Pork Jerky/Bak Kwa

My only preparation for CNY this year. I like to think that I have grand plans every year. This year, I confess that it creeped up on me and I found myself short of time to do much.

This has always been one of my favourite snack on CNY- I love the sweet and savoury aspect of it, the meaty texture, the crisp of the slightly charred bits. At every home visit, people would sometimes exchanged stories about how long they queue up to purchase the best bak kwa (My hubby calls it Long Yok). I think Bak Kwa is in hokkien dialect and Long Yok is cantonese.

I bookmarked a few recipes to reference to. My favourite is still Sonia's. I reduced the sugar to 50 grams and think the sweetness is just right. However, I think the meat wasn't pressed thinly enough. While it did have a crisp texture, I felt that it was too thick. Nevertheless, we loved it!

Not without a mini incident...

I was chatting with my grandma on the phone while it was it the oven. I set it to high on grill (which is around 250C), took it out to turn it around and my baking paper caught fire. Lucky for me, hubby was there to save the day, but my grandma found it amusing. I could literally feel her glare on me- just like the first time I cooked in her kitchen. So another lesson learned... concentrate when doing something new!

Using my chopsticks, marinating the meat was easy. Turning it round and round, making sure the meat was all gluey. Thanks to Sonia's pictures, I knew what to look out for. That's the reason why I love blogging. It allowed me to learn more about my own culture, food that I grew up loving- I never wish to forget my roots.

And hopefully, this compensate for my lack of preparation (which is what a good Chinese wife should do) for CNY.

Pork Jerky/Bak Kwa
480 grams of pork mince
50 grams of sugar
1 tablespoon of soy sauce
1/2 tsp of fish sauce
1/2 tsp of chinese wine
1 tablespoon of dark caramel sauce
1/4 tsp of 5 spice powder
1/4 tsp of salt
2 tablespoon of honey

Marinate meat with all ingredients with a pair of chopsticks. Turning it till it turns gluey. Place in fridge for a few hours (mine was around 4 hours).

Pre heat oven to 160C. Prepare baking tray- Sonia didn't use any baking paper. I did. Press meat into tray as thinly as possible. Bake for 15-20 mins. Remove from oven.

Change oven function to grill high or 240C. Snip meat by using a scissors, knife or pizza cutter into pieces. Place it back under the grill. I find that it is charred within 3-4 mins. Turn pieces and place in oven again.

Cool and eat (if you can wait that long).