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Hong Shao Rou 红烧肉
Red Braised Porkbelly

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Hello dear Steemians...

16th of Februar 2018 is a Chinese New Year or sometimes it will be called Chinese Spring Festival. We're welcoming the year of the dog now.
In Indonesia people call it "Tahun Baru Imlek" and since Januar 2000 it was officially becoming a national holiday just like the other special celebration day for the rest 5 religions officially recognised in Indonesia.

Considering this occasion I decided to choose a recipe of a classic chinese dish called "Hong shao rou" as a theme for the cooking contest offered by @mayasiam , which I personally think as the most delicious braised meat dish I've ever eaten among the chinese culinary collections. :-D
It surely contains a huge amount of fat, but I promisse you that it tastes like heaven LOL.
For those who are abstain from pork or perhaps even vegetarians could for sure find some alternative to replace the pork belly such as: beef or tofu, but that would taste completely different.
However, if one never knew it, then one wouldn't miss it either anyway, so perhaps it doesn't matter. :)

There are many recipe version of this dish in China, and originally it takes at least 1,5 hours to cook it although the ingredients as well as the cooking method actually quite simple.
But after few experiment with some different recipes I found on the internet I finally created my own version which cut the time quite a lot without affecting the taste.
It's great as saving energy is really important not only for the environment but also for the safety of my wallet. :-D

Ok... let's start cooking:
These are the ingredients that you'd need for this dish:

• 600 gram pork belly. I suggest you to buy pork meat in an organic shop like what I do, because pork belongs to the main product of the large industrial livestock-rearing.
  It's the most exploited animal in Germany aside from poultry.
  It's not only about ideology, but I can assure you that such meat from intensive stock-rearing facility simply has a bad quality and definitely not healthy either because of the massive use of antibiotic and it's really mean to the animal.
  I'm not strongly against eating meat as we human are originally omnivor and just a part of the food chain anyway, but at least we shouldn't be too greedy which make us exploit everything in every aspect.
  Even the prey should be able to enjoy moments of normal living condition and not suffering all the time before ending up in the butchery
• 3 cloves garlic, chopped (optional, you don't have to use it if you don't like garlic. However IMHO, garlic always makes food more delicious.)
• 2 cm ginger. Cut it crosswise into few slices.
• 2 tbsp brown sugar / rock sugar
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp shao xing rice wine(in Germany it's not expensive, even in Amazon-Germany it costs around 2,60 € for 600 ml bottle, so I guess one needs not to seek a replacement for it. This rice wine has a special taste which is typical for chinese dishes. However I saw that in english speaking country it's rather expensive, so if you want to replace it, you can try pale dry sherry. The taste is a bit similar, but remember to use the pale dry one.
• 1 star anis and 2 bay leaves or you can also simply use the five spiced powder as an alternative
• 2-3 stems of scallion. Chop the white and green part separately!

Instruction:

Take a note that this is the simplified method which I personally found and I can sure you that it tastes not much different than the one cooked with the classic method.
Firstly cut the pork belly into roughly 2 cm long for each cubes, then smear the pan with a little bit oil to sauté / fry each side of the meat cubes until they are slightly brown (use medium heat). I put the chopped garlic and the white part of scallion straight here, so is the star anis (or 1/4 tsp of five spiced powder). After it's slightly brown at all sides, add 1 tbsp of shao xing rice wine in the pan and a little bit water. Stir well until the wine is evaporated.

To shorten the cooking time we can start making the caramel sauce in a wok with another stove on the side. Heat the wok over medium and put the brown sugar and 2 tbsp of hot water. Water helps the sugar to dissolve more quickly.
When the sugar is starting to dissolve you can add a teaspoon of cooking oil. Lower the heat and stir until it caramelized well. Don't be impatient in making caramel sauce, it takes time. When the caramel sauce is formed, add ca. 60 ml hot water to the sauce, mix well, put into a small bowl and set aside.
Move the sautéed meat into the wok, add both soy sauce and pour some hot water until the meat is more or less covered.
Cover the wok with a lid and let it simmer with a low to medium heat. It's a bit difficult to say as each stove has different scale. I use an induction stove with the heat scale from 1-14 so for simmering I normally use the heat scale "6 or 7"

Originally, with this amount of water you should simmer about 1-1,5 hours until the water amount is reduced into only 1/4 left compares with the start point. But I only simmer it for 30 minutes and just take the excess water out. Pour the caramel sauce into the wok, mix well and turn the heat into high (with my stove I use the heat scale "11 or 12").
Don't cover the wok and just keep stirring until the sauce starts thickening.
Don't cook too long either, because otherwise the meat will turn dry and the sauce would get burnt. You would notice it when the sauce is thick enough and the meat gets its shiny red glazed colour.
Turn off the stove and serve the dish.
It's ok to just sprinkle the red braised pork belly with the green part of chopped scallion, but I personally like to have some roasted sesame seed on it so I sprinkle some too.

Have a nice try everyone! ;-)

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Porkbelly / Schweinebauch

Sliced ginger / Ingwerscheibe

Chopped garlic / zerhackter Knoblauch

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... frying the pork belly

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...making the caramel sauce

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...shimmering the meat

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...thickening the sauce

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Hong Shao Rou is ready to serve

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Let's enjoy it with steamed white rice! (The steamed rice for this dish is not seasoned nor salted. It's plain.)

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Note: Honestly I was not a great cook in Indonesia. When I was still living with my parent, my Mom always cooked and I only knew how to eat. :-D
When I worked in another city and lived in a shared house with my friends, I nearly always ate outside.
Eating outside is very convenient and not pricey in Indonesia. So I actually learn how to cook well only after moving in Germany. My mother didn't believe me when I told her for the first time in our phone call that I was about to cook something for lunch. Only after I showed her my "live in action" by making a video call while cooking, then she finally believed it LOL.
Btw I actually got interested to make this dish because I was tempted by a chinese film in YouTube.
At that time I saw the actress eating this dish in a scene and my gluttonous nerves just completely got seduced LOL.
Thank you Internet, for seducing me and teaching me too! :-D

See you next time.