Teriyaki Pork Belly

This teriyaki pork belly will melt in your mouth. It's so good that it's easy to overindulge yourself. This is a treat that should be enjoyed on a special occasion and memories of it be kept for a long time until another special occasion arise :)

Blog's Category: International

Intro

As a Ukrainian, I was treated to this special type of pork cut way too often. We, Ukrainians, can't leave without our beloved pork (oops... I'm a vegetarian for almost decade already :). There is two key points to cook nice pork belly - it has to be as fresh as possible (no-no to frozen one) and it has to be cooked in a simplest way for natural flavors of pork meat to shine.

The recipe posted here is somewhat different. Presumably, it's the way Japanese like their pork belly (hey, my Japanese friends, is it so?). Anyway, whatever has come out of this recipe was overwhelmingly approved by my folks. I'll, definitely, take this recipe on board. It's easy, impressive and looking sooo good.



What is it?

Slices of pork belly, cooked for a long time in a mix soy sauce, mirin (Japanese sweet cooking wine) with a green onion, ginger and garlic. At the end, sauce reduces into a great caramelized teriyaki glaze.

Taste Description

By testimonies of my folks, it's just plain yummy and addictive. Pork is very soft to the point of melting as soon as your teeth touch it; flavorful, with that special combination of sweetness and saltiness good teriyaki sauce are known for.

How to Serve

There is so many ways to serve it. I served it with thin, lightly buttered spaghetti, rolled in a Heston Blumenthal style (really cool way to serve spaghetti I picked up from youtube's Heston Blumenthal video about spaghetti bolognese). It can easily be served hors d'oeuvre style, on a tiny piece of melba toast and small piece of pumpernickel bread. Or, Japanese style - skewed on a wooden skewer or sprinkled with sesame seeds or green onion.

Japanese Teriyaki Pork Belly

• 8" x 5" piece of fresh pork belly, cut in half along side and then sliced into 2/3" slices
• 0.5 cup soy sauce
• 0,5 cup mirin (Japanese sweet cooking wine)
• 2 cups water
• 3 green onions, cut in 1" pieces
• 1 " ginger, minced or thinly sliced
• 4 garlic cloves, minced or thinly sliced
• 9 black peppercorns

- In a pot, bring all ingredients, except pork, to a boil. Add pork, bring to a boil and turn heat down to slow simmering.

- Simmer uncovered, stirring occasionally, until liquid reduces to a half-thick caramelized glaze. It will take from 1 hour up to 3 hours.

- Voila, enjoy!


Notes

- Mirin can be found in Asian groceries. I guess it can be substituted with 4-5 tbs of brown sugar or honey (liquids has to be upped then) although resulting taste may be different.

- Pork belly with or without skin can be used. For the fun, I cut out skin from one half of pork belly. This piece of skin was sliced then in strips and ended up in a same pot as the rest of pork belly slices - skinless and otherwise. Needless to say that everything was gobbled without any "what", "why" or "how". Now I know that it's perfectly fine to leave skin on.

*******************************************************************************************************************************

IN PICTURES

Here is how to make spaghetti "roll" for a nice presentation. Using grilling fork (longer teeth - better), pull over cooked spaghetti onto a fork trying to distribute them evenly and detangle a little bit hanging ends.

Move fork with a hanging spaghetti onto a wooden board, lower in down spreading spaghetti along the board and then, tucking them with another hand under the fork, quickly roll them onto the fork.

Now the fun part - move fork with a rolled spaghetti on a serving dish and, holding spaghetti in place at the end, pull the fork out.