Slow and Double Cooked Roast Pork Belly (Sio Bak)

Ingredients:

• 1.5kg lean pork belly
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp fennel seeds, toasted
• 1 tsp 5-spice powder
• 1.5 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp cracked pepper
• Vegetable for brushing
• Baking paper
• Aluminium foil

Method:

1. Getting the pork ready:
2. Make lengthwise scores on pork belly skin (the width should be the width you would like to cut for individual servings). Make sure that the scoring breaks the fat just touching the flesh underneath, and make sure the skin is cut to the end both sides. 2. With hot boiling water, blanch the skin – you will notice the skin shrinking and turning a little translucent. Pat dry. 3. Turn pork over, make a couple of deep slashes across the flesh diagonally. This would help marinade penetrates deeper into the flesh, and assist in rolling as well. 4. Marinade the underside with pepper and 5-spice powder, garlic, small amount of sea salt and toasted fennel. Tuck the marinade into the deep slashes created. Pat dry all sides of the pork. (Some people like their seasoning stronger and saltier, so do adjust accordingly to your taste.) 5. Turn back with skin side facing up on a roasting dish. Leave to dry up in the fridge overnight.
3. Slow roasting (water bath):
4. 1. Pre-heat oven to 140 degrees Celsius. 2. Using coarse sea salt (or Maldon salt), rub it between the scoring on the skin, whole length through. Don’t overdo the salt or you will get a very salty pork! 3. Get a water bath ready. Place pork on a rack in a roasting pan. Fill up with boiled water just before it touches the pork. (I bought my racks from Daiso – cheap and good., and propped it up with over-turned mini ramekins). Cover the top of the pork and tray with baking paper, followed by foil above it. Baking paper ensures the moistness is retained, while the preventing the foil from sticking to the pork skin. 4. Slow roast for 3 hours, checking every hour to see if you need to refill the water. Pork juices will get collected in the water, and this could be use as a base for a beautiful gravy later, after straining the oil off. 5. After roasting, let it cool. Once cool, you can return it into the fridge uncovered to dry the skin further for a couple of hours (if you are serving this pork later, you can also keep it overnight, bring the pork out to room temperate and roast it 30 mins before serving your guests). If you don’t have the time, pat the skin dry again with paper towel. 6. As for the remaining juices in the pan, you can keep it overnight (this would help in lifting the layer of oil after) or leave it in the pan to be re-used for the final crackling stage.
5. Final crackling stage:
6. Pre-heat oven to 230 C. You may use the same roasting pan with the pan-juices. Add more water (as the hot oven will dry it out almost immediately). 2. Place pork on a rack, in the water bath. 3. Brush the skin evenly with oil. Sprinkle sea salt all over the skin. 4. Roast for exactly 30 mins in a fan assisted oven. Turn it after 20 mins, so skin get evenly crackled. If you oven is not even, you may need to turn it more often to get the crackling even. 5. Almost guarantee the skin WILL CRACKLE 100% if you follow the above instructions to a T. 6. Let it rest 10 mins uncovered before cutting and serving. Drain off the oil in the roasting pan and use the remaining juices to make a lovely gravy.
7. Using griller (broiler) as an alternative:
8. ALTERNATIVELY, you can have the oven in grill (assisted fan) mode on 200-220C temperature to crackle the skin. This way is much faster, but don't place your pork too close to the grill metal but about 10cm under. And allow 5-15 minutes to crackle but you may need to turn the pork around to get it crackle evenly. This way to crackle is much faster but it also gets hot very quick. So check your pork every 2-3 minutes to be sure otherwise it would get burnt. I literally sat in front of my oven throughout the entire process and check (and turn) until I am happy with the crackling. Great way to get a sauna at the same time LOLx