This week’s cooking club at Gilmore Park Church featured 3 dishes which require deep frying. Cora shared with us Sweet and Sour Pork, Sesame Ball (Zeen Duy) and Pumpkin Tempura.

Cora is a very experienced cook. She demonstrated great skills in the kitchen. I remember she has more than once rescued disasters during our cooking sessions. Cora also loves to share as she always bring dessert for everyone at the cooking club meeting.

I don’t usually like to do deep frying at home. Deep frying, chinese style, makes the entire home smells with an oily odor which sticks for a long time before it clears. Other than that, it’s also a waste of oil because you could only recycle it that certain number of times.

Anyway, here is Cora’s first dish: Sweet and Sour Pork. Isn’t it pretty? I like the big colorful peppers which makes the dish soooooo inviting.

Ingredients

• 2 lbs pork butt, cut into cubes, trimming excess fats
• 3 bell peppers (different colors), cut into diamond shape.
• 1 can pineapple ring (cut into quarters)

For marination

• 2 to 3 tablespoons of light soy sauce
• 1 tablespoon of sugar
• 1 tablespoon of sesame oil
• 1 tablespoon of cornstarch
• white pepper

For batter

• 12 tablespoons self rising flour or
• 12 tablespoons all-purpose flour + 1 tsp baking powder + 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 3 tablespoons glutinous rice flour
• salt to taste
• water

For sauce

• pineapple juice
• ketchup
• white vinegar
• sugar
• water

I’m afraid that some of the ingredients do not have the exact amount as Cora cooks by feel and not direct from a recipe. What can I say … she’s an experienced cook.

Instructions

Marinate the cubed pork in the marination ingredients for at least 30 minutes.

Prepare the batter. Strain the batter if it’s lumpy. The batter consistency is slightly runnier that a pancake batter.

Dip the pork in the batter and deep fry them in a large wok of hot oil. The secret to crispy pork is to deep fry the pork twice just like frying french fries, i.e. fry the pork once, remove from oil to cool on a paper towel lined baking sheet in one layer. Then fry the pork again until they are crisp. Remove to drain on paper towel lined baking sheets.

Drain the oil and use the same wok to briefly stir fry the bell peppers. Cora fried the green bell peppers first as they are the unripe ones. Then followed by the red and yellow bell peppers. Remove and set aside.

To prepare the sauce, add in the pineapple juice, a few tablespoons of ketchup, vinegar, sugar and some water. The ratio of sugar to vinegar is 1 to 1. Adjust the taste according to your preference.

If you prefer crispy pork, you may use the sauce as dipping sauce. If the sauce is too runny, you may thicken it with some cornstarch solution. Otherwise, return the bell peppers and pork into the wok with the sauce and stir to coat everything with the sauce. You may serve this with steam rice or just as finger food with a glass of beer.

Great job! Cora.

A platter of fingers licking good Sweet and Sour Pork.