Crispy Pork Crackling Better than the Pork Belly - Air Fryer Step-By-Step

When Chinese roasted pork belly is done right, it's got super crispy skin with tender and juicy meat. I can hardly believe I made this all by myself. Hey, everyone. I'm Flo. Dude is behind the camera, and we're all about simple food, simple faith. I tried making roasted pork belly last year, I think it was, for Chinese New Year. We had the family come over for dinner, and everyone thought it was store-bought. It's so easy to make. It was just ridiculous that I haven't figured it out prior to that time. And now, with COVID, it's just easier to make it at home than going into a Chinese barbecue meat shop and line up for ... All right, so you want to get pork belly with the skin on. That's where you're going to get the crispy skin from. And you want the pork belly to be nicely marbled like this, with even meat and fat in there so that you get the perfect bite. I recommend buying pork belly from the butcher so that you can actually get a nice cut instead of trying to piece together what you can find in the market. And the one that we buy at Costco actually doesn't have the skin on, and the skin is everything for this particular recipe. But the skinless one is perfect for char siu. Seriously, this recipe is so easy, you're going to wonder why you haven't tried making it at home. We're starting off with ... Well, we have to flip the pork belly over. And we're going to use about a teaspoon of Shaoxing wine. Shaoxing wine is a cooking rice wine. We're just going to massage that into the meat until it's all absorbed. And if you don't have Shaoxing wine, you can use a cooking sherry. We've tried bourbon, and it works really well. Something along that line. You don't want to use a mirin, which is a little bit sweet. It's different. And I'm just trying to think if there's anything else you can use in this place. Anyways, Shaoxing wine, you can find it in any Asian market, even on Amazon, I think. I forgot to mention that this is about a pound and a half of pork belly. We're making a seasoning now to sprinkle on the meat. So about a teaspoon of salt, a quarter teaspoon of five spice powder. You don't need much. Five spice powder is really pungent. An eighth of a teaspoon of ground white pepper. Just going to mix that up. It's actually similar to the seasoning that we would put on Taiwanese chicken nuggets. We're going to rub this into the bottom side of the pork belly as well. Just massage that in. Okay, then we're going to flip it over. And this will be the fun part. To make the skin of the pork belly super crispy, we had to invest in one of these. It's essentially a meat tenderizer, but it's like a bunch of, I don't know, almost like nails to poke holes into the pork belly. The pork belly skin is really tough, so you want to have something that's really sharp. Now, I have this meat skewer that you could just poke holes all over, but this is a game changer. All right, here we go. Dude, it's so violent. Just be glad your hand is not underneath. So the more holes you get into the pork belly skin, you'll get more bubbles and that will make it more crispy. And that's exactly what you want here. But you know what? If you don't have this, you can just use a metal skewer and just jab them. And be just as violent. Okay, I am now going to just score it so that it's easier to cut after it's cooked. Because when it's crispy and when the pork skin is crispy, it's really hard to cut through. You can see even a knife can barely cut through. No, you just want to cut through the skin. You don't want to cut too deep either. There we go. Can you see that? See, it's just the skin that you want cut. Okay, then we're going to generously salt the top. Maybe two good pinches of salt. And again, we're going to rub this into the skin. And what this will do, will draw out any moisture in the pork belly. And that again, will help you get really crispy skin. Once this is done, you're going to let it marinate in the fridge for 24 hours. No, it's not instant, right? But it is on our show because I've already marinated it yesterday. So I'm just going to swap places. And what a difference, eh? In terms of just the pork belly skin and how it dries out. Oh yeah. I wouldn't do it for less than 24 hours though. Maybe more if needed, but not less. So you really want to draw out all that moisture. And if there is any moisture sitting on top, just dab it away with a paper towel. And kind of remove any excess salt that may still be sitting on top. I forgot to mention that while marinating in the fridge, make sure that you leave it uncovered. Don't cover it up because you want that moisture to evaporate. I have tried several different methods in making pork belly over the past year. And I have to say, this is probably the best method and easiest way to get a really good pork belly. And you all know I can't be bothered with a lot of different steps. So this is the best way that I think will get you the best results. So let's keep going. Okay, I'm using a piece of foil because I want to wrap up the bottom of the pork belly without wrapping up the top. And you also want to make sure that your pork belly is going to fit into your air fryer. It looks like a bad gift wrap. All right, I did measure this ahead of time. So I really do hope that it does fit in my air fryer basket. Okay, I did preheat this at 350. And now that it's hot, well, I didn't think that through. So anyways, I think I can get this in there. These tongs. There we go. Hey, work with what you have, right? We're going to air fry this at 350 for 25 minutes. All right, see you then. All right, let's check it out. Oh my lad, that looks so good. All right, we're just going to take the whole thing out. Be careful because there's a lot of fat in the foil. And then I'm going to put this back in. And we're going to cook it for another eight minutes back in here without the foil. Just so that we can get more of this crispy skin. Bring it back in. And this time we're going to cook it at 400 for eight minutes. Oh my goodness. Looks so good. It looks amazing. The texture and the color. And see like all those holes that were poked in. That's where all these like bubbles are. That will add to the crunch. I love using the air fryer to make this because it really renders the fat well. And so that you don't get the blobby fat when you bite into it. We're going to let this rest so that we don't lose all the juiciness that is inside where the tender meat is. We're going to rest this for about 15 minutes and then we're going to cut into it. Oh yes, we will. All right, so it's been actually closer to 20 minutes. So I think it's well rested now. And I am so thankful to have scored this earlier so I can cut right through. Oh my goodness, all the juices are coming out anyways. Do you see how juicy that is? Oh my goodness. Look at it. It's just like pouring out of the meat. Oh, I can't wait. Oh yeah, instead of trying to break through that skin and make a mess. Oh my goodness, it looks so good. I can't even. Oh, my mouth is watering. You know with Chinese New Year coming up, there's no way we're going to like go and line up for barbecue meat. Which is one of the must-haves for Chinese New Year here. Okay, I'm going to cut into each piece now. What are you going to do? Just go for it. That's what I'm going to do. Oh, extra piece of skin for you, dude. Oh yeah, that's mine. All right, are you all ready for? Oh yeah. If there's any reason for Smell-O-Vision to exist, this is it. Oh yeah. It's pretty self-explanatory as to what this dish represents. And that is the culmination of the delivery vehicle for ultimate crackling skin. There it goes. Is there grease flowing down my lip? Dude, leave no crackling behind. It's moist. It's not like, you know, I've had a ton of roast pork in my lifetime. And I've had my share of dry meat, blobby fat and not crispy skin. It's almost like it was why bother kind of moments. But this is a culmination of juicy meat, flavorful meat, fat rendered perfectly. And that piece de resistance, the crispy skin. And as I ate that, the bottom part of the pork belly, because it's so thick, I couldn't, I mean, I didn't want to jam it all in my mouth because I wanted to spread out the goodness. When you get down to the bottom of the pork belly profile is where Flo marinated it. And it had that umami pop. So it's like not super salty, but just that umami explosion at the end. So I guess if you were to eat a thinner slice and all the way through and all in your mouth, it's like the flavors all over the place. Boom. I really can't wait to dig into this. It just it smells and looks so good. And the crunchiness from that skin is what I'm after. So yeah, can't wait till dinner. Unfortunately, this recipe is not in the cookbook, but come on, guys, it's so easy. For those of you who have already purchased the cookbook, thank you so much for your support. And if you get a chance, please leave us a review on Amazon. And I really hope that you are enjoying it. For more recipes just like this one, check it out. And I will see you over there.