Tender, gelatinous and aromatic, Chinese red braised pork belly is scrumptious and comforting. This recipe shows you how to cook it effortlessly.
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What is Hong Shao Rou
A popular cut of meat, pork belly is treasured by many great cuisines around the world. Containing a high percentage of fat, it needs to be cooked in a particular way to reduce its greasy taste.
In China, the most loved pork belly dish has to be Hong Shao Rou/红烧肉, known in English as red braised pork belly or red-cooked pork belly.
Pork belly chunks are braised with soy sauce, rice wine, sugar and spices to create a complex taste: salty, sweet, aromatic and umami. The skin and fat become gelatinous, not greasy and melt easily in your mouth.
Regional variations
Apart from the desired taste and texture, braised pork belly also stands out for its red-brownish shine. That’s where the word “red” in its name comes from. Among many varieties of this dish from different regional cuisines of China, there are two classic ways to achieve this effect.
The famous Hunan style is believed to have been Chairman Mao’s favourite dish (Hunan was his home province). Rock sugar, in this version, is melted in hot oil to a caramel colour to give the meat an appetising appearance. Another popular variety from Shanghai cuisine involves dark soy sauce which plays a key role in colouring the pork.
Why this recipe
Over the years, I’ve made braised pork belly numerous times using different seasonings and methods inspired by various versions of this dish. Eventually, I settled down with a recipe that’s super easy, yet delivers a great result.
There is no frying involved (leaving you a greaseless kitchen) thus no extra oil needed (there’s enough fat in the pork belly already). And you don’t have to master the skill of caramelising the sugar properly. Yet the finished dish is more than satisfying. It’s totally novice-friendly. I promise!
Ingredients
The ingredient list is short and simple. Here are some tips on sourcing them that you might find useful.
Pork Belly
The star ingredient of the dish, pork belly is the fattiest yet the tastiest cut of pork. It’s not recommended to use skinless one. After cooking, the skin becomes super tender and gelatinous. You’ll love it for sure!
I usually cut it into 2-3 cm cubes (about 1 inch). You could use bigger chunks if you wish. Make sure they’re more or less the same size and extend the cooking time if necessary.
Shaoxing Rice Wine
A type of Chinese cooking wine, Shaoxing rice wine (绍兴酒) lends an aromatic, rich flavour to the meat. It also seems to minimize its greasiness. As one of the must-have condiments for authentic Chinese cuisine, it definitely deserves a place in your pantry.
Unlike in many other recipes which call for only a spoonful of Shaoxing rice wine, for this dish I recommend you use at least 250ml (about 1 cup) for 600g (1.3lb) of pork belly. In fact, you could increase the quantity and use only rice wine (without water) as the braising liquid (like how I cook Three Cup Chicken).
🛎 NOTE: The proper Shaoxing rice wine should contain very little salt (mine has 0.08g salt per 100ml wine). However, I’ve seen some versions have a much higher percentage of salt. And they tend to have a bitter, unpleasant taste (usually cheaper to buy). I suggest you avoid those ones (check the nutrition label before purchasing).
Soy Sauce
I use two types of soy sauce: light soy sauce (生抽) and dark soy sauce (老抽) for this dish. The former acts like an aromatic salt. The latter, which tastes less salty but offers a caramel overtone, is the key ingredient for giving the pork a beautiful brownish-red shine. So I don’t recommend that you substitute it with regular soy sauce.
Aromatic & Spices
Three simple ingredients, ginger, star-anise and bay leaf, are often found in classic Chinese braised dishes. They help to reduce the gamey taste of the meat as well as enhance its aroma.
Rock Sugar
A type of refined, crystallized sugar, Rock sugar is traditionally indispensable in Chinese pantries. Less sweet than white sugar, it’s believed to add shine to braised dishes. However, please feel free to replace it with regular sugar if you wish.
Cooking steps
It does take a while to cook this dish to the desired texture, but the process is simple and hassle-free. Here are the three steps:
Step 1: Blanch the pork
Blanching is a required procedure when cooking Chinese-style braised meat. It’s for removing blood and other impurities from the muscles and bones thus achieving a less cloudy broth and a less gamey taste.
Put the pork belly cubes into a pot filled with cold water then turn on the heat to high. As soon as it starts boiling, you’ll see froth appearing on the surface. Use a spoon to remove most of it. Then drain and rinse the meat under running water.
Step 2: Braise the pork
After blanching, put the pork into a clean pot then pour in Shaoxing rice wine and hot water (barely cover the meat). Add light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, ginger, star anise and bay leaves.
Turn on the heat to bring the liquid to a full boil. Cover with a lid and turn down the heat. Leave to simmer for at least one hour. Poke one piece of meat with a chopstick to check the tenderness. If it goes through without much resistance, you’re ready to move onto the next step.
