Oven Toaster Char Siew 叉烧

Char Siew, literally means 'fork roast', is a popular dish in Singapore. Long strips of seasoned pork skewered with long forks and roasted until the sauce caramelised and slightly charred. It is usually sold alongside with roast chicken, roast duck, braised tofu and egg etc..

Char Siew is a very versatile dish, you can have it with rice, noodles, hor fun, or use it as fillings for bun or pao.

To make it the traditional way, you may need to char-grill it. However, a friend shared with me her 'short-cut' version which I find very suitable for home-cook. There is no need for char-grill, just a oven toaster will do...

The pork is cooked twice, once half-cooked in the frying pan and then finished off in oven to give the charred look. Indeed this is a very simple and convenient dish, because you can prepare it in advance and just toss it in the oven before serving. Whenever I make this, I made sure there are a lot of extra sauces. We use it to drizzle over the rice and the plain rice immediately taste much more appetizing. 

So how does the bright red color of char siew came about? Well, it could be the red fermented bean curd, red yeast rice wine, red yeast powder, red yeast rice reaidue, or simply, red coloring (which I believe is more commonly used nowadays). If you are not super fancy of the red color, I believe you can just skip it. 

This recipe might not show you the very traditional way of making char siew but it has the busy mom in mind. 

This recipe is easy to make, but it always helps to watch the step-by-step video tutorial below.

Char Siew (Simplified Version)

Ingredients

• 200g pork collar, cut into 2 strips
• 1/2 tsp sesame oil
• 4 tbsp ABC Kecap Manis (ABC dark sweet sauce)
• 2 tbsp Shao Xing wine
• 1 tbsp soy sauce
• 2 tsp honey
• 1/4 tsp 5-spice powder
• 1/4 tsp red yeast powder (optional)

Cooking Directions

1. In a sauce pan, heat sesame oil, add dark sweet sauce, wine, honey, 5 spice powder, red yeast powder and cook until sauce thicken.
2. Add pork collar, stir to coat well.
3. Bake in preheated oven at 200C for 10-15 minutes or until the sauce slightly caramelised.

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叉烧（简易版） 

材料 

• 200克猪肉，切成2条 
• 半茶匙麻油 
• 4汤匙ABC Kecap Manis（ABC黑甜酱） 
• 2汤匙料酒 
• 1汤匙酱油
• 2茶匙蜂蜜 
• 1/4 茶匙5五香粉 
• 1/4茶匙红曲粉（选择性） 

做法 

1. 在一个平底锅，加热麻油，放入黑甜酱油，酒，蜂蜜，5香料粉，红曲粉，煮至酱汁变稠。 
2. 加入猪肉，均匀裹上浆汁。 
3. 放入已预热烤炉烤200℃ 10-15分钟或烤到略焦。