Sizzling Pork Sisig Recipe

A few months ago, my dear friend Cherrie invited a bunch of us over to her place for a Filipino Fiesta to celebrate her birthday. Boy oh boy, was I excited or what. Everyone knows how I feel about potlucks (so much more fun than eating out). Besides that, everyone knows that Filipinos know how to throw one heck of a food party. 

I decided immediately that I wanted to make a Sizzling Pork Sisig for the fiesta. I've got very fond memories of this dish because of how my brother would use to take me out for supper at this awesome little Filipino joint we like when I'm back in my hometown of Kota Kinabalu. We'd order a plate of pork sisig and also a bowl of sinigang each time without fail and it was DELICIOUS. 

The Internet tells me that "Sisig" means to "snack on something sour" but my understanding of this dish is that it's pork parts (head, cheek, liver, belly, etc etc ) that's been braised in vinegar before being grilled, diced and served on a sizzling hot plate. Always served with chilli, calamansi and an egg in the middle. I love this because it tastes so addictive, especially after you break up the egg, gets slightly scrambled and it's mixed with the rest of the dish. Yum. 

I just used the cheek and belly this time cause it's easier for me. But yes, very common to make with pork head.

Thank goodness for Footscray

(photo taken from my Instagram: @winceeee)

Happy to report that all the ingredients I didn't initially have for this recipe could be bought at Footscray. I just went to the Asian grocery right next to the market. The coconut vinegar was new to me and was SO fragrant. Yay for pre-cooked crackling that I could just chop and garnish on the dish. No calamansi or lime so cumquats it was. And yes, I did buy a sizzling hot plate just for the occasion. Been meaning to get one for a while anyway =). Even then, the hot plate is not actually necessary as it's used for serving only and not required in the cooking process.

This was our amazing spread that night (not including desserts) and OMG we had a whole roasted pig too!!!!! AWESOME

Filipino cuisine is still relatively new to me but every experience that I've enjoyed every experience that I've had with it. 

Oh, and I also made a Leche Flan Cake for the fiesta. A bit of a quirky cake, easy to make and delicious to eat. You can check out the recipe in my older blog post: HERE

Anyway, I'm glad I could get the chance to make this Filipino dish that I've always loved. It's simpler than the recipe sounds and final product is rewarding. Sour, spicy, grilled, pork with crispy edges topped with crunchy crackling and egg. What's not to like? Oh, and I actually did the braising process the night before to save time on the day as I had the cake to bake too =)

So, I do hope you give this recipe a go! Happy last few weeks of work before the Christmas break, everybody!

Sizzling Pork Sisig Recipe

(adapted from this recipe by Ang Sarap)

Ingredients:

6 pieces (or 400g) pork cheeks *
400g pork belly
1 cup coconut vinegar **
3 bay leaves
1/2 tsp salt 
1/2 tsp pepper
water
4 tbsp soy sauce
3 tbsp coconut vinegar **
2 tbsp butter
2 tbsp oil
1 thumb sized ginger (minced)
6 cloves of garlic
4 tbsp mayonnaise
1/2 red onion (diced)
2 cups pork crackling (chopped)
4 birds eye chillies (sliced)
1 egg
2 - 3 calamansi (halved) ***

* May be substituted with other pork parts with similar weight
** May be substituted with white vinegar
*** May be substituted with lime, lemon or cumquat

Method:

1. Place pork cheeks and belly in a small pot with the 1 cup vinegar, bay leaves, salt and pepper. Add enough water to just cover and boil for 20 minutes. Drain liquid and set pork aside to cool. You could do this step the night before too, if you want.

2. Heat up a grill pan on the stove and grill the pork pieces on all sides until charred and crispy (approx. 20 minutes). Can do this step on an outdoor BBQ if you have one.

3. Remove pork from grill and dice finely. Mixed diced pork in a bowl with soy sauce, 3 tbsp vinegar and butter. 

4. Heat up a pan and add the oil. Saute the ginger and garlic until fragrant. Stir in the diced pork mixture. Allow pork to crisp up before stirring/turning to cook the other side till crisp too. Stir in the mayonnaise.

