Most Australians will celebrate the day with a BBQ at a local park or at a mate’s place, play some backyard cricket and probably have a dip in the pool. It’s a day of relaxation and celebration! So while we’re over here in the UK, why not celebrate the national holiday of our sister nation with a yummy hog roast?

A hog roast is the perfect way to combine your love for food and friends. Invite your friends and family around and feast on delicious slices of pork and scrumptious salads. You can hire a hog roast machine and cook and serve it all up yourselves, or you can hire a hog roast company to come around to your place, set up, cook the roast, serve and clean up for a fairly reasonable price.

If you have a look online you will find quite a few companies that service the London area, the best thing about hiring a company to do it for you is that they are professionals in what they do, so you can sit back, relax and enjoy the day with no fuss while they take care of everything for you.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and lamb roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450.

So how to do you ensure the company you choose is the best one? There are a few things you need to do to ensure you get what you pay for. The first thing to do is to have an idea in your head of what you want, that way it will be easier for you to match a company with your needs and wants.

So write down how many people you are expecting to cater for, what type of roast you want – hog, spit or lamb, and whether you want sides and salads or whether you will provide them yourself. You will also need to decide if you want to supply the plates and cutlery etc or whether you want the company to.

Once you have all of this in your mind you should start doing some online research. Get yourself a list of five companies that look credible and have easy to use websites with plenty of information on them. Once you have your shortlist, see if you can find some customer references, if they have them it is a good sign the company is good at what they do. Now you can start the phone calls and obtain quotes.

When you’re on the phone with the company you can usually gauge how good the company is by how you are treated on the phone. Is the person you are speaking to knowledgable, curteous and helpful? Write comments down next to the company name about how the customer service was. Just becuase you call up and get a really cheap quote doesn’t mean they are the company for you. Did they run through the set up with you? Or let you know how long it would take them to cook and serve? What about the quality of their meat? Where is it sourced from?

You want people to answer all your questions and do so in a professional and polite manner. If they sound professional on the phone and have a professional site with customer references available to view, chances are the company should be able to provide you with a quality hog roast service.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and lamb roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450

A hog roast is the best way to cater for large numbers of people and it provides a feeling of togetherness as people need to work together to cook and serve it up. Here at BigRoast.com we’ll be having a lamb roast to see in the New Year, along with some roast potatoes, mint and basil peas and delicious gravy.

A lamb roast is better for smaller events, although if you are having a large party we can of course cater to your numbers with a lamb roast, no worries. The same applies to hog roasts, if you are having a smaller event we can certainly help you out with a hog roast in that event in anycase.

If you would like some ideas on how to make your New Year’s Eve function a winner with a Hog Roast, please feel free to contact BigRoast.com on 0845 500 5450 or email us on contact@bigroast.com and we will be happy to assist you with ideas and answer any questions you may have.

Happy New Year everyone!

You could opt for the catered office party, where you simply bring the food, drink and music to the office. This option is a less expensive option as you won’t have to fork out venue or room hire fees and makes it easy for the staff as they don’t have to get themselves anywhere. Although this option can sometimes be seen as a little ‘slack’.

A great idea for a staff party is to look into hog roast hire and have a hog roast in a nearby park. That way you can all get out of the office and still enjoy food and drinks in a party environment. If people want to party on afterwards they can head to a local pub or bar without too many hassles.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and lamb roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450

Hog roasts have been around for years, they date back to the medieval times where villages would often have a pig on the spit to celebrate a special occasion.

They are perfect for Halloween as children (and their parents) are often tired from all the trick or treating and want to just eat something they don’t have to cook themselves. You could even give a roll with some pork in it to some of the trick or treaters as their treat! I’m sure they would love it! You’d have to be careful about who you let in on your hog roast secret as you might find yourself catering for the entire neighbourhood once word gets out! So why not have a hog roast london style at your place for all the trick or treaters after their big night?

The team from London’s premier hog and lamb roast company Big Roast would arrive about seven hours before serving to set up and start cooking the hog roast. After serving the team will clean up and leave you to your party.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and lamb roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450

Cormarye

2 lbs. pork loin
1 1/2 tsp. coriander
1 1/2 tsp. caraway
1/2 tsp. pepper
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups red wine
1 cup broth

Mix spices and garlic with wine and pour over pork in a roasting pan. Cover and bake at 350° until cooked through, basting regularly. Strain the drippings from the roasting pan into a saucepan, along with the broth. Bring to a boil and simmer for about 15 minutes. Serve sauce with pork.

