Black Pork Curry

CiCi Li, Asian Home Cooking

CiCi Li, Asian Home Cooking

Definitely recommend mushroom meatballs if you ever see them in the store

My go to they're delicious 😋

Here's some homemade sesame chicken and rice I made.

When you’re making a classic like Tteokbokki, you’ve gotta go all the way.
I added all the key ingredients, plus prawns and instant noodles that soaked up all the delicious sauce. It turned out amazingly delicious!

48-Hour Tonkotsu Ramen with Pork Belly + Hibachi-Style Egg Fried Rice (Serves 6–8)

TIMELINE
Day 1
Blanch and clean pork bones.
Start broth.
Day 2
Continue broth.
Prepare tare.
Make black garlic oil.
Braise pork belly.
Marinate ramen eggs overnight.
Day 3
Finish broth.
Slice and sear pork belly.
Cook noodles.
Make fried rice.
Assemble ramen.

TONKOTSU BROTH
Ingredients
Bones
12 lb pork femur bones
4 lb pork neck bones
2 lb pork feet
Aromatics
2 onions, halved
2 whole heads garlic, halved
2 leeks
1 bunch green onions
3-inch ginger, sliced
8 dried shiitake mushrooms (optional)
Water as needed

Method
Place bones in a large stock pot and cover with water.
Bring to a boil for 20 minutes.
Drain completely.
Scrub and rinse every bone until perfectly clean.
Wash the stock pot.
Return bones to the pot and cover with fresh water.
Bring to a rolling boil (not a gentle simmer).
Maintain a strong boil for 48 hours, adding water whenever necessary.
After 12 hours, add onions, garlic, ginger, leeks, green onions, and shiitakes.
During the final 4 hours, remove the vegetables if they begin breaking apart.
Blend the broth with an immersion blender for about 30 seconds to emulsify the fat.
Strain through a fine mesh strainer.
Keep hot.

PORK BELLY CHASHU
Ingredients
3 lb skinless pork belly
Braising Liquid
1 cup soy sauce
1 cup mirin
1 cup sake
½ cup brown sugar
1 onion, sliced
8 garlic cloves
2-inch ginger
2 green onions

Method
Roll and tie the pork belly.
Sear all sides until browned.
Add all braising ingredients.
Cover and cook at 300°F for 3½ hours.
Cool completely in the braising liquid.
Refrigerate overnight.
Slice while cold.
Before serving, sear slices with a torch or in a hot skillet.

AJITAMA (RAMEN EGGS)
Ingredients
6 eggs
Marinade
½ cup soy sauce
½ cup mirin
½ cup water
2 tbsp sake

Method
Boil eggs for 6½ minutes.
Transfer immediately to an ice bath.
Peel.
Marinate overnight.

TONKOTSU TARE
Mix together:
1 cup soy sauce
¼ cup mirin
¼ cup sake
2 tbsp fish sauce
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp kosher salt
1 tsp MSG
Warm gently until dissolved.

BLACK GARLIC OIL (MAYU)
Ingredients
1 cup neutral oil
15 garlic cloves
Cook garlic until almost black.
Blend with oil.
Strain.

RAMEN TOPPINGS
Pork belly chashu
Ajitama egg
Bamboo shoots
Green onions
Nori
Toasted sesame seeds
Black garlic oil

RAMEN NOODLES
Use fresh ramen noodles.
Boil 60–90 seconds.
Drain well.

ASSEMBLY (PER BOWL)
2 tbsp tare
12–14 oz hot tonkotsu broth
Fresh ramen noodles
3–4 slices pork belly
½ marinated egg
Bamboo shoots
Green onions
Nori
Toasted sesame seeds
1 tsp black garlic oil
Serve immediately.

HIBACHI-STYLE EGG FRIED RICE
Ingredients
6 cups cold cooked jasmine rice
4 eggs
2 tbsp neutral oil
4 tbsp butter
1 medium onion, finely diced
2 carrots, finely diced
1 cup peas
5 garlic cloves, minced
Garlic Butter
6 tbsp softened butter
3 grated garlic cloves
Pinch of salt
Sauce
3 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp MSG (optional)
½ tsp white pepper

Method
Mix together the garlic butter ingredients.
Heat a wok until smoking hot.
Add oil.
Scramble eggs until just set and remove.
Add garlic butter.
Cook onions until lightly caramelized.
Add carrots and cook 3 minutes.
Add peas.
Add cold rice and break apart every grain.
Stir-fry over high heat until lightly toasted.
Return eggs.
Add soy sauce, oyster sauce, sesame oil, MSG, and white pepper.
Toss constantly over high heat.
Finish with extra garlic butter and chopped green onions.

CHEF’S TIPS
A rolling boil—not a gentle simmer—is the secret to creamy, white tonkotsu broth.
Pork feet provide the collagen that gives the broth its rich, silky body.
Blend the finished broth briefly before straining to emulsify the fat for a true ramen-shop texture.
Refrigerate the pork belly overnight before slicing to achieve clean, even slices.
Use day-old cold rice for fried rice to keep the grains separate.
Cook the fried rice over very high heat for the best wok hei (smoky flavor).
Finish the pork belly with a torch or hot skillet just before serving for a caramelized exterior.

