家乡味: homely Braised Pork Belly

Above braised pork belly may not look the best, neither is it anywhere close to perfect. But isn't this what homecooked food all about? Warmth, familiarity, even to the point of nostalgia, where you remember its perfections and imperfections by heart. These are the qualities that even the best chefs in the world find it hard to match.

Think Ratatouille, the Pixar animated movie. The heart of the toughest food critic in Paris will still melt at the memory of his mother's homely cooked food.

Braised Pork Belly is a very typical Hokkien dish, common in everyday cooking as well as during festivities. I remember it as my grandfather's favourite dish too. Like many Chinese men, he is an ultimate pork lover and there's always pork in every meal, whether as a main dish, in soups, or as condiment in stir fried vegetables. Well, he was a pig farmer too.

I tried hard to retrace the steps my mother took to cook this dish. But I was lacking in spices such as star anise, cloves and cinnamon sticks, and maybe missing a step here and there. Below is my 'agar agar' guesstimation recipe, that is open to suggestions for improvements.

Braised Pork Belly

Three-layered pork belly (you decide the quantity based on how many you're cooking for)
1 square of Tau Kwa (beancurd with its skin fried)
1 Taw Kee (beancurd sticks)
dried shitake mushrooms, soaked
hard boiled eggs
note: other than pork, the accompanying ingredients are optional but good to have.

3-4 cloves
1 cinnamon stick
1-2 star anise
several cloves of garlic, some chopped (depending on how much of a garlic lover you are)

Seasoning for pork:
Dark soy sauce
Sesame oil
Five spice powder
White pepper powder
2 cloves of garlic, chopped

Start preparing at least 2 hours ahead of serving. Sliced the pork into chunky pieces. Do not throw away the fatty part, even if you're not going to eat it, as the fats are crucial to a tender texture of the lean part. Season and leave aside for as long as you can, so that the seasoning is well absorbed into the meat.

On how much soy sauce to use in seasoning pork, my rule is to have all the meat "darkened" by the sauce. And maybe 1 tbsp of sesame oil and 1 tsp of five spice powder. It's very random here, use your nose.

Heat oil in a saucepan (you can use sesame oil or just vegetable oil). Fry garlic until it is fragrant but not burned. Throw in the pork and stir fry until it is semi cooked. Throw in the rest of the ingredients and fry for a few minutes.

Add water until it just covers everything. Here's where more of my estimation comes in, as I drizzle the dish with more dark soy sauce, light soy sauce, five spice powder...one recipe I saw uses brown sugar, though I'm not sure of its significance on taste.

But bring the liquid to boil, and turn down heat to simmer for 1-2 hours, until the pork is tender, the dark sauce is fully absorbed into the beancurds and eggs.

Serve with plain rice and a plate of stir fry vegetables. And do not throw away if you can't finish, as this dish still taste as good, or even better overnight. Can serve with plain steam buns too.