During this process, remember to stir around the meat 1-2 times. If you notice the liquid becomes too little, add a small amount of hot water to prevent burning (but no need to reach the original volume).
Step 3: Thicken the broth
Turn the heat up to the highest. Add rock sugar (or regular white sugar) to the braising liquid and leave to boil fiercely. As the sugar melts and the water evaporates, the broth will dramatically reduce its volume and become thicker.
During this process, stir the pork cubes from time to time to ensure each piece gains an appetising colour and shine. Remove from the heat when the broth is just enough to cover the bottom of the pot (Over-boiling can burn the sauce). Please refer to the tutorial video in the recipe card below.
A note about the cookware: If possible, use a small-sized pot so you wouldn’t need too much water to braise the meat making the final thickening process shorter.
How to serve
- Most commonly, Chinese red braised pork belly is served as a centrepiece in multi-course sharing meals.
- For a simply all-in-one meal, use it as topping for plain steamed rice, along with blanched vegetables, such as broccoli, bok choy, etc.
- It also makes a wonderful filling for Bing (Chinese pan-baked flatbread) or Gua Bao (half-circle shaped steamed buns).
Recipe FAQs
A: You can freeze it and use it as a master stock for the next time when you cook this dish again (add less seasonings in this case).
A: If used in small quantity, Shaoxing wine can be replace by dry sherry. However, for this recipe I suggest you skip it altogether and increase the water volume. The taste will be different but still nice nevertheless.
A: Yes, you can. Blanch the meat as usual then braise it in your instant pot. You may slightly reduce the hot water. Set to cook 25 minutes on high pressure and perform a natural release. Afterwards, use the sauté function to boil down the broth.
Other pork dishes
Looking for more ideas for pork dishes? Here are some popular recipes:
📋 Recipes
Love this recipe? Please leave a 5-star 🌟🌟🌟🌟🌟 rating in the recipe card below & if you REALLY like it, consider leaving a comment as well!
Braised Pork Belly (Hong Shao Rou/红烧肉), an Easy Version
Ingredients
- 600 g pork belly - about 1.3lb
- 250 ml Shaoxing rice wine - about 1 cup, see note 1
- 2 tablespoon light soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon dark soy sauce - see note 2
- 5 slices ginger
- 2 star-anise
- 2 bay leaf
- 20 g rock sugar - or 1 tablespoon regular sugar
Instructions
Blanch the pork
- Cut pork belly into 2-3 cm chunks (about 1 inch). Put into a pot then fill with cold water. Boil over high heat.
- Once it starts boiling, you’ll see froth appearing on the surface. Skim it off with a spoon.
- Drain the meat in a colander then rinse under running water.
Braise the pork
- Put the pork into a clean pot (ideally, a small one, see note 3). Pour in Shaoxing rice wine and hot water (barely covering the meat). Add light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, ginger, star anise and bay leaves.
- Bring the liquid to a full boil. Cover with a lid and leave to simmer over low heat for 1-1.5 hour until the meat is fork-tender (During the process stir the meat around a few times).
Thicken the broth
- Uncover the pot. Add sugar then turn the heat to the highest. Leave to boil fiercely (Stir from time to time) until the broth reduces to just enough to cover the bottom of the pot.
- Serve immediately with plain steamed rice and vegetable dishes of your choice.
Store and reheat
- The cooked pork belly can be stored in the fridge for up to three days or in the freezer for 2 months.
- Reheat in a pot (defrost first if frozen) over low heat. Add a little water to help to heat the pork thoroughly.
Video
NOTES
NUTRITION
NUTRITION DISCLOSURE: Nutritional information on this website is provided as a courtesy to readers. It should be considered estimates. Please use your own brand nutritional values or your preferred nutrition calculator to double check against our estimates.
Jatinder says
Can you make this in a pressure cooker. Just thinking of energy efficiency?
Wei Guo says
Yes you can! Happy cooking!
David Novick says
Hi Wei,
I’ve been a restaurateur, cooking school owner, restaurant reviewer, travel writer, and enthusiastic cook of many cuisines over the last 75 years (my “bona fides”) and I’d like to say the following: First off, it’s a fine recipe, which certainly meets your boast of an “easy” method while yielding a very satisfactory product. Of course, it’s technically not braising because you do skip the irritating saute step, but it’s good! FYI, I achieved very satisfactory results using chunks cut from a fatty pork butt roast, even though it wasn’t quite as unctuous as pork belly, a cut that isn’t anywhere near as easy to find in Mid-American mid-line supermarkets as the ethnic food press/blogosphere seems to believe!
