National Dishes of the World

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Char siu
Photo: Michael, Public domain, Wikimedia Commons

main dish

Char siu

叉燒 (chaa siu)

Roast pork in a glossy, sweet and savoury red glaze of honey, hoisin sauce and five-spice.

Eaten in: China, Hong Kong SAR China

Prep
15 min
Cooking
45 min
Resting
8 h
Total
9 h
Servings
4

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About the dish

Char siu is Cantonese roast pork and one of the siu mei – roast meats that hang on hooks in shop windows across Hong Kong and Guangzhou. Long strips of pork shoulder are marinated in honey, hoisin, soy sauce, rice wine, red fermented bean curd and five-spice, then roasted and basted several times until the edges caramelise. The name means ‘fork roasted’, because the meat was once skewered on long forks and cooked over a fire. It is served sliced over rice, with wonton noodles, and as the filling of fluffy char siu bao buns at dim sum.

Main ingredients

  • pork shoulder
  • honey
  • hoisin sauce
  • soy sauce
  • Shaoxing wine
  • five-spice powder
  • red fermented bean curd

China: In Guangzhou and all of Guangdong one of the most popular siu mei roast meats.

More: Wikipedia (en)

Recipe

Char siu

https://foodmap.ominuvo.com/dish/char-siu

Ingredients

4 servings

4 servings

Method

  1. Mix the hoisin, both soy sauces, wine, sugar, mashed bean curd with its liquid, five-spice and garlic; set aside 3 tbsp of the marinade for glazing.

  2. Rub the pork with the rest of the marinade, cover and refrigerate overnight.

  3. Heat the oven to 200°C, pour a cup of water into a roasting tin and set the pork on a rack above it.

  4. Roast for 20 minutes, then turn the strips and roast for another 15 minutes.

  5. Mix the reserved marinade with the honey, brush it over both sides of the pork and roast for about 10 minutes more under the grill until the glaze starts to char at the edges.

  6. Rest for 10 minutes, slice and serve with rice, greens and the juices from the tin.

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