KY cooks – Mui Choy Pork
It is no secret that one of my favorite meat is pork, the most versatile and tasty of all meat if you ask me. The only meat that is prohibited by at least 2 major religions must only mean that it is so good it’s practically a sin to indulge one with such luxury.
So when we started cooking regularly, it was one of my aim to be able to master as many pork dishes as possible. Since I’ve managed the tau eu bak (braised pork belly with soya sauce), naturally the next one would be mui choy pork belly.
ingredients for mui choy pork – mui choy, garlic, pork
Mui choy pork is a dish that is more popular in central Malaysia than up north in places like Penang. I first tasted it when studying at KL, and never did remember my mom making this dish.
Anyway, the list ingredients is pretty simple:
- pork belly, 300 gram
- 1 portion mui choy (any wet market)
- plenty of garlic
- 1 table spoon dark soya sauce
- 1-2 teaspoon sugar (according to taste)
steps in cooking mui choy pork
Cooking this dish is also very simple, but do remember that step one is never to be skipped or skimmed (will tell you why later)
- soak mui choy for at least one to two hour, change water 2-3 times in between, use slightly warm water for better effect
- pan fry the pork belly till slightly brown
- chopped mui choy in small pieces and fry with pork belly, add dark soya sauce
- cut pork belly into bite size then simmer with mui choy for at least 30 mins, add just enough water to cover half the pork and monitor every 5 minutes
- add sugar to taste before serving
mui choy pork goes well with sambal belacan
Alternatively, the simmering step can also be replaced with steaming. The benefit of steaming is that you don’t need to constantly make sure that you don’t run out of water.
The dish is best served with sambal belacan, the salty mui choy really does accentuate the taste of succulent pork with that layer of fat. I’m ready to make this dish again. 😀
Vinn, KY, and Haze
During this first attempt, I actually noobed it with the mui choy by not soaking it long enough. The result was extremely salty soup base for the dish, I ended up having to rinse the pork and mui choy 3-4 times while cooking half way. That should teach me a lesson not to try to be fast in cooking traditional Chinese dishes.
Till the next recipe post, happy cooking!