Babi Pongteh

This is another Nonya dish, I think you can tell by now, that I really love peranakan nonya cuisine. There is this restaurant at Binjai Park called IVINS that sells very nice peranakan food at very reasonable prices. My family and I dine there at least once a month. One of the dishes that I always order is Babi Pongteh. I just love the aroma of tauceo in this dish, and the gravy goes very well with plain white rice. It is not spicy at all and my kids love it too. You can use pork ribs, pork collar meat or pork lean meat for this dish. My hubby is more health conscious, he told me to use lean meat next time. But this dish will taste delicious with any type of pork you choose.

It is best to get the better quality tauceo and black soya sauce for this recipe. It makes a lot of difference in the taste. Of course, the better quality it is, the more costly it gets. But since I'm cooking for my family and loved ones it's better to use quality ingredients. Remove the seeds from the green chilli if you only want the sweetness of the chilli and not the heat. I have added 1 green chilli in this recipe, you can add more if you prefer. I made my own coriander powder by lightly toasting the coriander seeds on a dry pan and grind them into powder. For this recipe, you need about 1tbsp of coriander seeds to get 1/2tbsp of coriander powder. This is one of those dishes that will taste even more robust the next day - provided you can still have leftovers on the first day!

Pic 1

stir-fry the shallots, garlic, coriander paste & tauceo

Pic 2

add in the pork ribs & stir-fry

Pic 3

add in the dark soya sauce & sugar

Pic 4

add in water & simmer till pork ribs are tender

Babi Pongteh

Ingredients:

500g prime pork ribs (cut into sections)

12 shallots (peel & coarsely grind)

4 cloves of garlic (peel & coarsely grind)

1tbsp tauceo (crushed)

1/2tbsp coriander powder

3tbsp oil

425ml water

1tbsp sugar

1tbsp dark soya sauce

1/4tsp salt

Method:

1. Coarsely grind the peeled shallots & garlic together.
2. Add some water to coriander powder to form a paste.
3. Heat wok over high heat, add oil. Lower heat and stir-fry ground shallots & garlic. Fry till golden brown. Sprinkle a little water to prevent it from burning.
4. Add the coriander paste and the tauceo. Sprinkle a little water again and fry till fragrant. (see pic 1)
5. Over high heat, add in the pork ribs and stir-fry for 3 mins. (see pic 2)
6. Add sugar & dark soya sauce. (see pic 3)
7. Lower heat and add half of the remaining water and simmer for 2 mins.
8. Add the rest of the water and bring to the boil, simmer till pork ribs are tender about 20-25 mins. (see pic 4)
9. Remove the spare ribs from the gravy, simmer (without lid) the gravy till it's reduced to half and becomes slightly thicker. Pour gravy over the spare ribs & serve.