{"id":6927,"date":"2012-03-12T08:30:07","date_gmt":"2012-03-12T15:30:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailywaffle.com\/stage1\/?p=6927"},"modified":"2016-10-20T10:21:23","modified_gmt":"2016-10-20T17:21:23","slug":"char-siu-experiment-hoisin-pork","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dailywaffle.com\/stage1\/char-siu-experiment-hoisin-pork\/","title":{"rendered":"Char Siu Experiment, Hoisin Pork Results"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\nLast week I posted a one-off with a photo of some char siu chicken legs<\/a> we had in Kauai. I don’t know what the secret to char siu is aside from the red food coloring, but I’m determined to crack it. I went to Uwajimaya<\/a> yesterday to check out the jarred and packet marinades and see what was in those, but the plan was to make the marinade myself. So, while some Chowhounders said there’s no way a restaurant uses ketchup and hoisin, an old recipe in the Honolulu Star Bulletin<\/a> said different.
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\nWhile at Uwajimaya, I did look for the wet bean curd called for in the recipe, but couldn’t find it. I didn’t intend to add the red food coloring, so I knew this guy was going to come out brown rather than the technicolor red\/pink of the original. Fine, no problem. It was more a flavor I was looking for anyway.<\/p>\n

Though everyone calls for pork butt or shoulder, I wasn’t going to commit 3 or 5 pounds of meat to an experiment, mostly because we’re a small household and we’d be eating the results until the next millenium. I love char siu, but a girl’s gotta know her limitations. My pork tenderloin was about a pound and a quarter, so I cut the sugar to 1\/4 c. and everything else in half. I let it marinate for 20 hours in a ziploc bag in the fridge. I baked it on a rack on a cookie sheet (sorry, no hanging it from the oven rack) for 45 minutes at 350F and an additional 10 at 300F. When I pulled it out of the oven it was about 165F, very well done for a tenderloin, but it didn’t come out tough or dry.<\/p>\n

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I bought some pre-made char siu at the market so you can see it side-by-side. And in taste, I have to tell you, all I taste in the char siu from the market is pork, and maybe red, if you can say red is a flavor. It’s not even as flavorful as the marinade they used at Foodland. So while this is a perfectly delicious pork preparation — it’s hoisin pork, not char siu. If you’ve got good weather, I’d throw this on the barbecue rather than baking it, you’ll get some nice carmelization from the hoisin and sugar.<\/p>\n

As experiments go, this one yielded something entirely delicious on it own, but char siu-wise, I’ve got work to do on the marinade. Is the secret that wet bean curd? Maybe it’s the brand of 5-spice? I’ll report back if I hit on something. In the meantime, if you figure it out, let me know.
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\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/i> Print Recipe<\/a>\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t
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Hoisin-Glazed Barbecue Pork<\/h2>\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\r\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t\t
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Ingredients<\/h3>\r\n\t\t\t\r\n\t\t\t