Red Braised Pork

This recipe is by Fuscia Dunlop and found in her excellent Sichuan Chinese cookbook, 'Land of Plenty'. This recipe is one of the first Sichuan dishes we cooked and remains a family favorite. In fact, we cook a lot of her recipes and highly recommend adding it to your home collection!

Red braised pork is a perfect recipe for collar steaks as the fat will break down and caramelize the rest of the dish. Therefore parts of the recipe have been reworked to reflect our little tweaks (changes italicized)!

Instructions

Makes: 4 servings w/ two or three other dishes as part of a meal

Heavy flat-bottomed Dutch oven or braising pot

1 - 1 1/4 lb pork collar steak

a 2 inch piece of fresh ginger, unpeeeled

2 scallions, white and green parts

3 TBL peanut oil (or substitute out for other flavorful oils - olive oil not recommended)

2 cups pork or beef bone broth

1 TBL dark soy sauce

2 TBL Shaoxing rice wine or medium-dry sherry

3/4 tsp salt

3 TBL brown sugar

1/2 of a star anise (4 segments)

1. Blanch the pork for a couple of minutes in boiling water, then remove and rinse in clean water (this step can be omitted if you are in a hurry). Cut the pork into 2- to 3-inch chunks. Crush the ginger slightly with the flat side of a cleaver or heavy object, and cut scallions into 3 or 4 sections.

2. Heat the oil in the pot until it is just beginning to smoke. Add the pork and stir-fry for a couple of minutes. Then add the stock and all the other ingredients and stir well.

3. Bring the liquid to a boil, then simmer, half covered or uncovered, over a very low flame for about 2 hours, stirring from time to time, until the liquid is much reduced (almost sticky like caramel) and the meat is fork tender.

Serve next to a good rice and stir fried vegetables.