How to cook Char Siu Pork Bao

Hi guys, Kieran here from Q ‘n Up BBQ. Today I'll be making a marinade for Char Siu Pork which will be refrigerated overnight.

Let's start with preparing the pork. I like to use pork neck or scotch – it's pretty consistently marbled with a great balance of meat and fat – perfect for this recipe. They're generally around the 1.8kg to 2.3kg weight. Start by taking off any large strands of fat that aren't going to help.

Next, slice the piece of pork in half longways and flatten it out. Depending on the size of your pork neck, you may slice each half longways in either two or three pieces. Repeat with the other half and place aside.

In a large bowl, we'll mix the ingredients for the marinade. Add to the bowl 4T honey, 4T hoisin sauce, 4T soy sauce, 1T of minced garlic, 4T minced ginger, 2T Chinese Five Spice, 4T Chinese cooking wine, 1 tsp salt, 2T red pepper flakes & 2T red fermented tofu (plus 2T of sauce).

You may not have the red fermented Tofu but it is available in any good Asian grocery store. This is important as it gives the dish the red colour and provides a salty balance.

Mix these ingredients well and add the strips of pork to the bowl, coating thoroughly. Wrap the bowl in cling wrap and refrigerate overnight.

One of my favourite things to make is pickled vegetables. It's super easy, cheap, quick and yields great results. Start with a glass jar with a lid and add to it 1 cup of warm water, 1 cup of rice wine vinegar, 1 cup of white sugar and 2T of sea salt. Replace the lid and shake until the sugar & salt dissolves.

Next, add some vegetables. The choice is yours, but I like to use carrot, red chili, cucumber and fresh ginger, all sliced into matchstick sizes. Throw these into the jar as well, ensuring their fully submerged. Place the jar in the fridge overnight. 24 hours will be good, but the three day mark is where they really shine.

We've removed the bowl of pork from the fridge now and will let it stand while we set up our grill. We're going to be using the FC Cyprus Spit today for grilling these pork strips. I love this unit not only because of the ability to use rotisserie and grill simultaneously, but also the ease of adjusting the height of the grill from the heat source.

Light up some lump charcoal or in the chimney, then dump them into Cyprus once the fire from the chimney is roaring.

Adjust the height of your grill. If you can hold your hand for no more than 3 seconds above that fire, that's the optimum level to grill. Time to start cooking!

Place two to three pieces of pork on the grill at a time. You should be hearing it sear as soon as it hits the deck. Rotate 90 degrees every 2-3 minutes as we don't want it to burn, just cook through. Before each turn, baste the pork with the excess marinade from the bowl. The smell is incredible.

Check the internal temperature – pork should always be at least 165F for safe eating, but for this, we'll take it closer to 180F for a better slicing consistency.

When you're getting to a good internal temp, we can lower the grill to get some more char on the outside; again, that's what I love about this unit.

The pork is done now, so set it aside to rest on a plate, covered loose in foil.

I've got these bao buns here that were actually bought frozen, but usually, I'll make these from scratch. They take a bloody long time, but very worth it. I'll put the recipe up in the comment for those that have a few days up to their sleeve!

Slice the pork neck into small, thin pieces and layer them up into the bao, topped with the pickled vegetables from earlier. You can also cook off any excess marinade (until it bubbles, which removed any bacteria from the raw pork) and apply some more sauce. These little pockets are to die for!