Dry pork

The meat changed and the recipes did not

Selective breeding through the second half of the twentieth century pushed hard for leanness, and intramuscular fat in a modern pork loin is a small fraction of what it once was. Fat is what keeps meat feeling moist as its fibres contract and expel water, so the same cooking time now produces a much drier result.

The second half is habit. A generation was taught to cook pork thoroughly out of caution, and that instruction has outlived the reason for it in most of the world. How thoroughly pork should be cooked is a food-safety question, and current Food Standards Agency guidance is the thing to follow rather than an inherited rule of thumb.

What can be said without touching that question: pork cooked well past what the guidance requires will be dry, and that is a choice rather than a necessity.

Which cuts dry out, and which do not

Loin and tenderloin

The worst. Very lean, no connective tissue, almost no margin. Cook fast and rest, or brine.

Plain loin chop

Same problem in a smaller piece. Buy them thick.

Rib chop

More marbled than a plain loin chop and noticeably more forgiving.

Shoulder, collar and belly

Fatty and full of connective tissue. Almost impossible to dry out, and the answer for anybody who keeps having this problem.

Leg

Lean and large — the roasting cut most likely to disappoint.

What to do about it

1. Brine it. Salt and water for an hour or two transforms a lean chop, because salt lets the muscle hold more water. A dry brine — salt rubbed on and left uncovered in the fridge — works nearly as well and dries the surface for better browning.
2. Buy thicker cuts. A thick chop has a margin; a thin one goes from raw to dry with nothing in between.
3. Choose a fattier cut. Collar steaks and rib chops are cheaper than loin and far more forgiving.
4. Rest it properly — five minutes minimum for a chop, longer for a roast.
5. Cook to the guidance rather than past it, and use a probe thermometer if you want certainty about where you are.
6. Serve it with something acidic. Apple, mustard, cider, a sharp fruit — all of them make lean pork eat better.

Rescuing pork that is already dry

• Slice it thin across the grain, which is the single most effective thing.
• Sauce it generously. A pan sauce, an apple sauce or a mustard cream all carry dry meat.
• Shred it into a sandwich or a taco with something wet and sharp.
• Into a fried rice, a hash or a pie filling, where it is one component rather than the centre.
• Do not simmer it in liquid to "rehydrate" it. Cooked-out meat does not take water back up; it just gets more cooked.

Common questions