Green Garlic Twice-Cooked Pork, Sichuan Restaurant Style
Pork simmered with Sichuan peppercorns, chilled firm and sliced paper-thin, rendered crisp in a nearly dry wok, then finished with green garlic and dried chillies.
Method
Put the pork in a 18 cm pot, cover with cold water and add the ginger, spring onion, Sichuan peppercorns and Shaoxing wine. Bring to the boil on high heat, about , skim, then turn down to medium-low heat and simmer for . Take it out when a chopstick goes in with slight resistance and the juices run clear. Don't simmer it soft: firm pork keeps its chew when fried.
Add in this stepSkin-on pork belly (or skin-on pork leg), in one piece 300 gGinger slices 4Spring onion (for simmering) 1Sichuan peppercorns ½ tspShaoxing rice wine 1.4 tbsp
high heat→medium-low heatLet the pork cool in its liquid for 10 minutes, then lift it out, wrap it and refrigerate; allow in total, until it is firm right through. Chilled pork can be sliced paper-thin, about 2 mm thick and 6 cm wide. Use long back-and-forth strokes so the skin doesn't tear.
Lightly smash the white part of the green garlic with the flat of the knife, cut it diagonally into 4 cm pieces and keep whites and leaves apart. Chop the chilli bean paste finely (whole beans stay chewy and give less red oil), cut the dried chillies into 2 cm pieces and shake out the seeds, and rinse and roughly chop the black beans.
Heat a 28 cm wok, add just a film of oil and spread out the pork. Fry on medium-high heat for , until plenty of fat has rendered and the slices curl into little lamp-dish cups. Tilt the wok and pour off all but 1–2 tablespoons of fat into a heatproof bowl. The fat is very hot: wear a dry oven glove and pour slowly.
Add in this stepNeutral oil 1 tsp
medium-high heatPush the pork aside and turn the heat down to medium-low heat. Fry the chopped bean paste in the fat for , until the oil turns deep red, then add the black beans, sweet bean sauce and dried chillies and fry for about 15 seconds, until the chillies darken to a deep red. If they blacken they turn bitter, so move straight on.
Add in this stepPixian chilli bean paste 1½ tbspFermented black beans (douchi) 1½ tspSweet bean sauce (tianmianjiang) 1½ tspDried red chillies 3
medium-low heatToss the pork through the sauce and turn the heat up to high heat. Splash the Shaoxing wine around the edge of the wok so it sizzles, add the sugar, then the green garlic whites and stir-fry for . Add the leaves, toss for just 20 seconds and plate up before they wilt completely.
Add in this stepShaoxing rice wine 0.6 tbspSugar ¾ tspGreen garlic (suan miao), or welsh onion or leek 150 g
high heat
Cook's tip
Pouring off the fat is the secret to twice-cooked pork that isn't greasy; the rendered lard is excellent for fried rice or stir-fried greens. Without green garlic, a mix of welsh onion whites and leek comes closest in flavour.
Cooking it at camp
Simmer and chill the pork at home, slice it thin and pack it in a sealed container, and it becomes a 5-minute dish at camp. Bring an empty tin for the poured-off fat, let it set and bin it; never pour fat on the ground or down a drain.