Friday, February 19, 2010

Roast Pork Encore (烧肉)


After my first successful attempt in making roast pork (烧肉), I decided to make it again with more flavours.  This time round, I marinated the meat with rice wine and fermented beancurd.  While the meat was roasting in the oven, my mobile phone rang.  The school called to inform that DD1 is not feeling well and I had to pick her up from school immediately.

Lugging DS2 and DD3, I had wanted to catch a cab but there weren't any in sight so we took a 20 mins walk to school under the sizzling hot sun.  Thank goodness both DS2 and DD3 were cooperative and didn't make any fuss.

DD1 was in acute abdominal pain and she couldn't even walk out of the school's office.  Everyone in the office started worrying that she may be suffering from appendicitis. Now, that got me really worried.  While I was coaxing her to walk out to the main road to hire a cab, a very kind parent volunteer (Maria - I hope I got her name correct) offered to give us a lift home, without even asking where we live.  I gladly took up her offer without any hesitation as I really needed help.  And before I knew it, someone was carrying my 18kg DD1 to the car!  I'm really appreciative towards these ladies for all the help they've rendered.

A visit to the doctor revealed that DD1 was constipated and that caused her acute abdominal pain (I suspect it was due to too much new year goodies and too little water).  She was given saline laxative enema and in less than a minute, she cleared her bowels and was her normal cheerful self again :-)

Now, back to my roast pork.  I was out of the house since 2pm and back at 2.45pm to drop off DD1's school bag and out again to bring her to the doctor.  The queue at the clinic wasn't long but being a desperate mother, I consulted the patients ahead of us if they could let DD1 see the doctor first and I only got home at 3.45pm.  The roasting had stopped.

Instead of roasting the whole piece of meat, I sliced them into strips and scored the skin, then used satay sticks (bamboo skewers) to hold them in place (a tip from Lily).

The amount of oil collected wasn't as much as the first time and the oven wasn't oily too.  I attribute that to the scalding of the meat before roasting, not sure though.


Roast Pork II
Ingredients

1 piece of pork belly (around 1kg)

Seasonings
1.5 - 2 tsp fine sea salt
2 tsp five-spice powder
1 cube fermented beancurd
1 tsp rice wine

Method
  1. Scald pork belly in boiling water for a few minutes. Drain and cool the pork belly completely.
  2. Score the skin using a sharp knife (see 2nd picture).
  3. Mix seasoning together and rub the meat with seasoning. 
  4. Leave the pork belly in the fridge (uncovered) to season overnight. This will dry up the skin.
  5. Pre-heat oven up to 210C.
  6. Place pork belly (skin side up) on a rack with a tray lined with aluminium foil to collect the oil drippings.
  7. Roast the pork belly for 1 hour and 45 minutes or until you see " bubbles" all over the skin.
  8. Cool completely before chopping into bite-size pieces and serve.

12 comments:

A Full-Timed Housefly said...

hahaha... I can see this at last. Thanks for sharing

Sonia ~ Nasi Lemak Lover said...

No wonder you encore,your roast pork look so yummy.

Anonymous said...

Hope your dd1 has recovered..I really can understand your situation when your dd1 fell ill and you had to lug all to sch to fetch her back.

I ve experienced lugging all my 3kids to the clinic with one sick child and I came back puffing and panting.. to make things worse, dh is outstationed, real stressful time :(

You are one great mom, tks for sharing. Take care.

Your roast pork really looks very good.

cupcake

Anonymous said...

Hi, do we need to poke many holes on the skin layer before scoring the pork belly? Does it make a difference? thks

Anonymous said...

is the fermented bean curd red in colour? If not, pls advise which is the correct one to buy. Which version do you like better, your first or this second version of roast pork? thks alot :)

Blessed Homemaker said...

I didn't poke this time round, I just score them with a knife.

Blessed Homemaker said...

I used the normal fermented beancurd but I understand the red ones will taste better.

I prefer the 2nd version :)

Anonymous said...

if i dont have rice wine, can i use "hua tiao" wine or sherry?

Blessed Homemaker said...

I think any cooking wine works fine.

WendyinKK said...

Wow, u must have been worried like mad when u saw ur daughter in such pain.

I once had a student in my class suddenly crouching on the floor..bursting out tears, but witholding her cries.
She was in so much pain, she couldn't even move. I was pregnant that time, so I couldn't carry her or anything. Her mom took her to see doc, and doc said it's due to her menses having a hard time coming out.

U are so diligent. Wrapping up the lines on ur grill rack!!! I will never do that!!!

Blessed Homemaker said...

I've heard of some severe cases of menses cramps too. There's an ex-collg of mine, she will always go on 2 days MC when she starts her period, cos she said it was so painful she couldn't walk.

I prefer to wrap so that washing up will be easier. Lining is still alright,it's the removal that's more time consuming as they get stuck onto the rack. So I always explain to my children, eating it effortless but preparing and washing up is a chore. But that's because I love them, so I'm doing it willingly ;-)

Bakericious said...

the roast pork looks delicious and look forward to bake it soon once my new helper onboard cos my husband has been asking for it a few tims. thanks for sharing.