Bukkenade

2-3 lbs. beef, cut into cubes
1 Tbsp. parsley
1 tsp. sage
1 tsp. hyssop
1/2 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. mace
4 egg yolks
3/8 cups verjuice
1/2 tsp. ginger
1 tsp. salt
pinch saffron

Put the beef into a large pot along with water to cover – about 8 cups. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and simmer for 30 minutes. Skim off and discard any scum that forms on the surface. Add parsley, sage, hyssop, cloves, and mace. Stir well and simmer for another 30 minutes, or until the beef is tender. Temper the egg yolks in a separate bowl by slowly whisking in a cup or two of the broth from the pot. Add the remaining ingredients to the pot along with the egg mixture and stir. Remove from heat when as soon as it comes back to a boil.

Tostee

1/4 cup red wine

• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/8 tsp. ground ginger
• pinch salt
• pinch pepper
• 2 slices toast
• fresh ginger

Peel fresh ginger and chop very finely. Set aside.

Put wine, honey, ground ginger, salt, and pepper into a saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce to medium heat and simmer until bubbles start to stack – or until syrup is thick when cool. Spoon over toast and sprinkle with a little fresh ginger. Serve hot.

The next time you have a party think about cooking some of these medieval delights or if you don’t want to do the work yourself then let the Big Roast team come and create a Hog roast banquet for you.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and lamb roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450

To improve our service further Big Roast likes to publish some frequently asked questions and helpful answers. Posted below are some of the most recent.

How many people can a hog roast feed?

A whole hog roast can feed up to 120 people. Ideally, for a full sized pig roast, you would want at least 50 guests at your event. For parties smaller than 50 people Big Roast would recommend a lamb roast. A whole lamb roast will feed up to 45 people and is a more appropriate amount of food.

How big is a whole hog?

Approximately 50 kilogrammes. Big Roast will tend to use hogs between 45kg and 55kg in size depending on the size of the event. Once a pig grows to above 60kg it is considered to be full sized and is professionally butchered for loins, shoulders and chops. Smaller pigs are known as suckling pigs. Counter intuitively these are actually more expensive per kilo than bigger pigs.

How long does a hog roast take to cook?

A hog will take approximately 5 hours to cook. It can also take an experienced chef up to an hour to carve a whole pig while an inexperienced carver may take over an hour and a half. It also takes time to fire up a hog roast machine, prepare the hog and serve. As a result a full Big Roast hog roast can take 7 hours from start to finish.

How is it best to eat a hog roast?

Although tastes are very different Big Roast recommends that, with the best hog roasts, the slightly charred pork is carved straight off the pig into a soft white bap. Apple sauce should be added to the hot meat. Big Roast can provide salad options but are not necessary to enjoy a hearty hog. Big Roast’s website has a large number of excellent hog roast pictures but to fully appreciate a hog roast check out our You Tube video.

For other frequently asked questions that Big Roast receives follow the link – FAQ’s – or contact one of Big Roast’s enthusiastic staff.

Big Roast is London’s leading hog roast and spit roast service. For more information either email contact@bigroast.com or call 0845 500 5450

A typical hog roast event is for between 50 and 100 people – although it is possible for cater for smaller events and also significantly larger events. For this size event a single hog such as in the picture to the right is more than adequate.

So from the initial hog roast enquiry we send out a list of questions to customers to help us understand what they are wanting to achieve in a little more detail. Questions will include the number of vegetarians, whether salads/cutlery/plates etc are required and timing for serving the food. If we have a free booking on that day then we will ask customers to make a initial deposit of 25%. For a basic hog roast without salads or any extras this will be 25% of £595 – this deposit secures your booking.

From this point we will decide with you whether you want to include a vegetarian option (quiche and barbequed skewers are popular options but we can look into other variations where required) – it is important to understand that we prepare the vegetarian options in advance and therefore it will be hard for us to change numbers close to the event. Further options such as cutlery/types of rolls/sauces will also be agreed in advance.

Final confirmation emails will lay out what we are providing on the day and in the last few days we would appreciate if the final balance is paid – if you wait until the day then we will need to take cash at the event prior to cooking.

On the day our chef will arrive in a van hours before the food is due to be served and will start the cooking of the hog. While the spit roast is working its magic the chef will prepare the serving tables and lay out the salads. When the hog is ready the chef will start bringing people into line to collect their food and add any extras to their plates. There is normally enough meat for a certain amount of second servings – and after the feast has finished our chef will clear up and leave you to your evening. We are happy to provide Wish lanterns – another company of ours – for customers who want to have a magical end to their evening.

We do cater to specific needs that clients have and emphasise that although this is a typical hog roast – there are very few typical events for us as we find that all customers have specific needs. Please either email contact@bigroast.com or call us on 0845 500 5450.