Indonesia - Pork Cooked in Soya Sauce (Babi Kecap)

Pork Cooked in Soya Sauce 

(Babi Kecap)

Though Indonesia is an Islamic country, there is some pork available. It is hard to find and most restaurants don't serve it because any restaurant that cooks pork would have to have completely separate facilities and equipment to prepare it or the restaurant would not be considered halal (clean).

Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients

-       1/2 kg (1 1/4 lb) fillet of pork -or leg of pork

-       1 tb Clear soya sauce

-       2 tb Plain flour

-       1/2 ts Powdered ginger

-       20 g (4 oz) button mushrooms

-       4 Cloves garlic

-       1 sl of root ginger, about 2 cm -(1") across and 1/2 cm -(1/4") thick

-       3 tb Dark soya sauce

-       Pepper or a pinch of chilli -powder

-       2 tb water

-       2 tb Medium dry sherry or rice -wine (optional)

-       2 ts Lemon juice

-       6 tb Oil or pork fat

Directions

This, as its name suggests, is pork cooked in soya sauce. It is a particular favourite with my own husband and children, who always know when it is about to appear on the table because the ginger and garlic frying in the sauce smell so deliciously savoury.

-       Cut the pork into small cubes.

-       Put the flour into a bowl and add the clear soya sauce and ginger powder, mixing them well together.

-       Coat the pork with the mixture and then let it stand for at least 30 minutes.

-       Clean and slice the mushrooms.

-       Peel the garlic and ginger and slice them very thin; you can use these thin slices as they are, or cut them again into very tiny sticks.

-       Heat the oil or fat in a wok or thick frying pan and fry the meat, half of it at a time, turning it from time to time, for 5 minutes.

-       Repeat the process for the remaining half of the meat.

-       The flour that coated the meat will tend to stay in the pan or stick to the bottom of it, but leave it there-it will thicken the sauce later.

-       Now take most of the oil out of the pan, leaving only about two tablespoons which you then heat again.

-       In this, fry the tiny slices of garlic and ginger and the mushrooms, stirring continuously, for i minute.

-       Add the soya sauce, the water and the meat. mix well, season with pepper or chilli powder, and stir continuously for 1 or 2 minutes. just before serving, add the sherry or rice wine and the lemon juice. Serve hot.

This dish keeps extremely well in the freezer, and it is worth making a large quantity from, say, half a leg-of pork, which is much cheaper than buying pork fillet. If you are going to freeze your Babi Kecap, however, do not add the sherry or lemon juice at the time of cooking.

To serve from the freezer, thaw the meat out completely and heat quickly on a high flame for 2 to 3 minutes, stirring or shaking the pan well all the time.

Add the sherry or rice wine and lemon juice just before serving.