Char Siu Roast Pork

Inspired by Pacificana - Brooklyn, NY

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My friends and I started a tradition a few years back of having dinner in Sunset Park (Brooklyn’s Chinatown) before an annual gathering of local homebrewers nearby. Amazing food aside, I always love the huge banquet halls you’ll find in some of the more traditional Cantonese restaurants in that area. We all sit around a huge round table, order several dishes, and scoop up portions of each as we spin the plates around on a turntable. Everything is really great but the char sui (Chinese BBQ Roast Pork) is a favorite.

This recipe was inspired by a number of visits to Pacifica in the Sunset Park neighborhood of Brooklyn in New York City. Truth be told, the entire area has always been far more impressive to me than Manhattan’s Chinatown but that’s probably because there are far less tourists. If you are looking for authenticity then this is a great area to check out. That being said, char sui roast pork is far less intimidating that you might think. Everyone can marinade and roast a pork shoulder. That’s all you’re doing here but with common Chinese spices available at the vast majority of local grocery stores.

INGREDIENTS

CHAR SUI ROAST PORK(Serves about 8):

  • 3 lbs boneless pork shoulder (you can be slightly over)

  • ⅓ cup sugar

  • 3 tsp salt

  • 1 tsp Chinese five spice

  • 1 tsp white pepper

  • 1 tsp sesame oil

  • 1 ½ TBS rice wine (or rice vinegar)

  • 1 ½ TBS soy sauce

  • 1 ½ TBS hoisin sauce

  • 3 tsp molasses

  • ¼ tsp red food coloring (optional)

  • 4 cloves of garlic, minced

  • 3 TBS honey

GO FOR IT

MARINADE:

  1. Cut pork into 3 long strips (1 lb each) that are about 3 inches thick, then place is a large bowl or dish

  2. In another bowl, mix sugar, salt, Chinese five spice, white pepper, sesame oil, rice wine/vinegar, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, molasses, food coloring, and minced garlic

  3. Save ¼ cup of the marinade for basting later, and pour everything else over the pork and rub into the meat until well coated

  4. Cover pork and marinade in the refrigerator at least 8 hours or overnight.

CHAR SUI ROAST PORK:

  1. When finished marinating, place pork on a grill rack in a roasting pan after filling pan with 2 cups of water (if you do not do this, you will be in for a very smoky kitchen as the marinade and juices fall into the pan in the hot oven)

  2. Place pork in a 475°F oven for 25 minutes, then rotate the pork and roast for an additional 15 minutes

  3. As pork finishes, combine honey with 2 TBS of hot water (to help make it more fluid) and then mix that with the ¼ cup of marinade you saved from earlier

  4. After 2nd half of pork has roasted 15 minutes, remove from oven and baste with marinade mix and then place back into oven for an additional 5 to 10 minutes (or until internal temperature reached 160°F) before removing a final time and brushing with what remains of marinade mix

  5. Let pork rest 10 minutes before slicing and serving

NOTES:

Do what you can to get the boneless pork shoulder here. I made this for friends during a weekend getaway and all the nearby grocery store had was bone-in. It still came out really fantastic but cutting it into three separate 1 lb portions was quite the pain with the bone in there.

Furthermore, you may notice the optional red food coloring and be surprised. As it turns out, the food coloring is just there to add to the presentation. This is actually quite common for not only this Chinese dish but in some Al Pastor recipes in Mexican cooking as well as quite a few other dishes worldwide. You can skip it if you don’t have any food coloring on hand but it will make your food look really really cool.