Chinese Pork

I like cooking, but the past couple of years I've often avoided the day to day French recipes in favour of Asian food. I think it's because I miss Asian food, and until fairly recently commercial kitchens around here didn't really do Asian food. They incorporate some Asian flavours into what are basically French dishes and call them curries. Anyway, I digress...

We're lucky here in that pork belly is readily available in any supermarket or butchers - just look for poitrine. This recipe uses about 750 grams of poitrine, and makes a very nice, very unctuous and sweet/spicy dish. It's not diet food, it's comfort food.

Ingredients:

Frying oil

750 grams pork poitrine

1 cm ginger root, finely sliced

1 star anise

1 tablespoon rice wine

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 tablespoon cider vinegar

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

4 tablespoons brown sugar 

5 tablespoons water

Method

Take your poitrine and cut it into 3cm cubes.

In a small bowl mix

1 tablespoon rice wine

2 tablespoons soy sauce

1 tablespoon cider vinegar

2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar

Preheat a wok until it starts to smoke slightly, then turn the heat to low. Add 2 tablespoons of oil (I use peanut oil) and the ginger slices. Fry the ginger for 1 minute. Add the pork, turn up the heat to high and brown the meat for a couple of minutes, stirring occasionally.

Turn down the heat, and add your bowl of liquids, star anise and 4 tablespoons sugar (preferably brown).

 

Put 5 tablespoons of water into your mixing bowl, stir, then add that to your wok.

Turn up the heat again and once boiling, cover and reduce the heat to low. Simmer for 25 minutes, stirring occasionally and checking to make sure the liquid is not drying up. If it is, reduce the heat further and add a splash more water if needed.

After 25 minutes of simmering, remove the lid. There should be quite a bit of liquid left.

Turn up the heat to reduce the sauce and make it all shiny. With the heat on high, continuously stir and toss the meat - it only takes a couple of minutes. Reduce the liquid until there is ¼ cup of sauce left.

Serve immediately with rice.

I usually serve this with ¼ small cabbage, which I sprinkle with sesame oil and some chilli flakes, then steam for 5-10 minutes until soft, but still with some bite. This time around I served it with epinards.

 

The cooking photos are of a double batch.