Slowly Does It

One of my favorite cooking methods, especially for meats, is slow-cooking – be it the slow-oven roasting of things such as ribs, or the braising of meats and/or vegetables. In my book, slow-cooking is one of the best ways, if not the best way, to intensify flavors and bring out the rich complexity of the different ingredients. In slow-cooking, the different aromas and tastes all have time to meld and harmonize. And for meats, slow-cooking produces some of the most tender and tasty meats possible. Of course, not all foods are amenable to slow-cooking. A lot of ingredients fare best when very lightly cooked, or in some cases, not cooked at all and simply eaten raw.

For the Chinese, the favorite (or at least the most common) slow-cooking method would probably be braising. Braised dishes are an integral part of the repertoire of any Chinese home-cook. It is also the cooking process by which, in many ways, the competence of a professional Chinese chef is defined. We Chinese braise just about everything – from pork to goose, from tofu to noodles even! Braised dishes are robust, hearty and yet with a touch of refinement. They are food with a lot of “honesty” and “heart”. And I like that in food.

One of the best-loved braised dishes would probably be braised pork (lor bak). Every dialect group will have their own versions. Indeed, every family will have their own unique recipe for this most humble of dishes. The dish pictured above may not look very appealing in appearance – all dark and brooding in looks it may be, but this is quintessential Chinese comfort food. In fact, it would be true to say that a lot of Chinese comfort food has dark soy sauce as a key ingredient! There is just something about dishes cooked with dark soy sauce that seems to hit the spot for many, many Chinese. Think tau yu bak (dark soy sauce pork). Think plain thick dark soy sauce drizzled over plain chicken rice. What could be better? It speaks to us on a sub-conscious emotional level.

This is one of my family’s favorite braised dishes – braised pork with Chinese radish. Different cuts of pork can be used, from pork belly to pork muscle from the leg of the pig, as is the case here. This was my first time using this cut of meat. It had come well-recommended by the butcher, and it had looked so amazingly fresh that day, so I thought it would be interesting to try and see how well it cooked in a braised dish. It was a pretty lean cut of meat, and I was a little concerned that it would turn out rather dry and tough. As it turned out, it was nicely tender, and juicy too. So now I’ve added this cut of meat to my repertoire of meat cuts that I would use in my cooking.

Braised Pork and Radish

1 medium or large white radish
1 large piece pork ** (approximately 1 kg)
minced garlic
5 cloves whole garlic, skinned
3 tablespoons dark soy sauce
3 tablespoons light soy sauce
4-5 teaspoons sugar ***
3-4 tablespoons sweet Chinese glutinous rice wine
1½ to 2 cups chicken or pork stock

* Quantities are based on estimations, and should be adjusted according to the amount of radish and pork used, as well as personal preferences.

** If using pork belly, please see recipe below.

*** Some people prefer to use a piece of rock sugar instead, and that works equally well.

• Peel radish and cut into fairly large chunks.

• Wash and clean the pork, keeping it in one large, whole piece.

• Heat a little oil in a wok or deep pot, and sauté the whole cloves of garlic until fragrant. Add the whole piece of pork, and allow it to brown on all sides. Remove from wok, and set aside.

• If necessary, heat a little more oil in the wok. Sauté the minced garlic until fragrant. Add the radish and sauté for a couple of minutes.

• Return the pork to the wok. Add all the seasonings as well as the stock.

• Cover wok, and leave to gently simmer on a very slow fire for about 2 to 3 hours, or until the meat and radish are very tender. Cooking times will vary depending on the cut of pork used. For very long-cooking cuts of meat, it may be desirable to add the radish only after the meat has been cooking for about ½ to 1 hour, so that the radish doesn’t get cooked for too long and turn mushy.

• Once the pork and radish are at the desired tenderness, turn off the heat. Leave to rest for about 10 minutes. Then, removing the pork from the wok, cut it into slightly chunky pieces. Return the pork pieces to the radish mixture. Mix well.

• If a slightly thicker gravy is preferred, simply bring the gravy to a rolling boil, add a little cornstarch (cornflour) solution, mix well, allow the gravy to return to a boil and then turn off the heat immediately.

Notes:
• The same dish can be done with just radish, using maybe a vegetable stock, for a vegetarian option. The seasonings should be adjusted accordingly, as radish does not require as much flavoring as meat. I personally use only about 1 tablespoon dark soy sauce, 1 tablespoon light soy sauce, 1 teaspoon sugar, and skip the wine altogether.

• Similarly, a version with just pork can also be done. Such a lor bak (Hokkien for braised pork) dish is very versatile and can be served with other Chinese comfort food, such has braised wind-dried vegetables (men cai gan in Mandarin), braised preserved vegetables (such as men mei cai) – recipes for which will be coming up tomorrow – or even used to make noodle dishes such as lor mee.

Braised Pork Belly
The braising of pork belly requires a slightly different treatment, as this cut of meat can sometimes have a rather overt porky, even gamey taste, which is very unappetizing. Therefore, the prepping of the pork belly before it is cooked is very important. And the following prepping steps can be used in any recipe that requires pork belly.

Prepping the Pork Belly
• Bring a large pot of water to a strong rolling boil. This is very important – that the water be at a strong rolling boil. It is also important to fill the pot with a generous amount of water.

• Place the cleaned and washed piece of pork belly into the boiling water, skin side down. Almost immediately after the meat has gone in, turn off the fire, and then remove the pork from the pot. It is essentially just a very quick boiling-water-dip to blanch and seal the surfaces of the pork belly, and the meat will still be completely raw.

• Using the sharp edge of a knife, scrape the skin’s surface. Rinse well under running water. Repeat this process if necessary. The porkiness usually stems from the skin, so doing this should remove any porky taste from the meat.

Cooking the Pork Belly
• Once the pork belly has been prepped, it can be cooked in the same way as the braised pork above. Just be sure that when adding the pork belly to the hot oil, place it skin side down first.

• For pork belly, I also usually like to use a little more garlic than I would if using other cuts of meat. 8 to 10 whole cloves of garlic would not be overpowering at all.

• There is also an alternative method that can be used for braising pork belly (or even other cuts of pork)… After the meat has been browned in the hot oil, remove the pork and garlic from the wok. Add all the gravy ingredients (dark soy sauce, light soy sauce, glutinous rice wine and sugar). Stir on low heat until the sugar has melted. Return the pork and the garlic to the wok, and stir to mix well. Add the stock, cover and leave to simmer until the pork is cooked and tender.

• Again, as with the braised pork above, if a thicker gravy is desired, add a little cornflour solution to the gravy at the end.

And there you have it, a small little bonus for today: 4-recipes-in-1…

Braised pork belly… braised pork… braised white radish… braised pork with white radish…
Meat that is melt-in-the-mouth tender, radish that is sweet, soft and succulent, and gravy that is absolutely delectable when drizzled over steaming hot rice. Chinese comfort food. Chinese braised comfort food. Ahhhh…

Copyright © 2004 Renee Kho. All Rights Reserved.
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