18 Must-Try Chinese Pork Belly Recipes | The Woks of Life (2024)

FAQs

Why do Chinese boil pork belly? ›

The idea is that by boiling the fatty pork belly, it not only renders out some of the fat, it also tenderizes the meat. Because the boiling time is so short it's debatable how tender it makes the meat, but what it does do is prime the fat for high-heat cooking.

Pork belly is an excellent source of protein, essential for many bodily functions. It aids in muscle growth, repair, and maintenance, supports the immune system, and helps regulate hormones. Including pork belly in a balanced diet can contribute towards meeting your daily protein requirements.

Be sure to pick out a cut that has a rich, pink colour. Covered by a firm, creamy layer of fat, this will produce the best crackling. These points normally indicate quality meat, so avoid buying pork belly with a brown or greyish hue to it.

boiling water trick

This helps to prep the skin to crackle as its now "pre-cooked" so to speak. Make sure to pat dry with paper towel to further dry afterwards.

In Chinese cooking, proteins like beef, pork or chicken are velveted first before stir-frying them. There are several ways to velvet, but at its most basic level, it involves marinating meat with at least one ingredient that will make it alkaline. This is what tenderizes the meat, especially cheaper, tougher cuts.

Compared with other cuts of pork, pork belly contains more saturated fat. While saturated fat can be part of a healthy diet, a South Korean study on pork belly intake suggests lowering your total calories from saturated fat. That's because it may be linked to numerous health conditions, including heart disease ( 4 ).

So, streaky pork bacon is pork belly, but pork belly isn't bacon. Instead, pork belly is the whole slab cut from the fleshy underside of a pig. Streaky pork bacon is cut from this slab. Pork belly is unsmoked and uncured, while much bacon found in the U.S. can undergo a lot of processing—not ButcherBox bacon, though.

It's simply topped on the thinly sliced pork belly meat as a dressing. Raw garlic is a popular companion to rich meat dishes in Chinese cuisine. As the folk saying goes, eating meat without garlic will lose half the flavor.

The secret to cooking pork belly is the combination of a gentle heat to tenderise the meat and short, high temperature blasts to crisp up the skin on the outside. Typically, recipes call for around 2 hrs at 180C/160C fan/gas 4, then a further 30 mins or so at 200C/180C fan/gas 6.

Remove the meat from the heat once it reaches 190-195°F to prevent overcooking, plus don't add too many wood chips and overdo the amount of smoke. Do you cook pork belly fat side up or down? Fat side up! This way, the drippings will coat the meat as the fat renders and protect the surface from drying out.

Do I have to boil pork belly before frying? ›

Once you have the belly, the next thing you'll need to do is boil it, which helps render out some of the fat before frying. Based on other recipes I've seen, there's a split between boiling the belly in plain salted water and water that has additional seasonings like garlic, peppercorns, bay leaves, and soy sauce.

With that in mind, what I tend to use and find is the best spritz for smoking is apple cider vinegar but water will work as well, or a 50/50 mix. Another great alternative is apple juice where the sugars in the juice also add another level of flavour to your bark.

Cooking over indirect heat, marinating, using a high ratio of smoking chunks to charcoal, wrapping in aluminum foil, and allowing your meat to sit for three to five minutes will help to keep it moist.

$7.84 /lb. Avg. 10 lb.

By blanching the pork belly for 30 minutes before pan frying and pan-frying the pork belly without cooking oil, we can get rid of extra oil from the meat and make the meat extra tender.

Broth scum is simply denatured congealed protein. It comes from the meat, not the bones. It's not gelatin, which dissolves. It's mostly the same proteins that make up egg whites.

To cook pork belly properly, we have to give it the time and temperatures it needs to render both the fat and the collagen. This usually means low, slow cooking. Any meat will expel its available free water at temperatures above 180°F (82°C), becoming tough and dry.