Gesine Bullock-Prado is a pastry chef and cookbook author who hosts Food Network’s “Baked in Vermont,” which is where she lives. (Incidentally, she’s also the sister of actor Sandra Bullock.) In her 2025 cookbook “My Harvest Kitchen: 100+ Recipes to Savor the Seasons,” Bullock-Prado instructs how to maximize seasonal ingredients from farmers markets and personal gardens, including growing tips for those who want to practice green-thumb homesteading.
Bullock-Prado’s recipe for Schweinebraten is everything German food should be: warm, meaty, comforting, with flavor notes from roasted spices, mustard and dark beer.
“Choose a pork shoulder (sometimes called ‘butt but not because it’s describing the origin of the meat; it is named after the barrels or ‘butts’ that colonial New England butchers used to transport inexpensive cuts of meat) with an even fat cap that brings loads of flavor and, if it’s not too thick, brings a cracklin’ crisp to the party,” she writes. “Surrounding the pork with a moat of root veggies toward the end of cooking makes this a one-dish meal full of flavor.”
Schweinebraten (German Pork Roast)
Yield: Serves 8
INGREDIENTS
1 teaspoon cumin seeds
1 teaspoon caraway seeds
1 teaspoon yellow mustard seeds
2 teaspoons smoked paprika
2 tablespoons kosher salt
2 teaspoons ground white pepper
One 4-pound boneless pork shoulder
3 tablespoons German mustard
1 pound fingerling potatoes or baby Yukon Gold potatoes
2 medium yellow onions (1 pound total), quartered
1 pound red radishes, halved
2 large carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch strips
12 ounces German dark (dunkel) beer
1.5 cups chicken stock
3 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons unbleached all- purpose flour
DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine the cumin, caraway and mustard seeds in a small skillet and heat over low heat until fragrant. Remove from the heat and allow to cool completely before transferring to a spice grinder or mortar and pestle. Grind to a powder. Transfer to a small bowl and stir in the paprika, salt and white pepper.
With a sharp paring knife, score the pork fat cap in a crosshatch. Rub the entire pork shoulder with the German mustard and then season on all sides with the spice mixture. Place the pork on an ovenproof cooling rack set over a half sheet pan, or on a roasting rack placed in a roasting pan. Roast for 1 hour.
Remove the pork from the oven and place on a cutting board. Scrape up any fond in the pan and then add the potatoes, onions, radishes and carrots. Pour the beer and chicken stock into the pan with the veggies. Nestle the pork directly on the veggie bed and roast for up to 2 hours more, basting the veggies and pork every 20 minutes, until the internal temperature of the pork reads 165 degrees and the veggies are tender and golden.
Transfer the pork to a cutting board and cover with aluminum foil to rest. Transfer the veggies to a large bowl.
Pour the pan juices into a measuring cup, scraping up any bits of fond on the pan. Allow to sit for a few minutes to allow the fat to rise to the top. Skim off excess fat with a spoon. Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat, then sprinkle in the flour and whisk to make a roux. Continue to whisk until the mixture thickens and just begins to brown. Pour in the pan juices and continue whisking until the mixture comes to a hearty simmer. Lower the heat and continue whisking until the mixture reduces and thickens, about 10 minutes. Taste for seasoning.
Arrange the pork on a bed of the roasted veggies on a platter. Serve with the sauce on the side or poured over the roast.
— Excerpted from “My Harvest Kitchen: 100+ Recipes to Savor the Seasons,” $35. Copyright 2025 by Gesine Bullock-Prado. Photographs copyright Raymond Prado. Used with permission of the publisher, The Countryman Press, a division of W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. All rights reserved.