braised pork belly

Diana Chu

Caramelized and Braised Pork Belly

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Author: Diana Chu

Prep time: 10 MinCook time: 1 H & 15 MTotal time: 1 H & 25 M

I grew up eating variations of the soy sauce braised dish that my mom made. As a kid, I really got sick of eating chinese food all the time and always wanted to try things like meatloaf and pasta. Sadly, my mom passed away last year and now I find myself longing for those home-y dishes. I wish that I had asked my mom more often how she made so many of them. I'm really glad to be able to write down some of the ones I figured out for my kids.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs of pork belly (skin removed). Slice to ½ thick pieces.
• 4 Tbsp of oil
• Sugar –  3 Tbls of rock sugar. Palm sugar or even brown sugar will work but will burn much faster so stir it into the hot oil as best you can – and add the pork quickly.
• 1 cup of Shaoxing cooking wine or cheap sake
• 3 Tbsp dark soy
• 3 Tbsp light soy
• 4 slices of ginger
• 8 cloves of garlic
• 1 star anise
• Orange peel from 1/3 of an orange
• Juice from one orange
• 2 whole dried chilis

Protocol

1. Heat oil on high heat and add sugar in a large wok or pan with high sides. Work quickly - When sugar has melted, add pork belly and fry. The pork slices should become darkly colored. Be careful not to burn the sugar – it will turn into dark hard chunks if it gets burned.
2. Add ginger and garlic and fry briefly. Then remove the pan from heat.
3. Remove pork, ginger, and garlic from the hot oil and put into a pressure cooker. Discard the oil.
4. To the pork, add sake (or wine), dark and light soy, star anise, orange peel, and chilis. You can juice the orange and put that in. Add about 1 cup of water – you want to submerge the meat but not too much – go about ¾ the way up the pot. You can stir this and taste it – add soy, salt, or more water to adjust the seasoning.
5. Pressure cook for 1 hour. You may need to check at this point and see if it is tender enough. If not, cook again for ½ hour. If you do not have a pressure cooker, cook over medium low heat for 2-3 hours until tender, adding water as needed to make sure the sauce doesn’t dry out and keep the pork submerged. If the sauce is too water, boil it with the lid off to concentrate the sauce.
6. Serve pork with steamed rice, ramen, or noodle soup. Have blanched greens or other veggies dressed with a little sesame oil and salt as a side. The pork can also be eaten in steamed buns.

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