Sauced meat in Changchun: a century-old food on the tip of the tongue

Changchun Sauced Meat is a famous dish with a long history in Northeast China. It is deeply loved by diners because of its mellow sauce flavor, compact meat quality and instant taste. Making Changchun Sauced Meat seems complicated, but in fact, as long as you master the key steps and skills, everyone can make this mouth-watering delicacy at home.

Step 1: material selection and production

Raw materials are the key to the quality of sauced meat. Choose pork belly with fat and thin, and the ratio of fat to thin is about 3:7. After washing the pork belly, cut it into uniform strips with a width of about 5 cm and a length of about 10 cm.

Next, making sauce is the soul of sauce meat. Pour the rock sugar into the pot and stir-fry slowly until it melts into caramel color. Add water, soy sauce, soy sauce and sweet noodle sauce and stir well. Add cinnamon, fragrant leaves, star anise, pepper, ginger slices and other spices, pour cooking wine and appropriate amount of salt, and cook for 30 minutes on low heat.

Step 2: marinate and taste.

Soak the meat strips in the sauce for more than 4 hours. During this period, it is rotated once every 1 hour to ensure that the meat strips are evenly tasted. The longer the curing time, the stronger the flavor of the sauce meat.

Step 3: air drying and setting.

Take out the marinated meat strips and drain them, and hang them in a ventilated and cool place to dry. The air drying process needs to last for 2-3 days until the surface of the meat strips becomes dry and hard. This step can make the sauce go deep into the meat strips, and at the same time remove excess water to make the sauce meat firm.

Step 4: Cook thoroughly.

Put the air-dried meat strips into a steamer and cook for about 2 hours on high fire until the inside of the meat strips is cooked thoroughly. In the process of steaming, the sauce will ooze from the surface of the meat strips, making the sauce meat bright and attractive.

Step 5: fry and color again.

Fry the steamed sauce meat in hot oil for about 2-3 minutes until the surface of the meat strips is golden and crisp. This step of frying can make the sauce meat crispy outside and tender inside, and the sauce is more fragrant.

Step 6: Arrange and load plates.

Take out the fried sauce meat, drain the oil, cut it into pieces and put it on the plate. At this time, the sauce meat is ruddy in color and rich in sauce flavor. With shredded onion, coriander and cucumber strips, an authentic Changchun sauce meat is ready.

Tips:

When making sauce, you can adjust the ratio of soy sauce to sweet noodle sauce according to your personal taste. Those who like salty taste can add more soy sauce, and those who like sweet taste can add some sweet noodle sauce.

In the process of air drying, attention should be paid to ventilation and shade to avoid bacteria breeding in the meat strips.

When frying again, the oil temperature should not be too high, so as to avoid burning or frying the meat strips.

Sauced meat can be matched with different side dishes according to personal preference, such as sauerkraut and shredded radish.

The prepared sauce meat can be sealed and stored in the refrigerator, and it can be taken as you eat, with better flavor.