Dong Bo Rou
Braised pork belly cut into large cubes and tied using a kitchen twine. It is braised or stewed in a sweet soy sauce based liquid for several hours over a bed of leeks and ginger inside a claypot. Then it is steamed for an hour or more making the meat so tender it literally melts in your mouth.
Equipment
- Clay Pot
- Steamer
- Kitchen Twine
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 kg pork belly slab
- 1 tbsp cooking oil
- 3 tbsp rock sugar
- 1/3 cup water
- 2 pcs leeks cut into long pieces
- 12 slices ginger
- 1/4 cup light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
- 1/2 cup shaoxing wine
- water
- cornstarch slurry
Instructions
Cleaning the pork belly:
- Wash pork belly and use a knife or cleaver to scrape the skin and get rid of unwanted residue
- Heat wok and press the skin side of the belly to get rid of hair.
- Use a brush to clean the skin side of the pork belly with tap water. Scrape the skin again.
Blanching the pork belly:
- Put enough water into a pot or wok. Do not turn on fire yet.
- Place the pork belly skin side up in the water. Push the sides of the pork for a better shape.
- Turn on the fire and set to high. Cover and bring to a boil. Boil for 10 minutes.
- Remove and rinse the pork belly in tap water.
Tying the pork belly:
- Cut the pork belly into large cubes.
- Use a kitchen twine to tie each cube tightly.
Caramelized sugar:
- In a pan, add cooking oil and add rock sugar
- Set heat to low and stir until sugar is melted.
- Continue stirring until color starts turns reddish.
- Add a 1/3 cup of water gradually. It will splash a little then thicken. Keep on stirring.
- Set aside this caramelized sugar.
Braising/Stewing process:
- In a claypot, arrange a bed of cut leeks/scallions at the bottom. Place a layer of sliced ginger. This helps prevent the pork belly from burning. If you have a bamboo net, place it first before aranging the leeks and ginger slices on top of it.
- Place the pork belly cubes skin side up.
- Add light soy sauce and dark soy sauce for deeper color. Add shaoxing wine, then add water until almost full. Add the caramelized sugar.
- Cover and bring to a boil in high heat.
- Set heat to low and simmer for an hour. Add some water if needed.
- Then turn the pork belly skin side down. Cover and simmer again for half an hour.
- Prepare steamer and set heat to high and boil. Make sure there are lots of water in your steamer.
- Place claypot into the steamer and steam in high heat for 1 to 1 1/2 hours.
Arranging and serving:
- Remove from steamer and arrange pork belly in a dish. Best if served on top of some blanched bokchoy
- Thicken the sauce with cornstarch slurry and pour over the pork belly.
- Serve with white rice and enjoy.
