overhang on all the edges.
Fit the pieces of pork into the bottom of the pan. Prepare the marinade by breaking the achiote bricks into pieces, dropping them into a blender jar, adding the lime juice and 1 tablespoon salt; blend until the mixture is a smooth thickish marinade.
Pour the achiote mixture over the pork, spreading it evenly to coat all surfaces (I recommend you wear latex gloves, since achiote will strain your hands red).
Cook the pig. Fold the overhanging banana leaves in over the pork, then use the last package of banana leaves to cover the pork completely.
Pour about 3 quarts of water over the leaves - it will collect in the bottom of the pan and should be about 1 inch deep.Wearing heavy oven mitts, lower the pan into the very hot pit (this will take two people); the water should immediately begin boiling in the bottom of the pan.
Cover the pit with the steel or corrugated metal sheet, and immediately begin piling the excavated dirt around the edges of the sheet to prevent any oxygen from entering the pit. (You have to do this carefully and completely, since any oxygen leaks will cause the fire to continue burning - which typically leads to a burnt pig. It's the intense amount of residual heat in the brick-lined pit that cooks the pig.)
Once the edges are sealed, spread all leftover dirt evenly over the pit-covering sheet.Typically, a 35-pound pig needs 4 to 6 hours to cook to fall-off-the-bone tenderness.
Serve the pig. When you've decided to take the plunge and unearth the pig, clean the dirt off the steel or corrugated sheet, then, wearing heavy oven mitts, remove it. Lift out the roasting pan full of pig and stop for a moment to savor the aroma.
When you peel back the banana leaves, and press in a thermometer, the fork-tender meat should be between 150 and 165 degrees if your pit was at the right (scorching-hot) temperature. I like to carry the pan to the kitchen, remove the meat, pull meat from bone, coarsely shredding it into baking pans, and then slide all the meat, covered with foil, into a low oven, until I'm ready to serve (it will hold for an hour or two).
I set the huge roasting pan on the stove over high heat (on all burners) and boil the juices until they're as rich as I like (usually I reduce them by ½ their original quantity). Taste and season with salt.
Serve with meat on a big, deep, beautiful platter with plenty of steaming hot corn tortillas, cilantro, pickled red onions and habanero salsa.

https://www.thefooddictator.com/the-hirshon-yucatecan-whole-roast-pig-cochinita-pibil/

The Hirshon Sardinian Roast Pig – Su Porceddu

February 2, 2019 by The Generalissimo Leave a Comment

The Hirshon Sardinian Roast Pig - Porceddu

Porceddu Image Used Under Creative Commons License From it.blastingnews.com

My Citizens, we are now more than ½ way through our week of international whole pig recipes in celebration of the “Divine Swine”, the Chinese New Year of the Earth Pig! Today, we visit the legendarily beautiful island of Sardinia for their take on this classic form of cookery!

The cuisine of Sardinia is the traditional cuisine of the island of Sardinia, and the expression of its culinary art. It is characterized by its own variety, and by the fact of having been enriched through a number of interactions with the other Mediterranean cultures while retaining its own identity.

Sardinia’s food culture is strictly divided into food from the land and food from the sea, reflecting the island’s historical vicissitudes and especially its geographic landscapes, spacing from the coastline to the ragged mountains of the interior.

The Sardinian cuisine is considered part of the Mediterranean diet, a nutritional model that was proclaimed by UNESCO as an intangible cultural heritage.

Porchetta or porcetto, in Sardinian porceddu or porcheddu, the suckling pig of about 4 – 5 kg or twenty days, cooked slowly on a spit, on grills and flavored after cooking with myrtle or rosemary. This roast is a classic of Sardinian pastoral cuisine – before attempting this dish, please read all about how to do a whole hog cook here.

A research paper abstract I found online cites:

Su porceddu, the roast suckling pig, is widely regarded as the Sardinian dish of choice – the dish that identifies Sardinians.

The recognition of its role, its pervasive presence on tables at home and in restaurants, as well as its transformation, in the discourses of Sardinians and of foreign observers, into a sign of Sardinianness and into a collective stereotype, have a long history of deeply intertwined material, religious, economical, cultural, and political dimensions.

As further elucidated on cliffordawright.com:

The slaughter of the pig across the northern Mediterranean is a time of celebration. The whole family and the village partake in the festivities.

Although the moment of slaughter is a solemn affair, it immediately turns joyous when Sardinians clean the pig for roasting, as in this porceddu. If the pig is not to be spit-roasted, it is then butchered, with use found for every part of the pig.

Both the farmer and his wife make lard and mustela (pancetta) to season cabbage, wild fennel, or chicory minestrone. The trotter might be stuffed and the head boiled and served as a delicacy. The ham is used to make prosciutto, and the intestines cleaned to make sausages. The blood, carefully collected at the time of slaughter as it drains from the pig, is mixed with pine nuts, raisins, and honey to become a delicious sweet.

There are two ways in which this traditional suckling pig is prepared. For the first method, a large pit is dug in the ground and covered with rocks. A large fire is built upon the rocks, and when it has burned for many hours, the pig is set upon it and covered with hot coals, which are then covered with myrtle branches.

