Penang Lor Bak

Truth: The Brothers Grumps (Dom and Dan) and I hate Chinese New Year visiting. The stifling Penang-at-the-beginning-of the-year heat, seeing people whom we were once close to (e.g. Dom and Dan's babysitters when they were still in diapers - Dan's 18 now, and Dom's 21). The conversations in Hokkien or Cantonese of which me can make neither head nor tail of, so we just smile politely and busy ourselves eating all the CNY cookies our hosts put out while driving each other crazy.

There is one thing that we will gladly make the annual pilgrimage for though. Dan's Babysitter's, or Auntie Ng's (Ex I mean) lor bak.

Small chunks of sweet, spice-laden pork, the natural sweetness enhanced by 5-spicepowder with water chestnuts encased in a crispy, salty beancurd wrapper. Dip the rolls in the starchy, sticky sweet-savoury sauce ( lor) or spicy-sweet-slighly-sour chilli sauce, or, our favourite, tongue-numbing, seriously addictive sambal belachan (Auntie Ng's way).

So yes, visiting is ok and we pay our respects and Gong Xi Fa Cai and all that, but all we really want is the lor bak. Not ang pow money, not prosperity and long life.

Hand cutting the pork makes all the difference when you eat the rolls. Purchased ground pork or using the food processor just don't cut it. You want to feel the chew of the meaty morsels in your mouth, small enough that you can easily swallow the big bite of the roll you took so greedily, but not that small, so that it provides just the amount of resiliance and oh-so-satisfying chew - much more satisfying oral-wise than, say, a burger. You'll still be able to get strands of meat stuck in your teeth with this one.

Long hours of marinating ensures that the sweet savouriness permeates the meat. Making my own lor bak and removing all traces of pork fat (so many stalls in Penang don't do this - couple the fat with the deep frying and mostly it's an inedible mass of heart attack-inducing gunk) guarantees that each bite will turn out a wonderful mixture of chewy-yet-yielding chunks of meat, with the freshness and crunch from the water chestnuts, coupled with the addictively crispy beancurd skin. The 5-spice powder is then the magic ingredient that becomes the catalyst that makes this great.

Penang Lor Bak

450g lean pork
6 water chestnuts
1 large onion1 small egg
Couple stalks spring onions
1 large beancurd sheet

Seasoning:
Dash of pepper
2 tsp five-spice powder
2 tsp sugar
2 tbsp light soy sauce
1 tsp oyster sauce
cornflourtoothpicks

Mise en place:
Slice the pork into smallest pieces your patience can muster - don't be tempted by the food processor or even to buy ground pork - you'd be ruining it!I sliced mine into 3-4 mm cubes

Peel and slice the water chestnuts into similarly sized small piecesSame with the onion and spring onions

1) Mix up the pork dice, onions, water chestnuts and seasoning together. Leave to marinate for 6 - 8 hours
2) Add the egg and enough cornflour to make reduce the wateriness of the mixture to a paste like consistency (add a little and mix as you go along - I ended up adding about 3 tbsp)
3) Spread out your beancurd sheet. Wipe the sheet with a damp cloth to remove some of the salt
4) I separated mine into 8 pieces
5) Put approximately 4 tbsp pork mixture into each beancurd sheet (leave a 2 cm allowance on the sides of the sheet). Use your spoon to compact the mixture as much as possible
6) Roll up the sheet, twist the ends (like a Christmas cracker) and secure with toothpicks
7) Place the rolls in a bowl with a tight cover (I used my Pyrex dish) and steam for half an hour
8) After the rolls have finished steaming, heat up your oil in your deep fryer/wok/pan. Test with a small piece of beancurd. It should turn a deep brown pretty fast. Deep fry the rolls till dark brown and crispy.
9) Carefully remove the toothpicks (I found that twisting the toothpicks before pulling them out them made them easier to remove without too much damage to my pretty little frills )
10) Serve with the lor sauce

Brown Sauce for Penang Lobak
Recipe by Amy Beh http://kuali.com/recipes/viewrecipe.asp?r=1324

Ingredients
2 tbsp dark soy sauce2 tbsp castor sugar
1/8 tsp Chinese five spice powder (ng heong fun)
1/8 tsp salt4-5 tbsp water

1-2 tbsp corn flour or tapioca flour, mixed with 3 tbsp water
1 egg white, lightly beaten

Method
Combine all ingredients in a small saucepot. B
ring to a low simmering boil over a gentle heat until it turns starchy and sticky
Stir occasionally until sauce turns smooth.
Add in egg white and stir with a fork to form fine strands.
Set aside to cool and use this as a dipping sauce for serving lor bak rolls.