Steamed Rice with Preserved Pork-Belly and Egg | Sybaritica

When I featured Chinese Preserved Pork-Belly  in a recent ‘Foodstuffs’ post, I said that I planned to use some of it in a very common way by steaming it over rice. This dish, which permits of countless variations, is a very ‘homey’ sort of preparation and many people add the pork, along with other ingredients, to rice in electric steamers to make a quick, simple meal. I am using a clay-pot to steam my rice and I am departing from the more standard method by using pre-cooked rice, thus necessitating a fairly short cooking time. In addition to the pork, I will be adding some greens and other flavorful ingredients…

The Ingredients

  • 1 ½ cups cooked Rice;
  • 1 slice Preserved Pork Belly cut into chunks (about 1 cup in all);
  • 3 dried Black Mushrooms (Shiitake), reconstituted and sliced;
  • 1 medium sized Baby Bok Choy;
  • 2 Dried Scallops (conpoy);
  • 2 Eggs;
  • 2 Scallions, thinly sliced;
  • 1 tbsp. Oyster Sauce;
  • 1 tsp. Rice Wine;
  • ¼ tsp. Sesame Oil;
  • ½ tsp. each Salt and White Pepper.

The Method

First, cover the dried scallops with a quarter cup or so of boiling water and leave to soak for thirty minutes until softened. Afterwards, shred the scallops and save the soaking water.

Put the rice into a suitable steaming vessel (a clay-pot or the like) and stir in the sliced mushroom, oyster sauce and reserved soaking water from the scallops.

Beat the egg along with the shredded scallop, rice wine, sesame oil, slat and pepper and the white and light green parts of the scallion. Save the dark green parts for garnish.

Arrange the chunks of pork on top of the rice and then pour the egg mixture over it all.

Finally, place the bok choy around the edges of the dish and steam over high heat for about twenty minutes. When it is done, garnish with the remaining scallion and serve.

The Verdict

Well, it would be hard to mess up with such nice ingredients cooked so simply and my wife and I enjoyed a very nice lunch. I was a little disappointed that the egg didn’t form more of a topping for the rice as in some Japanese preparations but I guess the rice needs to be already hot so that the egg begins to cook when it is poured on rather than soak in. Still, it made the rice very nice tasting and gave it a pleasant, unexpected texture.

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