Stir-Fried Pork with Green Peppers
My husband is the guinea pig for all the recipes I post on Planet Green and TreeHugger. He's an excellent sport about it all, eating whatever I put in front of him without complaint. But every once in a while he rebels and asks me to put aside the lentils and kale and make him a Chinese meal. I usually turn to Fuchsia Dunlop and find something spicy and delicious, better than anything you can get for Chinese take-out.
This is a very simple stir-fry and, like most Chinese dishes, comes together very quickly once you have all of the ingredients chopped and ready. You can control the spiciness of this by using hotter or milder peppers, depending on your taste. I actually had green bell peppers in my refrigerator, so I used those, and added some heat by using some of my pickled hot cherry peppers. I used a double smoked bacon, rather than pork belly. Personally, I think between the soy sauce, the fermented beans and the bacon, there is plenty of salt in this dish and I didn't add any extra. Be sure to taste the dish before adding salt to it.
This recipe is from Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook by Fuchsia Dunlop.
INGREDIENTS
| 9 oz | Italian frying peppers |
| 1 3/4 oz | pork belly or thickly sliced bacon |
| 7 oz | lean pork |
| 1 tsp | Shaoxing wine |
| 1 tsp | light soy sauce |
| 1 tsp | dark soy sauce |
| 2 | garlic cloves, sliced |
| 2 tsp | black fermented beans, rinsed |
| salt | |
| 1/2 tsp | potato flour mixed with 2 tbsp stock or water (optional) |
| About 3 tbsp | peanut oil for cooking |
PREPARATION:
- Cut off and discard the stems of the peppers, and slice at a steep angle into 1 1/4 inch chunks. Cut the pork belly and the lean pork into fairly thin slices, set aside the pork belly. Add the Shaoxhing wine and the soy sauces to the lean pork and mix well; set aside.
- Add a little oil to a wok and heat over a medium flame. Add the peppers and stir-fry, pressing them against the side of the wok with the wok scoop or ladle, for about 5 minutes, until they are fragrant and tender and their skins a little golden and puckered. remove the peppers from the wok and set aside.
- Reheat the wok over a hot flame until smoke rises, then add 2 tablespoons of the oil and swirl around. Add the pork belly and stir-fry until the slices are tinged with gold.
- Toss in the garlic and black beans and stir-fry briefly until fragrant, and then add the lean pork. When the pork has almost changed colour and lost most of its water content, return the peppers to the wok and continue to stir-fry for another minute or so, adding salt to taste.
- If using the potato-flour mixture, give the mixture a stir and tip it into the wok at the final stage, stirring just long enough for the sauce to cling to the meat.
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