Taiwanese Braised Pork with Rice (台式卤肉饭)

Taiwanese Braised Pork with Rice (台式卤肉饭) is one of my favourite dish in Taiwan. When I came back to Singapore from my holiday in Taiwan, I scoured around for the recipe....one that doesn't seem too difficult for someone like me who rarely cooks big time.

I chanced upon this recipe, tried it and liked it. This dish requires patience as time is needed to braise the pork till all the goodness and flavour is soaked in the meat. But all the effort is well worth it! The braised pork is very fragrant and yummy. The spices also gave the dish its authentic taste. It went really well with a bowl of steamed rice. I also cooked some hard boiled eggs in the same pot and it went very well with the pork and rice.

It was thumbs up from my hubby and daughter.

Taiwanese Braised Pork with Rice (台式卤肉饭)

recipe from Chop-chop Chopsticks (my notes in red)
Serves 4

Ingredients:
20 oz of pork belly (either grounded or in small chunks) - that's about 567g. I used both small chunks and grounded. For the pork belly chuncks, I poached in hot boiling water for a short while before cutting into chunks with skin on.
4 of boiled eggs (shell-off)
6-8 cloves of garlic (diced)
6-8 shallots onions (diced)
1/2 cup of deep fried red onion(shallots)

Cooked rice - as much as you want

For the Braising Broth
Mix the following in a container and have it ready before you start cooking:

1 tbspn peanut butter
1 cup all-purpose soy sauce (the ones from Taiwan or Japan would be better) - I reduced to 3/4 cup
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup rice cooking wine (Shao-Xing wine is even better)
1 tbspn white pepper powder (black pepper will do too, but not as good)
3-4 star anise
1 tsp of dried cloves
Some cinnamon powder
(Note : I put the star anise and dried cloves into a small cloth bag so that these can be removed easily before serving)
 

Method:
1. Heat 2 tbspn of vegetable oil in a heated skillet or wok.

2. Stir fry the garlic and shallots until they are nice and brown.

3. Mix in the grounded pork belly or pork belly chunks and stir fry until they get a little color. (To get rid of the 'porky' smell, I poached the pork belly in hot boiling water for a short while. Then remove from the water and cut into chunks first before mixing with the grounded lean meat to stir fry.)

4. Pour in the braising broth that you prepared.

5. Add the boiled eggs without shells and the deep-fried red onions.

6. Put in some water to make sure that the broth covers everything in the skillet.
(Tips: DO NOT add any more soy sauce. Too much soy sauce will make it too salty and too dark in color. You would want your braised eggs to look golden brown, right?)

7. Bring it to boil and let it sit on fire simmering for at least 30 min.
(Tips: The longer it is braised, the better the tastes and color would be. I usually do 60 min when I have time.)

8. Serve with nicely-cooked white rice.

DONE!

More Tips: Don’t waste the fabulous braising broth you have after you finish the dish.  Feel free to add in things like tofu, mushrooms, dried tofu, seaweed, or vegetables like carrots and potatoes. Let it cook in the broth for as long as it takes.  Serve it with some sesame oil. YUM!

Note :
- I added dried tofu, mushrooms and boiled 小白菜 to this dish to complete my meal.
- On another day, I ate this dish with 面线. It was equally yummy!!

Update on 26 April 2020

I was inspired to make this dish again after seeing several pictures of this delicious and mouth-watering one-pot meal.

This time, I used 600g minced meat and tweaked the braising broth ingredients as below :

Braising broth ingredients 
1 tbspn peanut butter
1/2 cup light soy sauce (the ones from Taiwan would be better)
1 tbspn dark soy sauce
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup Shao-Xing wine
2 tsp sesame oil
1 tbspn white pepper powder
1 tspn mixed spice powder or five spice powder
Some cinnamon powder
1/4 cup water


 

I am submitting this post to Asian Food Fest #10 August 2014  : Taiwan hosted by Alan Goh of Travelling Foodies

Do link back to LY's Kitchen Ventures if you have used any information published in this blog.