Hubby and I read about ieat's blog entry on Fatty Cheong's char siew and decided to try it for ourselves last Friday when the family came over for dinner to celebrate my birthday. We used collar butt pork and since we bought it the Sunday before, we thought we will marinade the meat instead of freezing the meat and then thaw it a day or 2 before Friday to marinade it. We also anticipate that the longer the meat is soaked in the sauces, the better the result will be.
Prior to this attempt, I have tried making char siew from another 2 recipes. The first was the Chinese BBQ Pork from Donna Hay. It turned out ok, good tasting, but definitely without the authentic char siew taste. My 2nd attempt just over a month ago was better and good. I didn't add any red colouring to on both occasions.
Prior to this attempt, I have tried making char siew from another 2 recipes. The first was the Chinese BBQ Pork from Donna Hay. It turned out ok, good tasting, but definitely without the authentic char siew taste. My 2nd attempt just over a month ago was better and good. I didn't add any red colouring to on both occasions.
I used this "Fu Chung Beancurd" in place of bean paste in Fatty Cheong's recipe. This beancurd was used in redneck's recipe and since I specially bought it for char siew, I might as well just use this.
In there, we have about 1.4kg of pork. We had to adjust the amount of sauces estimately. Of course I had to use my 'agarism' (estimation) for this. In the end, I still had quite a bit of marinade left over... The above, strips of pork rained with white sugar and oyster sauce.
Hubby cleverly used the plastic bag that used to contain the pork as a glove to run the pork strips through the marinade ingredients.
The red colouring made it look quite gross... as if the meat was covered with blood!
There, we used the xue di zi to bake the char siew... except that I was too busy cooking and preparing other stuff that I forgot to baste it.
The result was awesome! This is really quite close to the taste authentic char siew. Although we could easily buy good chair siew from HK shops, we figured we like the idea of trying it and then see if we could reproduce for ourselves at home. I'm sure my mother will be quite proud of me. She can make good siow bak and I can make good char siew! :p Will make it a point to go down to try out the real Fatty Cheong's char siew when I am back in SG in a month's time. So then I can try out what should it taste like!
6 other thoughts:
hi, do you really use 500grams of sugar? that's a mighty lot!
yes i did. this recipe is already modified from the orginal! worth a try or 2 or... 3!
Hi,
Ur char siew looks really awesome! What's the " collar butt pork" cut called in Coles or Woolies? Could u please share ur ADAPTED version of Fatty Cheong's recipe? My email is aquarius66@iinet.net.au
Thks in advance,
Susanna, Perth
your char siew looks delicious! Am very inspired to make it asap. Since I don't have a xue di zi, I'll pbbly have to make do with my oven.
quick qn: did you use cut down on the quantity of fermented red beancurd (or did you use the same amt of beancurd paste mentioned in ieat's website?)
thanks a ton!
Hi, thanks for your compliment. I think you can use an oven. I'm sure others have tried before. I've not tried it myself :) I always use xue di zi for cooking meat.
I didn't use 300g of fermented bean curd. That would be too too much! It has been some time since I last made it but I think on that instance, I put in about 3 pieces of beancurd cubes (gotta mash and put into the marinade) and a little of the liquid in the preserved bean curd.
Hope this helps and wishing you success in making this :)
Hi I got a xue di zi and finally made the char siew last week. Feedback was positive but I think I need to cut down on the salt and use pork belly next time. =)
My adventures are documented below:
http://waragaw.blogspot.com/2010/12/char-siew-attempt-no-1.html
Thanks for sharing!
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