Tuesday 11 March 2014

Sweet n Sour Pork

Occasionally I want an oriental dish with lots of sauce - not a stir fry. I am a fan of sweet n sour, in that I like the combination of sweet, sharp and salt. But I don't want a cloyingly, collagenous overly sweet gloopy sauce. The ones you buy in jars are all of these things (believe me I've tried a few). And then I've done such recipes whereby you painstakingly make the sauce in a separate saucepan from scratch - sieved tomatoes, cornflour, pineapple juice, vinegar, soy. All very nice but when I've had a busy day I want a sauce I can knock up in one pan with the whole dish. 




Here's my recipe, it's dead easy and the kids love it (especially the pineapple). Anything with rice is always popular in our house. I also like the fact that I don't have to particularly go out for most of the ingredients, like I have to with a stir fry. I generally have most stuff in fridge and store cupboard for this dish. 

1 tenderloin pork fillet, cut up into slithers
2 tbsp ground nut oil
1 onion or half bunch of spring onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, crushed/finely chopped
1 inch of fresh ginger, finally chopped.
1 tsp Chinese 5 spice powder
2 tbsp tomato purée 
1 tbsp cornflour, slackened down with a drop of cold water
1/2 pint chicken stock
1 tbsp of Shaoxing rice wine
2 tbsp rice wine vinegar
2-3 tsp sugar
2 tbsp soy sauce
1 small tin of pineapple chunks
2 peppers, green and yellow
Half pack of baby sweetcorn
Freshly ground black pepper
A handful of raw frozen prawns

Heat oil in a wok, chuck in your 'aromatics' - onion, garlic and ginger. After a couple of minutes add the pork (you could use chicken instead). Then throw in the Chinese 5 spice powder. Colour all of this nicely, should only take 5 minutes or so. 


Add your vegetables, peppers and sweetcorn and stir fry for a bit. 



Then start making your sauce - add tomato purée, rice wine, stock, cornflour and water, vinegar, sugar and soy. Simmer all this gently for about 20 mins. 



Towards the end, add pineapple chunks and raw prawns. Ready to serve when prawns have turned pink. 


This is lovely with egg fried/plain rice or noodles. If you want a spicy kick add a chilli at the beginning with onion, garlic and ginger. 

Anne








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