I was, however, surprised to see you repeated the nonsense about rock sugar being less sweet than granulated sugar that’s found on several Chinese recipe sites. (You guys should really stop recyling misinformation between each other!) It’s not, even if it may seem so because it dissolves so much slower than granulated in one’s mouth. How could it be? it’s basically pure sucrose, (sugar) or at least the opaque and clear versions are. The brown has some deliberate impurities for coloring agents, but I hardly think enough to affect sweetness. For an excellent treatment of this issue see, https://foodcrumbles.com/rock-sugar-sugar-crystallization-bastognekoeken/
I was surprised to see bay leaf as an ingedient, and after some thought I went with so-called Asian (Indian) bay leaf (Cinnamomum tamala), rather than the Occidental bay (Laurel) leaf (Laurus nobilis, — Mediterranean, or even Umbellularia californica, the somewhat stronger American version) despite your photo seeming to show the Western leaf (One longitudinal vein rather than the Asian’s three). I thought the charactoristic cinnamon overtones of the Asian variety worked well, but now I’m curious about the using the Laurel. Perhaps I’ll use some of each next time.
I want to stress that none of this pedantry in any way detracts from my initial assertion: It’s a fine, easy recipe!
David Novick
Wei Guo says
Thank you David for sharing your thoughts and experiences. I’m sure my readers will appreciate your input!
Cooking with Alison says
Hi David,
There are several sources stating that the type of rock sugar commonly used in Asian cooking is less sweet than granulated sugar. Including WebMD. But you called this misinformation. Based on the recipe that you shared? I can tell that you haven’t personally cooked with this type of rock sugar before, and not just because the link you shared was for rock candy (which is different, by the way), but because if you had actually tasted a gram of rock sugar in comparison to a gram of granulated sugar, you would notice an obvious difference in sweetness. It’s rude of you to feign credibility while openly insulting the author on a topic you are neither knowledgeable nor experienced enough to comment on.
Fred Rickson says
Maybe I missed it, but you should note that Shaoxing rice wine can also be found in the food section of some stores (not the liquor/wine area) where it contains 1.5% salt and tastes terrible. Best to you.
Wei Guo says
Thank you Fred for pointing out the potential problem. The proper Shaoxing rice wine should contain very little salt (mine has 0.08g salt per 100ml wine). It’s a good idea to check the label for nutrition information.
G Wee says
Hi Wei,
The Hong Shao Rou recipe looks delicious and pork belly is my favourite cut of pork. FYI that the paragraph that references Chairman Mao seems to be duplicated.
Happy cooking,
Wei Guo says
Thank you so much! I’ve just edited it.
Joetta Gobell says
I just made this with some excess pork belly I had from making another recipe and OMG it is perfection. Simple and astoundingly flavorful, I’m having a hard time not just eating it all myself standing over the container and suffering the consequences. Haha! I used dehydrated ginger slices because I was out of fresh and it turned out so so good. Thank you for this excellent, easy, and clear recipe.
Wei Guo says
It’s indeed irresistible! Happy that you liked it.
Emma Axten says
I just made this for the first time for my husband my first attempt at cooking Chinese food for him. He has high standards as he is Chinese and he liked it
Wei Guo says
Glad you and your husband enjoyed the dish!
Archis says
Really looking forward to making this for Christmas Eve dinner.
So some of the recipes suggested that I caramelise the sugar just before starting the braising process, and coat the meat in the melted sugar before adding the braising liquid. Would that give a better finishing colour (I’m looking for the glaze :)).
Also, I’m a little short on Shaoxing (I’m making for a large number of people), would it be fine if I added some mirin to make up for it?
Thanks!!
Wei Guo says
Hi Archis! It’s fine to use the traditional method that you’ve mentioned. To be honest, you wouldn’t notice much difference in the finished dish. That’s why I’m using a simplified version for this recipe. If you don’t have enough Shaoxing wine, simply replace the missing part with water. Mirin tastes very different so it’s not a recommended substitute. Happy cooking!
Jenn says
I know you say you need pork belly with the skin but where I live I can only find pork belly without skin. I’m sad because I really want to make this as I miss the great food after living in a city where food like this was readily available.
Wei Guo says
Hi Jenny! It’s ideal to have the skin on but it’s fine to cook this dish with skinless pork belly. Happy cooking!
Lee says
I want to make a double or triple batch of this would I need double or triple the amount of wine?
Thank u!
Wei Guo says
For the optimal taste increase all the ingredients proportionally, including the rice wine. That said, you may also replace some of the wine with water if you wish.
Cassie G. says
An easy to follow recipe with helpful footnotes at the end for extra guidance. I’ve used this recipe a few times now and it’s always a big hit at the dinner table. Thank you for sharing this with us. I’ll be scouring this website for other recipes to try!
Wei Guo says
That’s wonderful to hear Cassie! It’s such an easy classic. My family have it regularly too.