Homemade Pork Jerky, 肉干

My baked food for last week didn't turn out well. I was very busy at work and was stressed over the tight deadlines. I thought I could distress by doing some baking. Unfortunately, my bakes didn't turn out well.

I made a Black Sesame Butter Cake earlier in the week and it turned out to be hard and almost tasteless. I made an Olive Ciabatta and the dough was too wet and dense. It was still edible though. The only more presentable bake was the Pork Jerky, or known as Bak Kwa in Singapore.

When I saw Sonia's post earlier this year, I was very tempted to try it myself. However, as I don't know what kind of meat is good for making this Pork Jerky, I didn't attempt this. Fortunately over the weekend, I saw that "Porkee" lean pork was on sales at our local supermarket, I thought of trying out the recipe. If it didn't turn out well, at least the cost of making it wasn't so huge.
meat_porkjerky1
As it turned out, the meat was quite soft despite the fact that it was a little too thick. The overall taste was nice, as commented by my children. However, I found it lacking of some "char siew sauce" taste though the kind of caramelized taste was there. Actually, it wasn't too difficult to make. It was rather pleasing to see the end result. I'm re-posting the recipe for my personal reference.
meat_porkjerky2 Recipe for Homemade Pork Jerky (肉干), adapted from Nasi Lemak Lover.

Ingredients:
500g Lean meat (from Porkee), chopped and cut until almost like minced
100g sugar

1 tbsp Light soy sauce
1/2 tbsp Chinese rice wine (omitted because I ran out of it)
1/2 tbsp Fish sauce
1 tbsp Mushroom sauce (or oyster sauce)
1/2 tbsp Dark caramel sauce 
1/8 tsp Chinese five spices powder 
A dash of Pepper
1/2 tsp Rock salt
2 tbsp Honey

Method:

1. Put all ingredients together in a big bowl and mix well. Blend and stir the mixture in one direction until the meat becomes gooey. Important to mix them till gooey, otherwise the meat might break out. Cover and store in the fridge for several hours.
2.Spread the marinated pork thinly onto a paper-lined baking tray using your fingers.
3. Bake at pre-heated oven at 160C for 15-20mins. Remove from oven. Increase the oven temperature to 240C. At this moment, there will be a mixture of the meat and its juices on the baking tray. Leave them as it was.
4. Wait till slightly cooled, cut into your desired size and shape using a pizza cutter, and placed them back on the same baking tray.
5. Grill (top heat only) at 240C for 10mins, remove from the oven, flip over to the other side, and continue grilling for 7-9mins or until golden brown with slight burnt.
6. Once done, let it cool and enjoy! meat_porkjerky3 meat_porkjerky4

9 comments:

Unknown said...
July 8, 2012 at 5:12 PM

Very nice looking pork jerky. Great to have low fat version. More healthy. I like to have it with sandwich :) have a nice day!

Passionate About Baking said...
July 8, 2012 at 5:24 PM

Thanks! Yes, healthier version means less tender. :p Thanks for the idea, I almost forgot I can sandwich this in my breads!

Jess @ Bakericious said...
July 9, 2012 at 3:23 PM

Hi Jane, I love bak kwa, yours look really tempting. Luckily I have a pack of bak kwa with me if not I am sure craving for it hahaha...I love thick bak kwa too, the one I always buy is thick, soft and tender, 1kg only a few slices but so so yummy.

passionbaker said...
July 9, 2012 at 8:55 PM

Gee, at this time if the year you still have Bak kwa really shows that you like it a lot! Hehe... If you like it so much, you should really try making it, it's really very simple and healthier too! I used lean pork and it was still tender. Try it Jess!

Sonia ~ Nasi Lemak Lover said...
July 19, 2012 at 9:29 AM

Thanks for the shout out! Yours look good too.

Unknown said...
January 27, 2014 at 9:41 AM

Wow, homemade bak kwa ! Didn't know this can be even possible. I am keen to try out for CNY. Won't freshly minced pork be better than the Pork Kee frozen ones?

Passionate About Baking said...
January 27, 2014 at 11:13 AM

Grace,
Definitely fresh ones are better. That was what i had in my freezer. Good thing that after baking, it didn't have that frozen taste. Thanks to the good marinating. :)

Unknown said...
January 28, 2014 at 11:26 PM

Would you consider trying out pineapple bak kwa or orange bak kwa ? Share the recipe with us if you do. Thanks

Passionate About Baking said...
January 29, 2014 at 8:44 AM

Grace,
If I can get hold of the recipe, I would like to try too. :)

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