5. Heat up a hot plate, if using. Once hot, add the pork onto the plate. Sprinkle with onion, pork crackling and chillies. Make some room in the middle of the plate and add the egg. Serve with calamansi (or substitute). Complete this step directly in the pan if you're not using the hot plate. Eat immediately with steamed rice.

Dahon Tea Lounge, South Melbourne

It's a celebration of Filipino cuisine here at Dahon Tea Lounge!

Chicken Adobo Skewers - $2 each

The char and smokiness was unmistakeable as soon as it hit the table. Delicious flavour from it and also loved how chewy/bouncy the chicken bits were

BBQ Pork Baguette with Chips - $8.70

Deeelicious! Grilled perfectly and juicy as well. This whole thing was just effortless to eat. I wish I worked closer to South Melbourne so I could have this for lunch. $10 for the baguette with chips and drink is so affordable and complete.

Pancit Palabok - $11.80

Rice vermicilli noodles with prawn sauce topped with tofu, crushed pork crackling, smoked fish, fried garlic, spring onion and egg

Interesting! Gorgeous blend of flavours that are really new to me but thoroughly enjoyed. Definitely from the smoked fish. The texture of the noodles were great as it had a good bite and resistance. El dente and good to chew. Loved this a lot!!

Deep Fried Pork Belly (!!!!!!) with Fried Egg on Rice - $11.20

OUR MAIN REASON FOR COMING HERE DID NOT DISAPPOINT. Cannot begin to describe how much we enjoyed this. Crispy but juicy pork belly, dipped in sauce and eaten with the hoisin-like sauce. I was also impressed because everything was impeccable. The fried egg was perfect in every sense of the word and the quality of rice goes unnoticed. The kind of rice I'd eat at home as well.

Ube Macapuno Cake - $3.20

Purple yam with coconut cake

Looooove this Filipino dessert! Yam is one of my favourite flavours for anything, really and the slices of young, shredded coconut flesh in the middle was just ace. Good stuff

Original Hotcakes with Scoop of Ice Cream and Condensed Milk - $7.90

Friends and I went with the simplest/straight forward option for hotcake in the menu: plain with condensed milk. So glad we did! I like how the hotcakes were nice, crusty on the outside but soft on the inside and slightly salty too. This did not take us long to gobble up. Perfecto~

One of the main reasons why I've always enjoyed and been intrigued by Filipino cuisine is because it's familiar to my Chinese background, but it's not. It's got the trappings of flavours that hit home, but with lots of new ingredients that I've never tasted or know how to make at all. One good example is the Pancit Palabok (see above). Vermicilli with tofu I've had, but never with a flavour so distinct as the smoked fish. Like it so much.

Prior to this, I've been meaning to try my friend Cherrie's restaurant for the longest time but never really got around to it cause I was just so flat out in my final semester of Masters last year. Then one day, I saw a photo of the unveiling of the new addition to their menu on their Facebook page: DEEP FRIED PORK BELLY!!!!!! I immediately called my friend S to tell him about it but even before I finished asking, he just said, "YES!!!". My other mate C joined us as well and we had dinner at Dahon that very night.

I know I've barely scratched the surface of what Filipino cuisine has to offer, but I'm looking forward to coming back again and again to try more of it despite how hard it is to go past the deep fried pork belly. Thankfully, my buddy Adrian has been making a couple of delicious Filipino treats in our past few blogger potlucks. 

So, if you're just as curious about Filipino cuisine as I am, definitely head to Dahon for a meal and say hi to the lovely Cherrie. Place is close to the city and so affordably priced. 

Thank you again Cherrie for such a memorable meal. Everything was absolutely delicious! Look forward to catching you again at the next catchup meal/potluck!

Leche Flan Cake Recipe

My Leche Flan Cake drizzled in Mango Puree instead of Caramel. Works too!

