Make roast pork belly right in your own home! This iconic Chinese dish is famous for juicy, tender meat and crispy, crunchy skin. It's a magical combination and a total delight for the senses and taste buds!
Course Main Dishes
Cuisine Asian, Chinese
Keyword Chinese roast pork belly, roast pork belly
Place a rack in a foil-lined baking pan. Set aside.
Rinse the pork belly under cold water and then pat dry thoroughly with paper towels.
Place pork belly on a cutting board, skin side down, and make 2-3 cuts, about 1" apart, cutting only halfway into the meat.
Flip pork belly, skin side up, and poke all over with a the tip of a paring knife, skewer, toothpicks, etc., being sure not to poke any holes too far beyond the skin. You want holes that only just break the skin.
Using a clean sharp blade and a ruler or straight edge, score lines into the pork belly skin, about 1" apart. Again, be careful not to cut too far into the flesh.
Mix all marinade ingredients together in a bowl.
Flip the pork belly back over, skin-side down, and rub the marinade all over the meat, being careful not to get any marinade on the skin.
Place the pork belly, skin-side up on the rack in the pan.
Sprinkle 1 teaspoon salt evenly over the skin, gently rubbing the salt in with your fingers.
Let the pork belly sit for about 20 minutes. Blot off any accumulated moisture/water from the skin with a paper towel.
Place the pork belly in the pan into the fridge overnight, or at least 8 hours.
Roasting the Pork Belly:
Preheat oven 350F/180C and place the oven rack in the middle of the oven.
Use a paper towel to wipe off all the salt and thoroughly dry the pork belly skin.
Roast pork belly uncovered for 1 hour.
Remove pork belly from the oven and turn the oven temperature up to 450F/230C. Blot pork skin with a paper towel to soak up any moisture that may have accumulated.
Put pork belly back into oven and roast for 10 minutes, or until skin is puffy and crisp, checking every 5 minutes.
Let pork belly rest uncovered for 15 minutes.
Place pork belly skin-side down on cutting board and cut into strips, using the cuts you made in the flesh. Saw through the meat and then press down hard with the knife through the crisp crackling.
Chop each strip into chunks using the score marks you made in the skin as a guide.
Serve with hot yellow mustard.
Notes
I place the entire baking pan with the pork on the rack in the fridge to dry so that I can transfer the entire thing to the oven. If you do not have enough space in your fridge, simple place the pork belly on a dish and then transfer it to a rack in a pan when you are ready to roast.
You do not have to poke the pork skin to get crisp crackling, but it will not bake up as much with the "bubbly" texture.
Making the pre-cuts in the meat and the scores in the skin are completely optional steps and do not affect the overall results once the pork belly is cooked.
The pork is best eaten on the day it is made. The texture of the meat will not be as good when leftovers are reheated and the crackling will be soft and chewy.