RED-COOKED PORK SHOULDER
The first time I heard about Cecilia Sun Yun Chiang, was last year from an article in Apartamento magazine. Was soo fascinated with her life growing up in China followed by her life in America. She opened one of the first chinese restaurants in America to serve authentic Chinese dishes in the 60’s.
Following reading this article I scoured the internet to look for her bio/cook book – The Mandarin Way – eventually finding a copy, I now have my hands on her famous red-cooked pork shoulder recipe!
In honour of Cecilia Sun Yun Chiang I’ve made her famous red-cooked pork shoulder.
Red-Cooked Pork Shoulder
INGREDIENTS:
- 14 lbs of pork shoulder – I used 1.75kg as we can’t eat that much meat!
- 2 cups of water
- 1 cup of light soy sauce
- 2 finely sliced pieces of ginger – 2.5 inches long
- 2 garlic cloves
- 3 – 4 star anis
- 1.5 tbsp shaoxing wine
- 2 cloves garlic – minced
- 1/2 cup of sugar
METHOD:
Fill up large pot with water and as soon as it boils plunge the pork into the water and let it boil again. As soon as the water boils remove the meat and rinse in a large bowl of cold water then place the meat into a wok.
Combine water and the rest of the ingredients except for the sugar & shaoxing wine.
Pour mixture over the meat, turn up heat. As soon as it boils turn the heat down to a simmer and cover with a lid. Cook for approx 1.5 hours turning the meat occasionally.
Turn up the heat and add the sugar & shaoxing wine. Keep basting the meat for approx 15 mins or until the sauce reduces. Use a skewer to check that the pork is cooked – it should enter the meat easily.
Remove meat from wok and carefully slice and serve with sauce on top.
There is a lot of meat in this recipe so can be used as part of a large dinner party meal or you can have part of it for dinner and use the remaining sliced meats in bao buns, noodle soups, sandwiches or even chopped up for fried rice……the list goes on.