So last week, we were planning a surprise birthday party for my friend Jeff and I thought I should bring a cake for the event. I mean, Jeff is one of the most dedicated and gifted people I know and we've all been blessed by his cooking and generosity in one way of another, so this was just my small way of saying, "Thanks for everything".

Then, I thought of the traditional Filipino Dessert: Leche Flan Cake, something I've been meaning to make for almost a year! It's so fascinating because at the bottom, you have your good old butter cake. But at the top, you get a layer of Creme Caramel, aka Flan. I mean, who doesn't love Flan?! This is probably the first time I've ever made something Filipino and I LOVE trying to cook different cuisines.

ALSO, it was nice to introduce a different kind of layering for cakes than what most of us are used to, so I thought it was pretty fitting for this month's Sweet Adventures Blog Hop (SABH), where the theme is: Layers =)

See the layers? This was Cake No. 1

Only thing is, it turned out to be quite a disaster the first time I made it. Though it tasted good, the custard came out TOO firm and overly sweet. The cake base was worse because it was so stiff, dry and dense that it was hard to swallow.

From what I hear, this cake is meant to be really, really moist and soft, just a delight to eat. Feeling incredibly unsatisfied but determined to get it right, I decided to skip class and bake this cake again on the day of the party ;p

Then I realised where I went wrong:

1) Forgot to use the Coke instead of Milk
- When I made it again with coke, cake turned out much more aerated and light from the gas in the coke. Plus, you couldn't really taste the coke anyway and the cake came out pretty delicious

2) Didn't add enough water in the Bain Marie/water bath
- First time I only had up to two centimeters but it didn't create enough steam for the cake and custard. Second time, I filled it up to more than half the bundt pan and the textures came out perfect... YES!

3) Temperature too high
- I'm no baking expert, but even I know that 175degC was a bit high for baking custards. I shouldn't have followed the original recipe because when I baked it again at 160degC, the consistency was just right

4) Too much condensed milk
- Decreased the amount of condense milk and used more evaporated milk than the original recipe called for. SO much better...

Anyway, I've made ammendments to some crucial aspects of the original recipe. The final cake was really delicious (especially the flan) and well received at the party. I think most people liked the slightly unconventional idea. Just glad I finally got everything right. Oh, and I did actually add Mango Puree to the flan mix but no matter how much I added, the taste didn't change much so I scrapped it.

Best part about this cake is how simple it is to bake. For all you bakers out there looking for something new to try, I suggest you give this a go. It's as fun to bake as it is to eat. And the layers really is quite purrty too =)

________________________________


Leche Flan Cake
(adapted from this recipe by Jules Food)

Ingredients:

Cake:1 box butter/yellow cake mix (and ingredients to prepare as directed on box)
Coke or Pepsi

Flan: 300g sweetened condensed milk
1 can (375ml) evaporated milk
3 eggs
1 tbsp vanilla extract

Topping:Caramel ice cream topping or Homemade Mango Puree

Method:
Preheat oven to 160degC. Spray a bundt pan generously with cooking oil. Follow instructions to make the cake, but substitute milk with equivalent amount of coke/pepsi as stated on box. Pour cake mix into bundt pan and set aside.

Put the flan ingredients in a blender and mix well. Pour the flan mix gently down one side of the pan. The flan will go to the bottom of the cake mix so when you tip it over, the flan layer will be at the top.

Place bundt pan in a large roasting tray and pour boiling water into tray until it fills slightly above half of the bundt pan. Bake in oven for 50 minutes. The cake will stay more moist than most cakes and you will see it separate a bit from the pan when it's done, as shown below.

Let it cool at room temperature for at least 2 hours before serving. Turn the bundt pan over and let it sit while warming to room temperature. Finally, drizzle topping of choice and ENJOY! =D

*** Cooking Tips:1) Preheat oven well (mine takes about 35min to reach the temperature)
2) Use boiling water in the bain marie. Make sure you have enough if your tray is big
3) Use the Coke instead of water
4) If possible, use an oven thermometer for better accuracy

So happy that everything turned out the way I'd hoped! Persistence DOES pay off in the kitchen =)

Post note: A photo of the one I made again in 2013

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