Developing a dish is an interesting task. A lot of times I’ll have some spontaneous idea to make something and build a dish around what is available to me. Sometimes it’ll come out great the first try; other times it’s a work in progress. Currently I am working on a pork bun dish since I found some pork belly in my freezer.

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Preparing the pork

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To clean the pork, I followed a traditional method in Chinese cooking and boiled off the first, meaning I parboiled the pork belly and dumped the water it cooked in. This does a few things: it cleans the pork of foul odors and foreign matter, it tightens the skin and meat which holds the overall shape of the belly better, and it helps it store better if you want to braise it at a later time. 

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For the braise, usually I go towards a more traditional style of hong shao rou, red cooked pork. This time, however, I realized I didn’t have dark soy sauce and didn’t feel like going out of the way to pick up a bottle. I decided to use black vinegar - an aged rice vinegar commonly served with soup dumplings - and regular soy sauce, drawing some inspiration from Filipino adobo. I added bay leaves and peppercorns, following the adobo route. I also decided add in dried orange peel, cinnamon, cloves, dried red chilis, and shaoxing wine, tying it to the traditional hong shao style braise. I added some aromatics: ginger, garlic, onions and scallions, and some umami components: dried shiitakes and dried scallops. 

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To give the braise a little sweetness, I added raisins, brown cane sugar, and rock sugar. After simmering for two hours, I let the pork cool to room temperature in the braising liquid. I took the pork and mushrooms out and strain the remaining braising liquid, reserving it for later. Everything then was refrigerated overnight for easy slicing and portioning in the morning.

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Preparing the buns

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For the buns, I wanted to go an offbeat route and do something a little unique. I found some great black garlic and decided to incorporate that into my buns for a hint of nuttiness, sweetness, and umami. I also added in some lemon salt I had in my pantry. The rest is pretty standard. Activate the yeast in room temperature water and a little sugar, letting it sit for 10 minutes. You’ll start to see bubbles foaming on the surface - the yeast “burping” from eating the sugar. Add that to a stand mixer with the dough hook attachment and add flour, milk powder, water, fat (I used brown butter accentuate the nuttiness from the black garlic), salt, sugar, baking soda and baking powder.

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Let it run until it starts coming together, cover it with a towel and let it proof for an hour, until it doubles in size. Punch the dough down, roll it out onto a clean surface and begin kneading it - not for too long though as you’ll get a denser bun which is not our goal here. Cut the dough in half, then in quarters, then in fifths. Roll each small segment into tiny balls and let it proof for about 30 minutes. Take each ball, flatten it with the palm of you hand and roll it into an oblong, keeping the center ever so slightly thicker than the ends. Take a greased chopstick and fold the dough in half and let sit for another 30 min.

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Meanwhile, prepare your steamer. Once the dough has rested, steam them for about 3-5 minutes, let them cool and store in freezer bags until you’re ready to have them.

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Making the right toppings

I was always of the opinion that the toppings on pork buns really make or break the dish. Traditionally, you’ll have pickled mustard greens to help cut through the fat from the pork belly, and peanuts and sugar for crunch and sweetness. This two toppings perfectly compliment the dish and bring it together, adding key elements in taste and texture. For my pork buns, I decided to add pickled ginger, pickled onions, and candied garlic chips.

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For the ginger, I sliced them in slivers and pickled them in rice vinegar, sugar, and a little salt. Drawing from the numerous times I’ve eaten soup dumplings, the ginger is a perfect partner for the black vinegar in the braise, adding some freshness and spiciness. 

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The onions were sliced paper-thin, and pickled in red wine vinegar, salt and sugar. This adds a little crunch and more vibrant acidity than the ginger alone, as well as color. The garlic was the last component I thought to include. Having two different forms of garlic both adds complementary flavors and contrasting flavors. It shows the variety of the ingredient and its many flavor profiles. Not only that, it also adds crunch and sweetness, components the dish was missing originally. To candy garlic, slice the garlic into chips, and fry it in a pan with a little butter. When its about half way done, remove the garlic chips and add sugar into the pan with the residual butter. When the sugar begins to caramelize, add the chips back into the pan to coat and finish cooking. Move to a lined baking sheet and let cool.

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Reduce your leftover braising liquid until it becomes a thick glaze. You may have to adjust for seasoning, adding in more black vinegar, soy sauce, or sugar depending on what you’re going for. For mine, I added a touch of molasses and a splash of black vinegar.

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Thinly slice some scallions along a hard bias and soak in ice water until the scallions begin to curl. Drain and let the water dry off a bit before plating.

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Assembling the bao

Take a slice of your pork belly and throw it into the steamer on a plate for 2 minutes, just until the meat and fat begin to warm and soften. Take the meat out and brush it with some glaze. Throw it under the broiler for 1-2 minutes, just to caramelize the sauce. Meanwhile, steam your bun for 1-2 minutes, until warmed through.

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Take the bun and meat out and begin assembly. Gently open the buns, delicately place your pork belly inside, top with pickled onions, a few strands of ginger, some garlic chips, and finally a bit of scallions. Be frugal, you don’t want to over crowd everything and ruin the balance of the dish. You should be able to see every component still once the dish is complete.

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The smells you’ll get are the acid from the pickles, the sweet and sour glaze that smells strongly of black vinegar, some fermented smells from the black garlic and a but of nuttiness from the buns.

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The bite should should showcase the fluffy bun, the unctuous pork belly, bright and acidic pickled onions, sharp ginger, crunchy, sweet and nutty candied garlic, and finally some freshness from the scallions. A perfect bite.

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...or so you would hope. I’ll be quite honest and say that the first attempt of these buns wasn’t completely how i envisioned. The buns weren’t these soft pillowy clouds I imagined. The candied garlic turned into more of a garlic brittle. But this is a part of the process as well. This is not failure by any means. Great dishes are built out of what happens after this step.When I first tasted the completed bun, it was overall too soft in texture, with large shards of candied garlic, creating an unpleasant feeling of hard candy hidden in soft “mush”.

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I chopped the garlic up a bit and created more of a garlic brittle - much more manageable and texturally appealing. The buns were a challenge. I chalked it up to not having enough yeast, not using bread flour, and not having enough milk powder. As well as this, the steaming process should be a delicate one, whereas I was unable to have that ideal environment. I thought about remaking the buns, but my frugality wouldn’t let me waste the 40 buns I just made.

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I decided to reshape the dish. Knowing overall that the texture was too soft, I decided to griddle the buns on both sides. This caramelizes the sugars outside, creating a toasted and crunchy exterior, with a still soft pillowy interior.

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Assembling the bun again with a bit more ginger and onions, topped sparingly with the chopped garlic brittle, this was exactly what the dish needed, and I didnt have to remake or waste anything! Sometimes dishes don’t always go how you imagine, but there’s always more than one way to get to your destination.

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This new pork bun dish, featuring a toasted black garlic bao and garlic brittle, captured everything I had imagined for this dish. And it was only made because of a mistake with the original recipe concept. The best part though, is that there is still plenty of room to improve and innovate this dish forward.

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