Dong Po Pork Curry Don From Shokugeki No Souma. This Is The First Time I’ve Cooked A Meal For @onionchoppingninja;

Dong Po Pork Curry Don from Shokugeki no Souma. This is the first time I’ve cooked a meal for @onionchoppingninja; it was always her cooking for me. Dong Po pork normally doesn’t contain spices, but adding in the spices Nikumi mentioned gave it a fragrant and savoury taste. It was a tedious dish that took about 3 hours to make, but the results were worth it. The rice had a numbing taste that counteracted the oiliness of the meat. Onionchoppingninja said that the meat was juicy and syrupy, which was as the manga described.

Dong Po Pork (serves 3~4)

800g pork belly with skin and nice alternating layers of fat and lean meat

3 bunches of spring onions

2 thumbs size knob of ginger, thinly sliced

2 cups Shao Xing Hua Diao wine

0.5 cup light soy sauce

0.5 cup brown sugar

1 tbsp dark soy sauce

3 star anise

2 teaspoon of Sichuan peppercorns

2 tablespoons of cornstarch

Method:

Cut the pork belly to pieces of the desired size. Parboil until the surface turns white.

Cut off and shred the white end of the spring onions. This can be done by holding one end while scoring the other finely with the sharp tip of a knife, then switching the ends and repeating.

Line a huge pot with the green spring onions. Scatter the ginger slices over them. Place the pork belly skin side down on the spring onions. This is in order to render out the fat on the skin side.

Add in the soy sauce, brown sugar, star anise, Sichuan peppercorns. Pour in the Shao Xing wine. 

Bring to a boil, then let the meat simmer for 2 hours, flipping once during the middle.

Remove the meat from the sauce and steam on high heat for 30 min. This step is extremely important in order to ensure the glossiness of the skin.

Mix cornstarch with a little water and add it the hot sauce while stirring.

To serve, pour the sauce over the meat.

Rice with Tengjiao Oil and Rock Salt

3 handfuls of Sichuan peppercorns (no idea what tengjiao is, and couldn’t find tengjiao oil in supermarkets, but this should be pretty close)

~100ml oil with no taste, like canola oil

2 cups rice

Pinch of salt

Method:

Cook the rice.

Infuse the oil with the Sichuan peppercorns. This is done by heating the oil in a pan with the peppercorns. Heat with stirring till the peppercorns pop. Remove from heat and leave aside.

When the rice is done, add the salt and oil and mix well (with the peppercorns filtered out).

To Assemble:

Blanch bok choy in boiling water.

Divide the rice into deep and wide bowls. 

Arrange the pork belly skin up on the rice. This can be made easier by denting the rice slightly with a spoon so that the meat can sit snugly and not fall over. Place the blanched bok choy on the sides of the meat.

Pour the sauce over the meat and bok choy. 

Top with the shredded spring onions.

Dig in!