Twice-Cooked Pork Belly With Vegetables
Pan Guang Mei, Chongqing, China. Photo: Gabriele Galimberti
From Yahoo Food’s Cookbook of the Week, In Her Kitchen: Stories and Recipes from Grandmas Around the World by Gabriele Galimberti (Clarkson Potter):
Pan Guang Mei has one son and one grandchild. She was born in the countryside of Sichuan, and now she lives in Chongqing, a city of more than thirty million people and one of the five biggest in the world. She grew up in a tiny house, where the kitchen was a sort of camping stove placed on a table. Now she lives with her husband on the nineteenth floor of a skyscraper in the southern part of the city, and her kitchen is as big as her first house.
The word rou (the third word in the recipe name) means “meat cooked again in the wok” in Chinese, and, indeed, the meat has to be cooked twice: the first time in boiling water and the second in a wok with some vegetables. Folks in China know that eating pork every week is good, but in moderation and provided that you accompany the pork with plenty of vegetables (and possibly you cycle every day to the market to shop). This is how you keep slim, according to Guang Mei.
Hui Guo Rou (Twice-Cooked Pork with Vegetables)
Serves 2
1 (14-ounce) pork belly, skin on
2 (1-inch) pieces of fresh ginger, peeled and thinly sliced or shredded
2 bunches of green onions, trimmed and chopped into 2-inch pieces
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon hot chili sauce or hot chili paste (doubanjiang)
4 teaspoons soy sauce
½ red bell pepper, cut into 1-inch dice
½ green bell pepper, cut into 1-inch dice
1 large red onion, cut into 1-inch dice
Place the pork belly in a wok or large saucepan; add water to cover the meat completely. Add half of the ginger and half of the chopped green onions. Bring to a boil, lower the heat to a simmer, and cook for 30 minutes, or until the pork is tender.
Drain the pork, remove the skin, and cut the pork into thin slices.
Wipe out the wok. Add 1 tablespoon of the oil and warm over high heat until the oil is very hot. Add the rest of the ginger and cook for 1 minute. Add the sliced pork and cook for 5 minutes, stirring often. Remove everything to a dish.
Wipe out the wok again and add the remaining 2 tablespoons oil and the sugar over low heat. When the sugar is melted and begins to caramelize, add the hot chili sauce and the soy sauce. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes, then add the sliced pork, the diced bell peppers, the diced red onion, and the remaining chopped green onions. Heat everything together for 5 minutes. Serve immediately.
