Siew Yoke ~ 'Chinese Roast Pork'

Having encountered numerous failures, I was ecstatic when I finally managed to achieve the hawker type crackling effect on my siew yoke.


Ingredients
1.5kg pork (sam chan bah)
1/2 tsp salt

(A):
2 tbsp vinegar
1 litre water


(B):
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp Chinese five-spice powder
2 pieces of red fermented beancurd (tau chu or nam yee), well mashed
1 tsp cooking wine
1/2 tsp sugar

Method
1. Combine water and vinegar and bring to a boil. Scald the skin of the pork with the hot vinegar mixture. Set pork aside, then rub just enough salt on the skin. Rub meat with combined marinade (B) and leave aside for one to two hours to dry.

2. Place pork with the meat side up on a rack and roast in a turbo broiler at 200ºC for 20 to 25 minutes. Remove meat. Prick the skin with a sharp metal skewer several times. Put meat back on the rack with the skin side up and roast at 200ºC for 25 to 30 minutes or until skin turns crispy.

Note
After roasting, the chunk of meat will shrink to less than half its original size


Tip :
1. I find fresh pork does yield a better result. I have experimented with a piece of pre-frozen pork belly and found the skin took a little longer to start blistering.

2. Leave the oven door slightly ajar (1 cm) during the grilling of the skin to let in fresh air.

3. Grill the pork on the middle rack.

4. Marinating the pork overnight to get a more flavoursome pork.

5. The skin must be kept dry during the marinating process.

Redneck says……
This is very more-ish so try to avoid eating all at once – save some for later.

Recipe : kuali.com (adapted)

Update 1 April 2008 : Another easy method of getting puffy crackling siew yuk here