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Sticky pork belly with Vietnamese-style salad

Preparation time
over 2 hours

Cooking time
over 2 hours

Serves
Serves 2

By Donal Skehan
From Saturday Kitchen

Ingredients

  • ½ tsp fennel seeds
  • 6 tbsp hoisin sauce
  • 3 tbsp runny honey
  • 3 tbsp rice vinegar
  • 3 tbsp soy sauce
  • 4 tbsp tomato ketchup
  • 2½cm/1in fresh root ginger, finely chopped
  • 1 star anise
  • 600g/1lb 5oz pork belly, skin removed

For the rice

  • 100g/3½oz sticky rice
  • 1 kaffir lime leaf
  • pinch salt
  • 165ml/6fl oz coconut milk

For the dressing

  • 1 small red chilli, finely chopped
  • ½ garlic clove, grated
  • ½ lime, juice only
  • 1½ tsp light brown sugar
  • 1 tbsp rice vinegar

For the salad

  • 1 tbsp salted peanuts
  • ¼ cucumber, cut into ribbons using a peeler
  • 6 radishes, thinly sliced
  • 75g/2½oz sugar snap peas, halved horizontally
  • 2 spring onions, thinly sliced
  • 2 tbsp torn fresh mint leaves
  • 2 tbsp torn fresh Thai basil leaves (or coriander)
  • ½ Chinese cabbage, leaves separated and roughly chopped

Method

  1. Toast the fennel seeds in a dry frying pan over a medium heat until fragrant. Tip into a bowl, add the hoisin, honey, vinegar, soy sauce, ketchup, ginger and star anise and mix well.

  2. Put the pork in a roasting tin lined with kitchen foil, pour over the marinade and massage it into the meat. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, or overnight.

  3. Preheat the oven to 160C/140C Fan/Gas 3.

  4. Pour 3 tablespoon water around the pork, cover the tray with foil and roast for 2 hours, or until tender, basting with the juices halfway through. Remove the pork from the oven and increase the temperature to 200C/180C Fan/Gas 6.

  5. Pour the cooking juices and any remaining marinade from the pork tin into a small saucepan and bring to the boil over a medium heat. Simmer until thick and syrupy. Remove the star anise. Brush the sauce all over the pork, reserving 1 tablespoon for the salad dressing, and place the tray back in the oven, uncovered, for 20 minutes, until sticky and caramelised.

  6. Meanwhile, for the rice, put the sticky rice in a bowl and cover with cold water for 30 minutes.

  7. When the pork is ready, transfer to a chopping board, cover lightly with foil and leave to rest for 20 minutes.

  8. Drain the rice and place in a saucepan with the lime leaf and salt. Pour over the coconut milk, cover, bring to the boil, then turn the heat down to its lowest setting. Simmer for 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and leave to rest with the lid on for a further 10 minutes. Remove the lime leaf.

  9. For the salad dressing, mix all the ingredients together in a bowl and add the reserved 1 tablespoon pork sauce.

  10. For the salad, toast the peanuts in a dry frying pan for 1 minute. Remove and smash in a pestle and mortar. Toss the remaining salad ingredients together in a bowl. Mix through the dressing.

  11. To serve, divide the salad between two plates and top with the peanuts. Cut the pork into thick slices and add to the plates. Fluff the rice up with a fork and serve with the pork and salad.

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