The earth is piled on top, leaving no evidence of what is happening under the ground. This method was typical of the bandits who once populated the desolate reaches of the island’s interior.

In the second method, a fire is built with aromatic woods such as juniper, mastic, olive, arbutus, or holm oak. The pig is splayed and affixed to a large strong stick that is pushed into the ground in front of the fire, and basted with a chunk of pork fat. Once the pig is done, it is smothered with myrtle leaves and left for 30 minutes before carving.

In place of the exotic woods, build a fire with whatever wood you have available. Once you begin to roast the pig, throw any combination of leftover nut shells, dried herb twigs such as thyme, marjoram, oregano, mint, or basil, bay leaves, or water-soaked apple wood chips onto the fire to create an aromatic smoke. In this country, myrtle is used only for ornamental plant purposes and it is unlikely you will find pesticide-free myrtle. After experimenting I believe that the closest thing to myrtle is a mixture of bay and sage leaves. If unavailable, use rosemary leaves to smother the finished pig.

Citizens, I have managed to find a source for dried wild Myrtle leaves to help you achieve the authentic flavor – you can buy them in quantity here. You can buy juniper wood pieces here if you don’t have a local source. You can buy pesticide-free Myrtle twigs (and fresh leaves in the Spring and Summer!) here.

This is a superlative and ancient recipe that I am positive will become a great joy for the entirety of TFD Nation!

Battle on – The Generalissimo

The Hirshon Sardinian Roast Pig – Su Porceddu

Rate this recipe

2 ratings

Ingredients

11 pound piglet (after cleaning weight), cleaned by your butcher according to the instructions in the TFD BBQ God post
1 large jar stone-ground mustard (TFD likes Kosciusko brand)
Inner flesh seasoning blend made from equal amounts of garlic and fresh thyme, blended
3 large bunches fresh sage leaves
Stuffing Ingredients:
3 pounds pork tenderloin, cut into thick slices
1 fennel bulb, sliced
1 lemon, sliced
1 orange, sliced
6 garlic heads, papery outer skins removed
***
10 large garlic cloves, cut into thin slivers
1 lemon
1 pound pork fat or salt pork, in one piece
***
Finishing glaze:
1 ¾ cups dry white wine
¼ cup minced garlic
¼ cup white wine vinegar
Finely chopped fresh rosemary
3 cups sugar, measured into separate bowl
½ cup smoked paprika
butter
1 pouch CERTO Fruit Pectin
***
Dried herb twigs, thyme, oregano, mint, basil, apple wood chips, bay leaves, and marjoram to throw on the coals
Myrtle leaves (strongly preferred) or a mixture of sage and bay leaves

Instructions

Make the glaze:
Mix wine, garlic, vinegar and rosemary in a 3 or 4 quart saucepot. Stir in sugar. Add butter or margarine to reduce foaming. Bring mixture to full rolling boil that can't be stirred down. Take the pot off the heat briefly and add the package of Certo and paprika. Boil for a minute exactly. Take off the heat and start to stir again for an additional five minutes. Use an immersion blender and make a smooth mixture with no chunks. Let cool and refrigerate.
For the pig, coat the inside flesh of the pig with stone-ground mustard and then the herb blend made with garlic and thyme. Add Sage leaves on top of the herb blend. Pork tenderloins are inserted to replace the rib cage and ensure the proper shape of the porchetta when sitting belly-down. Add the other stuffing ingredients. Stitch up the pig per the master recipe instructions and place a lemon in its mouth.
Cut small slits made all over the pig skin and stuff the garlic slivers pushed all the way in.
Prepare a hardwood fire in a fire pit, grill, or smoker and let it burn for 3 hours, replenishing as needed with wood, until you have a good supply of hot coals - TFD prefers a fire made juniper and myrtle for his recipe. Do not use wood made of composite materials. You can also use regular lump charcoal of the highest quality, and add some well-soaked juniper and myrtle chips to the coals periodically to provide flavor.
Affix the pig to a straight hard stick that you should be able to find lying around (this might take you 15 minutes) and place 20- inches in front of the fire, chest side towards the fire - TFD prefers a modern spit roaster for this. The pig should be leaning slightly towards the fire. Make sure there is a drip pan under the pig to catch the dripping fat. Again, please check the BBQ God post to see how to do this properly!
Cook for 3 to 4 hours, basting with the salt pork or pork fat affixed to a meat fork. Dried herb twigs, thyme, oregano, mint, basil, apple wood chips, bay leaves, and marjoram should be on hand to periodically throw on the coals - all should be well-soaked to produce lots of smoke.
Turn and continue roasting for another 3 to 4 hours. In the last 30 minutes or so, baste carefully with the paprika glaze - make sure it doesn't burn! Test for doneness by pulling on one of the ears; it should almost come off. Let the pig sit for 30 minutes on a bed of myrtle or bay leaves before carving and serving.

https://www.thefooddictator.com/the-hirshon-sardinian-roast-pig-su-porceddu/