The last thing I aspire to do is bore you with yet another slow cooked pork shoulder, but evidently I'm going to anyway. In my defense this one is different. Chinese flavours such as star anise, cinnamon and ginger complement pork exceptionally well. Imagine a piece of pork belly with it's succulent layers of tasty meat and fat and the incredibly crisp skin. Even without seasoning it still smells like Chinese food to me. Or the sweet and sour pork everyone loves so much, the crisp battered pork balls dipped in an intensely red sauce full of the tang of vinegar and the sweetness of sugar. It's one of the world's most popular foods for a reason.
Whilst I had Nigel Slater's tome Tender out to make the cake of the last post, I flipped through and was intrigued by an interesting sounding recipe for plum sauce. It was quite a strange set of instructions.
The recipe instructs to heat whole plums until they burst. I couldn't see it happening with the rock hard plums I had bought, but persevered, even though I was slightly alarmed at what my cooker hob may look like should they explode too violently.
After a while, I resorted to cutting them in half to allow them a better chance at softening to a mush and even then I still had to smush with my spoon often. I kept reading and re reading the recipe in case I had misread an instruction or missed a vital ingredient or direction. But, it seemed I was following to the letter.
Eventually after adding much more water than specified and experimenting with turning the heat up, then down, then back up, I had created something resembling a sauce.
Which I pushed through a sieve to obtain a smooth, silky consistency. It was sweet and very tangy with hints of warm star anise and aniseed cloves, but not quite right...
Until a thought occurred to me: add some of the juices from the roasting pork and voila! A more exciting fusion of flavours, both aesthetically and taste wise. Now the sauce had notes of apple juice and savoury, meaty juices spiked with onion, earthy, sweet garlic and peppers. Plus, the fact that it looked like the surface of some far distant alien planet made me love it even more. Recipe at bottom of post
The pork after cooking for 2 hours, 3 more to go, although by the end of hour 4 it's already soft enough to pull apart and at that point my patience ran out. I tore small strips from the meat, especially the ends where it had roasted a little more and become crispy, dunking them into the sweet and savoury gravy and drank spoonful after spoonful of the juice straight from the baking tin. I was alone, clearly.
Anything with Chinese flavours screams to be coupled with rice, like a knee jerk reaction. I surrendered, but fancified with some beets and bell peppers which I roasted with a little oil and saffron salt, then chopped into small chunks. They added a bit of interest and a different texture and the salt coloured the rice a pleasant yellow in places.
Recipe : Pork shoulder with Chinese flavourings
Pork shoulder, which can become boring and bland, is given a new lease of life with an aromatic cooking bath of soy sauce, Korean sesame and pepper gochujang, tangy, hot sriracha and sweet apple juice.
1 piece of pork shoulder, about 3 lbs in weight (1.5kg)
1 onion, peeled and sliced
2 cloves garlic, peeled but left whole
1 bell pepper, seeded and sliced
1 chili pepper, seeded and sliced
3 bay leafs, torn
3 sun dried tomatoes, sliced
2 star anise
2 cloves
1 tsp Sichuan peppercorns, crushed
1 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper
3 tbsp soy sauce
1/4 cup apple juice
1 tbsp Korean gochujang sauce (optional)
1/2 tbsp sriracha sauce
Preheat the oven to 375oF
Lay the onion, garlic, bell peppers, bay leaves, chili, star anise and sun dried tomatoes in a baking dish. Place the pork on top. Push the cloves into the flesh. Sprinkle with the Sichuan peppercorns, salt and black pepper.
Mix together the soy sauce, apple juice, gochujang and sriracha and pour all over the pork. You should have at least an inch of liquid in the bottom of the baking dish.
Cover the dish snugly with two pieces of strong foil and bake for 4 - 6 hours. After 4 hours the pork will be incredibly tender, easy to pull apart with a spoon. After 6 it will be falling apart. It's up to you how you want it and how long your patience lasts in a kitchen full of tantalizing smells.
Remove from the oven, wrap the pork in foil to rest and keep all the flavourful vegetables and juices to make your gravy and serve with the meat.
Recipe : Sweet and sour plum sauce 'gravy'
Adapted from Tender volume 2
4 plums, cut in half and stones removed
1/2 cup water
1.5 tbsp sugar
1/2 inch piece of ginger, peeled and cut into pieces
2 star anise
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbsp red wine vinegar
1/4 cup juices from the roasted pork
Place the plums, water, sugar, ginger, star anise and salt in a saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring frequently until the plums are collapsing and turning to mush and becoming sauce like.
Remove from the heat, leave to cool slightly, then blend to a smooth, thick puree in a blender or processor.
Push the blended sauce through a sieve into a bowl beneath, pressing down with a spoon until you have a smooth, lump free sauce. Discard any remaining pulp.
Gently reheat the sauce in a pan over low heat and pour in the pork juices. Stir well to emulsify, even though there will still be some separation of fats. (Don't worry, it looks really pretty).
Serve the pork with any vegetables that haven't disintegrated from the baking dish with the sauce 'gravy' poured over. Accompany with some rice or steamed Asian greens or both.
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