This braised soy sauce pork belly dish is adapted from the traditional braised pork belly with black bean sauce. I love this dish because you can make it a one pot meal with mung bean noodles that soak up the delicious sauce from this stew.
This dish can either be made in a regular saucepan or pressure cooked in an instant pot.
Tips to making this braised soy sauce pork belly.
For this dish, I usually cook the pork a day ahead of time so that the pork can be cooled in the refrigerator to remove most of the fat that is rendered (melted) during the initial cooking process.
Pork.
When buying pork belly, find a piece with minimum fat. However, this is personal preference. Some of the fat will render into oil which can be removed when refrigerating the sauce overnight. Removing the fat layer may not be necessary if the pork is very lean and you can tolerate fatty foods. However, I tend to be health conscious and tend to buy lean pork AND remove the fat, much to my one daughter's disappointment.
Pork belly with minimum fat
The pork skin exudes more oil during browning when the skin is pricked with a tenderizer or lacerated with a sharp knife.
Tenderize the pork skin prior to cutting the pork belly into 1.5" (4 cm) cubes.
Tenderized and cubed pork belly
Brown the cubes of pork belly before adding the diluted soy sauce chicken mixture helps render the fat due to the higher surface temperature.
Diluted soy sauce chicken mixture added to pork belly.
Allow the pork belly to pressure cook with the soy sauce chicken mixture for 15 minutes to somewhat soften the meat. After this step, the meat can be cooled and the congealed fat can be removed.
Remove the congealed fat from the cooled pork.
Vegetables.
Shitake mushrooms, Chinese radish (daikon) and potatoes are usually added to this pork stew. The potatoes absorb the saltiness of the sauce. Do not use baking potatoes as they tend to disintegrate under pressure! However, this will just create a thicker sauce. Cut the vegetables in chunks similar in size to the cubed pork.
Cubed shitake mushrooms, daikon and potatoes.
Pressure cook this for an additional 10 minutes to soften the vegetables and allow the sauce and vegetables to blend together.
Thickening the sauce.
Thicken the sauce with a cornstarch water slurry by adding it to the soy sauce mixture while the mixture is at a boil on the "saute" mode of the instant pot.
Braised soy sauce pork belly with shitake mushrooms, daikon and potatoes.
Making the braised soy sauce pork belly a one dish meal.
To make this a one dish meal, add softened mung bean noodles, or any other noodles that do not get too soggy in a liquid, to the stew before serving. The sauce for the stew will flavor the noodles.
BRAISED SOY SAUCE PORK BELLY
Equipment
Ingredients
- 1 kg large piece of pork belly
- 2 cups chicken soy sauce mixture to cover meat from soy sauce chicken recipe
- 1 Tbsp cooking oil.
- 1 Tbsp Shaoxing Chinese cooking wine
- ½ cup water to dilute sauce
Soy sauce mixture from scratch
- 1 cups LIGHT soy sauce
- 1½ cups water
- 1 Tbsp DARK soy sauce
- ¼ cup sugar
- ¼ Tbsp Chinese five spice powder optional
- 1 star anise
- 1 small cinnamon stick
Thickener
- 1 Tbsp corn starch
- ¼ cup water
Vegetables
- 6 Dried shitake mushrooms
- 4 medium non-baking potatoes
- 1 small daikon
Instructions
- Wash pork belly.1 kg large piece of pork belly
- Tenderize and cut into 1 1/2" cubes
Preparing the shitake mushrooms
- Wash shitake mushrooms and soak in some of the soy sauce chicken mixture overnight.
- Slice in half or 1" slices.
Brown pork
- In saucepan or instant pot, heat with oil1 Tbsp cooking oil.
- Cook all sides until browned and fat starts to render.
Combine soy sauce from soy sauce chicken recipe
- Cover meat with sauce from soy sauce chicken recipe2 cups chicken soy sauce mixture
- Add water½ cup water
- Add Shaoxing Chinese cooking wine1 Tbsp Shaoxing Chinese cooking wine
Make soy sauce mixture from scratch
- Combine ingredients in saucepan or instant pot1 Tbsp Shaoxing Chinese cooking wine, 1 cups LIGHT soy sauce, 1½ cups water, 1 Tbsp DARK soy sauce, ¼ cup sugar, ¼ Tbsp Chinese five spice powder, 1 star anise, 1 small cinnamon stick
Making pork belly in saucepan
- Braise pork belly in saucepan for one hour until tender, but not too soft.
- Cool in refrigerator until fat solidifies. Remove as much fat as needed.
Making pork belly in instant pot
- Pressure cook for 15 minutes.
- Cool in refrigerator until fat solidifies. Remove as much fat as needed.
Preparing vegetables
- Wash and peel daikon and potatoes.
- Cut daikon and potatoes into 1½" cubes.
Cooking vegetables
- After removing fat from pork belly, add vegetables to pork belly stew and pressure cook for another 15 minutes or cook in saucepan on stovetop for ½ an hour until potatoes and daikon are soft.
- To thicken sauce, combine cornstarch and water to create a slurry.1 Tbsp corn starch, ¼ cup water
- Bring the stew to a boil, add cornstarch slurry and allow to thicken.
- Serve with rice or noodles.
