Francesinha | Hungry Valente

Cooking steps

Everything into the pan

High heat to start. Coat the bottom of a wide pan with olive oil, halve the yellow onion and cut it into big cubes — the whole lot gets blended later, so there is no point being neat about it. Wait until the onions are soft and translucent. In goes the tomato pulp, then the beer, then the piece of pork fat with the skin still on it: the skin is where the body of the sauce comes from, so do not trim it off. Piri piri to your liking — this is where the heat is decided — and a pinch of salt.

Yellow onionPiri piriOlive oilPork fat, skin onBeerFine sea saltSkinless tomato pulp

Ten to fifteen minutes

Leave it alone, so the beer starts to lose its edge.

Blend it, then the alcohol

Take the pork fat out, blend what is left with an immersion blender until it is smooth. You can then put the fat back in. Drop the heat to low or medium, then your whisky or a blended Scotch, nothing expensive — and red port wine with it if you have it.

Red port wineBlended Scotch whiskyPork fat, skin on

Bay leaves, then twenty minutes

Put one or two bay leaves in, and fifteen to twenty minutes on a low heat to pull it together. The pork fat and the bay leaves come out before any of it reaches a plate.

Bay leafPork fat, skin on

Get the sandwich ready

Sea salt on the steak and nothing else. Peel the skin off the linguiça. Toast the bread, two slices per francesinha; they have a lot of sauce to hold.

Beef steak, thinFlaky sea saltLinguiçaWhite bread

Everything on the grill

The steak first — it should be thin and nicely grilled. Grill the fresh sausage, then when it comes off, it can be cut in half and then butterflied open. You should put the sausage back on to grill on the inside to be well cooked. Lastly, grill your bacon (or do it in the oven to get it crispy) and grill your linguiça.

LinguiçaFresh sausageBeef steak, thinSmoked bacon

The fries

Deep fry the french fries or you can air-fry them if you prefer, doesn't really matter.

French fries

Build it

To build a francesinha you start with laying a slice of toast, and continue in this order: one slice of ham, the steak, the fresh sausage, two slices of linguiça, two slices of bacon, the second slice of toast on top, then four slices of Gouda — one to each corner, so the whole thing is covered when it melts.

GoudaWhite breadSmoked baconCooked hamLinguiçaFresh sausageBeef steak, thin

Melt it, sauce it, serve

Put the plate about a minute in the microwave, one at a time, until the Gouda has run down the sides. Then add the fries on the side and the sauce goes on top until the plate has a pool of sauce. It is then ready to be eaten with a knife and fork.

GoudaFrench fries