Stekt fläsk med löksås – crispy fried pork belly, smooth onion sauce and boiled potatoes over the fire

Crispy pork belly, soft onion and a smooth sauce made in the frying fat

4 servings
Time: 20 min at home + 1 hr over the fire
Difficulty: Easy
12 ingredients
11 steps

Photo: Kjetil Ree, Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

It is early afternoon in January, eight below and not a breath of wind at the fire pit. The pork slices are lying in the cast-iron pan and have stopped sizzling angrily. Now they crackle, the edges have turned brown and translucent, and the smell of fried pork reaches all the way to the track where the children are skiing their last laps. Next to the pan, the potato pan bubbles away with the lid ajar.

Stekt fläsk med löksås – fried pork belly with onion sauce – is traditional Swedish home cooking that copes with the cold better than most things. It is salty, rich and hot, and everything you need fits in one frying pan and one saucepan. But it is the sauce that makes the dish. It is made with the fat the pork leaves behind, with soft yellow onion and milk, and it is also what can go wrong outdoors: flour that goes lumpy in the wind, milk that burns on and sauce that sets on the plate before anyone has had time to eat. That is why this recipe starts at the kitchen worktop at home.

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At home and by the fire

At home

The shaker bottle. Pour the milk into the plastic bottle, add the flour and sugar, screw on the lid and shake hard for half a minute. This is the whole secret behind a lump-free sauce outdoors. The flour sinks to the bottom during the day, so the bottle gets another shake by the fire.
The onion. Peel and thinly slice the onion and put it in a tub. Thin slices soften in half the time, and that matters a lot when the pan is sitting in sub-zero temperatures.
The pork. Score the rind or the hard edge of fat on each slice with two or three small cuts. That stops the slices curling up in the pan. Put the slices in a bag or tub.
The peas. Put the bag of frozen peas tight up against the pork. It acts as an ice pack that keeps the pork cold all the way out.
The potatoes. Scrub or peel them and halve the biggest, so all the pieces are about the same size and are ready at the same time.
Water. Fill the flask with boiling water for the potatoes.

By the fire

Everything happens on one bed of embers, but in three places: the saucepan sits where it is hottest, the frying pan at the edge and the foil with the fried pork on the saucepan lid. The order is potatoes first, pork next and sauce last, because the sauce needs the fat and the pork turns chewy if it has to wait too long.

What the cold does to the pork and the sauce

The dripping sets in minutes. The fat in the tin mug is white and solid long before the sauce is ready. That does not matter. Scrape it into the pan with a spoon and it melts straight away.
The sauce thickens as it cools. An onion sauce that is perfect in the pan turns into a solid mass in a cold cup. Add a splash of milk to the pan if it has been standing and thickening, and serve on plates that have been warmed with hot water from the flask.
The fat on the plate turns white. Eat as soon as it is served, and give small portions with seconds straight from the pan instead.
The milk can freeze. Carry the milk bottle inside the rucksack, wrapped in a jumper, and not in an outside pocket. If it has turned slushy it is fine to use, but shake it for extra long.
The pork needs to be kept chilled. Out in sub-zero temperatures the pork keeps cold by itself, and the bag of peas helps. A warm car or a sunny seat is what can warm it up, so keep the bag in the shade until the pan is hot. How to pack the food in the pulk so nothing leaks or freezes is explained in pulk sled with gear.
The pork can freeze together. If the slices have frozen together, prise them apart and wipe off the ice with kitchen roll before they go in the pan.
The cooking water takes time. Ice-cold meltwater takes a long time to come to the boil, which is why the flask of hot water comes along. If you are going to melt snow for the potatoes, read melting snow for water first.

Safety with hot fat

Sizzling fat is hot enough to burn hands and faces, and children do not see the spatters coming. An adult handles the pan wearing fire gloves, and the children stand at least an arm's length from the embers while the pork is frying. Never put wet or frozen slices straight into hot fat. Ice and water make the fat spit.

If the fat in the pan gets so hot that it starts to smoke, lift the pan off the embers. Keep the lid within reach the whole time. If the pan catches fire, smother the flames by putting on the lid and leave it on until the pan has cooled. Never pour water, and never put snow, on burning fat. The water turns to steam in an instant and throws the burning fat out.

For a burn: cool it with cool water, never with snow or ice. Do not cool a burn for more than 15 minutes, as the risk of hypothermia increases out in the cold. Seek medical care straight away if blisters form over an area larger than the person's own hand or if the child is one year old or younger. More advice on cooking safely by the fire is in fire safety in nature, and you can check fire bans and rules in lighting fires outdoors.

