I’ve been wanting to make Char Siew for a while now. I have a go-to recipe that my friend, Maria shared with me a while ago but that recipe requires me to marinate the meat for at least 2 days or more before baking. But because I was craving some char siew immediately and didn’t want to pay over $6/lb for it at the Chinese BBQ shop, I decided to try this recipe that I found at Baking Mum’s blog.So I went off to the Asian grocery store and came home with major poundage of boneless, country style pork ribs. I prepped about 2/3 of it with Maria’s recipe and those are now sitting in my freezer waiting for the next time I crave char siew (I will give you that recipe in another post).
Quick and Easy…With a Couple of Tweaks
But the rest I saved for this recipe. It’s really quite easy and only requires a 4-hour marinating time before cooking so if you prepare early enough, you could get it cooked the same day you buy your meat. As a matter of fact, I didn’t even give it 4 hours. I only had enough time for a 3-hour marinade time before I started to cook it and as you can see from the picture, it is good enough.
A couple of comments on the recipe–the original sugar amount was much too high for me. I ended up cutting the sugar a little and still found it too sweet. I would cut it more next time so in my adapted recipe, I will just put in the lesser amount.
Also, it was not salty/savory enough for me so I added more soy sauce and also a dash of fish sauce (about 1 tbsp). And then, because I can’t help myself, I also added some garlic paste from Gourmet Garden (about 2 Tbsp). I would have used fresh garlic but the meat was already braising down when I tasted the sauce and wanted to kick it up a notch really quickly and GG’s herb and spice pastes are really convenient for such occasions.
Braised Char Siew
(adapted from Baking Mum’s Non-Bake Char Siew recipe)
Ingredients
1000g boneless, country-style pork ribs (belly pork will also work, don’t use pork that is too lean)
100g sugar (originally 140g – you might even want to cut the sugar even more)
2 tsp salt
1/4 cup light soy sauce
3 tbsp dark soy sauce
1 tbsp fish sauce
2 tbsp garlic, minced fine or use Gourmet Garden’s Garlic paste
600 ml water
a little red coloring (I added a couple of drops of red food coloring, it’s really red at first but as the sauce cooks down, it darkens).
2 tbsp oil (optional – I didn’t end up using this at all because I thought the pork fat glazed itself fine)
Method
1. Mix the sugar, salt, light and dark soy sauce, fish sauce, water and red food coloring in a bowl.
2. Add in the pork and marinate for about 4 hours.
3. Take pork out and set aside and pour marinate into a wok. Bring to a boil.
Marinated Char Siew Pork
4. Add in the pork and bring to a boil again.
5. Lower heat to medium or medium-low and simmer meat, uncovered, until meat is tender and sauce has thickened. Turn the meat around a few times during the cooking process to ensure even cooking.
6. At the end, the sauce will resemble a thick syrup (in about 45 minutes to 1 hour). At this point, you can choose to add the extra oil for more sheen but I didn’t find it necessary.
7. Remove pork from sauce and slice.
You can save the syrup and dilute it with a bit of water, and serve it on the side to add to your rice or meat. Any extra syrup will also be yummy with other dishes later.
Enjoy!
Cheers, Annie
>Oh my! I may have to try this, we don’t have sweet char siu in Japan.
>Hey Annie everytime I come here I have something new… Pork ribs I have only had them out but making them at home mmm the color is so tempting…
>Oh cool, a “quick” char siew! So very doable. Bookmarked/clipped it. Thanks! =)
>That looks delicious!
>WOW! this looks so good! I bookmarked and it must be tried out soon. Thanks for sharing.
>wow, looks really yummy, can’t tell that the char siew was braised instead of baked.
>Scrumptious, unctuous, sweetish, salty-ish, fingerlicking goodness!
>I can’t vouch for the taste, but it definitely looks like the real thing. Now all you need are those metal hooks and you can hang them in your kitchen window. 😉
>Nice char siew..will try it out when I crave for it :)) Thanks for sharing this recipe:)
>wow.. normally the need for charsiew kicks in on the weekend.. looks like it has kicked in early this week! haha.. great shots.. saliva worthy;P
>Man that looks so good, char siu is such a staple. The photos kill, now I want char siu too.
>I love how your camera caught the glistening texture of the char siu. I can practically taste it.
I hang my head in shame because in my moments of desperation I will sometimes purchase char siu from Costco that was made in Canada.
>This looks fabulous! I’ve never heard of it, so I think I’ll definitely have to try it! Just stopped over to wish you both a very Happy Thanksgiving!
>Yumm.. this looks soooo succulent!! A really good recipe!
>Wow! 1)No baking, 2) all the ingredients are common things in the pantry, and 3) not that long of a marinading time…that’s all parts of a perfect busy mom’s recipe. I’ll have to try this one out! Thanks for sharing!
>wow this sounds easy peasy, less cleaning too!
>@K and S – really, what kind of char siu is available in Japan?
@Ramya – the cut is actually called "country-style pork ribs", which are boneless pork butts cut into long steaks. They have lots of internal fat in them which makes them extra juicy.
@TS – thank you for your support! Do let us know when you try it.
@Melissa – thanks!
@vanpham – you're welcome!
@Piggy – well, it's missing those yummy charred bits. But other than that, it tasted pretty much the same.
@JS – 🙂
@Chef Ben – actually, we have some metal hooks. But no way we're hanging them in our window…we'd be fending off the neighbors and the flies all day long 😉
@Elinluv – thanks, and let us know how it turns out for you!
@Cumi & Ciki – heheh
@Robert – go ahead and make some…it's really easy!
@Jenster – they have char siu in Costco? how interesting. I don't think they do that down here.
@Michelle – thanks, and Happy Thanksgiving to you too!
@mycookinghut – thanks!
@smile4me8p – we're going to have to do a head-to-head comparison between your long marinade recipe and this no-bake one! Upper Room?
@babe_kl – yeah, less washing is always good!
@
>greyish, roast pork type, not sweet at all.
>hello there,
thanks for adding my at foodbuzz. i love roast pork more than char siew though. haha. btw what camera are you all using?
cheers
brad
>Will the outcome got caramelized result?
>Love this simpler recipe. This is so good in steamed or baked buns.
>Looks like the baked ones. I think my mom made this before. Thanks much for the recipe.
>Really looks and feels succulent! My mil also used this method to make her char siew. Looking forward to Maria’s recipe! Btw I read that some recipes called for 5-spices powder. Do u think it is essential?
>omg, this char siew looks good. I might try it! thanks!
>I love your version of char siew! By the way, I’ve given you a Commenters’ Meme. Do check it out at my blog. Thanks!