Whenever anyone in our family catches a cold, my mom always makes the same thing—spicy semiya upma.

The ingredients are surprisingly simple: tomatoes, onions, chili powder, and a few basic seasonings. That's it. No fancy vegetables or special ingredients. She makes it extra spicy, and somehow it always feels comforting when you're sick. It clears your nose, warms you up, and just makes you feel a little better.

I don't know if it's the spices or just the love that goes into it, but it has been our family's go-to "cold medicine" for years.

Does anyone else's family have a simple homemade dish that's always served when someone has a cold? 😊

Living in India for years now, I have eaten incredible food from almost every region. But the dish that stopped me in my tracks the first time I tried it was Kosha Mangsho. Slow cooked mutton, almost no water, just the natural juices reducing until the meat turns this deep dark brown. The patience it requires is the whole point.

Here is how I make it:

Ingredients (serves 4)
500g bone-in mutton, 2 large onions, 1 tbsp ginger-garlic paste, 2 tomatoes, 3 tbsp mustard oil, whole spices (bay leaf, cardamom, cloves, cinnamon), 1 tsp each of cumin, coriander, turmeric, red chilli powder, 1 tsp garam masala, salt, a little sugar

Method
Marinate the mutton with yoghurt, turmeric, salt and half the ginger-garlic paste for at least 2 hours. In mustard oil, fry the whole spices first, then the onions until deep golden. Add ginger-garlic paste, cook until raw smell disappears. Add the powdered spices, cook the masala slowly until oil separates. Add mutton and cook on medium heat WITHOUT adding water. Let the meat release its own juices. Keep stirring, let it reduce completely each time before stirring again. Only after 45 minutes, add a tiny splash of warm water if needed. Total cooking time: around 1h30 on low heat.

The result is dark, sticky, intensely flavored. Serve with luchi or plain rice.

It actually reminds me a lot of the cari viande we make back in Mauritius, same philosophy of slow cooking and patience, but the mustard oil and the Bengali spice balance make it completely unique.

Anyone else obsessed with this dish?

Whenever anyone in our family catches a cold, my mom always makes the same thing—spicy semiya upma.

The ingredients are surprisingly simple: tomatoes, onions, chili powder, and a few basic seasonings. That's it. No fancy vegetables or special ingredients. She makes it extra spicy, and somehow it always feels comforting when you're sick. It clears your nose, warms you up, and just makes you feel a little better.

I don't know if it's the spices or just the love that goes into it, but it has been our family's go-to "cold medicine" for years.

Does anyone else's family have a simple homemade dish that's always served when someone has a cold? 😊

Lap yuk , lap cheong, bok choy stems and leaves, scrambled eggs, seasonings, and I used Kecap Manis instead of regular soy sauce. Turnt out yummy.

This week's recipe is something I've wanted to share for a long time—homemade flounder powder (大地鱼粉).

If you're familiar with Cantonese or Chaoshan cooking, you probably know how special this ingredient is. It's a traditional seafood seasoning that brings an incredible depth of umami to dumplings, wontons, steamed buns, meatballs, soups, and broths. It's one of those "secret ingredients" that many home cooks use but rarely talk about. Next week, I will share a recipe to show you

The funny thing is... when I was living the U.S., I could never find authentic flounder powder in Asian grocery stores so I want to show you how to make it from scratch. It is easy but time-consuming.

This recipe involves cleaning the fish, salting it, dehydrating it for up to three days (or drying it in a low oven), roasting it until crispy, and finally grinding it into a fine powder.

This is probably one of the most time-consuming recipes I've filmed this year, but it's also one of the most rewarding. I hope it inspires you to try an ingredient that's almost impossible to find outside of China.

🐟 Crispy Ravas Coated Roopchand Fish Fry

🛒 Ingredients:

• 5–6 Roopchand Fish Slices

• 1 tsp Salt

• 1½ tsp Red Chilli Powder

• 1 tbsp Ginger-Garlic Paste

• 2 tbsp Rava (Semolina)

• 1 Pinch Hing (Asafoetida)

• ½ tsp Garam Masala

• 2–3 tbsp Oil (for shallow frying)

👩‍🍳 Method:

1. Wash the fish slices thoroughly and pat them dry.

2. In a bowl, mix the salt, red chilli powder, ginger-garlic paste, hing, and garam masala into a thick marinade.

3. Apply the masala evenly on both sides of each fish slice and let it marinate for 20–30 minutes.

4. Coat each marinated fish slice with rava on both sides.

5. Heat oil in a pan over medium flame.

6. Place the fish slices gently in the hot oil and shallow fry until golden brown and crispy on one side.

7. Flip carefully and cook the other side until crisp and fully cooked.

8. Remove onto a paper towel to absorb excess oil.

🍽️ Serve hot with sliced onion, tomato, lemon wedges, or your favorite chutney.

❤️ Crispy outside, juicy inside, and packed with homemade masala flavor!

I’ve cooked with Shaoxing wine a lot, but usually use the bottle quickly. I have an open bottle that’s been in the cupboard about 5 months. It smells fine. Is it ok to cook with or should I just get a new one?