Hygiene, fat and leftovers

Raw and cooked kept apart. Do not put the fried pork back in the bag or on the board where the raw pork was, and use a clean fork or spatula for the cooked meat. That is why the foil comes along.
Cooked through by itself. Pork belly fried until crisp is always cooked through. Trichinella is very rare in Swedish farmed pigs, which are checked at slaughter. Wild boar meat, on the other hand, should always be cooked through unless you know it has been tested.
Warm sauce is hot sauce. If the sauce has to wait, keep it at the edge of the embers so it is steaming the whole time. Livsmedelsverket (the Swedish Food Agency) uses 60 degrees as a guideline for keeping food hot.
Leftovers. Leftover sauce and potatoes should cool quickly. Below freezing, that works fine outdoors with the lid on. Then keep them cold and reheat the leftovers until the sauce boils before you eat them again.
The fat comes home with you. Never pour the fat out in the snow. It stays there in lumps when the snow melts. If you pour fat on the fire, it flares up. Let the fat set in the tin mug, scrape it into a bag and take it home.

Stekt fläsk med löksås with children

The shaker bottle belongs to the children. Let them shake the milk and flour at home, and shake again by the fire until there are no white specks along the sides of the bottle. The children can also count pork slices, serve the peas and scatter parsley. An adult takes care of the pan and the fat. More ways to give the children jobs by the fire are in cooking with children over a fire.

Salted pork belly is salty. Give the youngest children a smaller piece of pork and more potato and sauce, and do not salt the sauce until everyone has tasted it. If it is cold on the trail, eat inside a lean-to shelter or with your backs to the wind. Advice on keeping the children warm is in how cold is too cold on the slopes.

Tips for a smooth onion sauce

Low heat for the onion. The onion should turn sweet and soft, not burnt. Burnt onion makes the whole sauce bitter.
Flour in the milk, not in the pan. The classic way is to sprinkle the flour over the onion and add the milk a little at a time. That works nicely at the hob but is hard with mittens and wind. The shaker bottle gives the same sauce without lumps.
Stir the bottom. Milk burns on in cast iron when the pan is too close to the embers. Better to pull the pan aside than to leave it where it is.
The right thickness. The sauce should run slowly off the spoon. If you want it thicker, shake 3 tablespoons of flour into the milk instead of 2. If it is too thick, thin it with milk.
The fat gives the flavour. Two tablespoons of the pork fat is enough. More makes the sauce greasy when it cools.

Common mistakes

The pan is not hot when the pork goes in – the slices stew in their own fat and turn chewy instead of crisp.
The fat is not poured off – the pork never crisps up.
The onion is fried over too high a heat – it goes brown at the edges and raw in the middle.
The milk bottle is not shaken again by the fire – the flour stays at the bottom and the sauce is thin.
The sauce is salted before it is tasted – with lightly salted pork it ends up too salty.
The pork is put under the sauce – the crisp surface goes soggy.

Vary the stekt fläsk med löksås

With fried potatoes: boil the potatoes at home and fry them in the pork fat after the pork. It saves the saucepan and the cooking water.
With paltbröd: dried paltbröd (Swedish blood bread) is blanched in salted water and is traditionally served with exactly this – fried pork and white sauce or onion sauce. You can do that in the potato pan.
Vegetarian: fry thick slices of smoked tofu or halloumi in butter and make the sauce with butter instead of pork fat.
With bacon: thick-cut bacon crisps up faster than pork belly, but gives less fat for the sauce.
Thursday dinner: the pork also goes well with ärtsoppa over an open fire, and if there is pork left over, fläskpannkaka in the same pan makes a good next day.

If you want the pork as a side rather than a main course, try raggmunk with fried pork or kolbullar with pork and lingonberries. More about frying in cast iron over embers is in cooking in the wild, and about getting dinner on the table in the cold in cooking outdoors in winter.

Allergens

The onion sauce contains milk and wheat flour, which means gluten. Gluten-free sauce: shake 1 tablespoon of cornflour into the milk instead of the wheat flour. Lactose-free milk works just like ordinary milk.

Frequently asked questions

How long should you fry pork belly?

Slices about a centimetre thick need 12–15 minutes over a medium heat in a hot pan, and they should be turned a few times. The pork is done when it is golden brown and crisp and the fat has stopped bubbling hard.

Should you use lightly salted or fresh pork belly with onion sauce?

Both work. Lightly salted pork belly is the classic and is saltier, so the sauce needs hardly any salt. Fresh pork belly is salted while it fries and gives a milder dish that many children prefer.

How do you make onion sauce without lumps?

Shake the flour into cold milk in a leakproof bottle before it goes into the pan, and pour the mixture over the soft onion, stirring. Stir until the sauce boils. Lumps usually form when dry flour meets hot liquid.

What do you eat with stekt fläsk med löksås?

Boiled potatoes are the classic, ideally with green peas and parsley. Some people like lingonberries or pickled beetroot on the side for the acidity.

Can you make the onion sauce the day before?

Yes. Let it cool quickly, keep it cold in an airtight tub and heat it in the pan until it boils. It thickens in the cold, so thin it with a little milk. The pork tastes best fried on the spot.

Does the pork have to be cooked through?

Pork belly is always fried until crisp, and then it is cooked through. Pork from Swedish farmed pigs is checked for trichinella at slaughter, and infection is very rare. Wild boar meat, on the other hand, should always be cooked through.