I'm the Culinary God-Chapter 525 - 261: The Crunchy Sweet and Sour Pork, Totally Not Enough to Eat! [Seeking Monthly Ticket]
"Would you like to spend 1,888,888 points to exchange for the special item ’Eye of Discrimination’?"
After pressing the exchange button for the Eye of Discrimination, the system’s prompt immediately sounded in Lin Xu’s mind.
"Yes!"
Once the exchange was confirmed, the System Points were automatically deducted.
Then, the prompt sounded again:
"Exchange successful. Congratulations to the host for obtaining the special item ’Eye of Discrimination’, which can accurately determine the quality of ingredients and the Level of dishes."
He had finally exchanged for the Eye of Discrimination.
Lin Xu felt a cool sensation in his eyes. Qin Wei had just finished making a dish of hand-torn cabbage, and Lin Xu focused his attention to use the Eye of Discrimination. A line of text soon appeared before him:
"A dish made with cabbage, sliced pork belly, chunks of dried chili, chopped scallions, minced ginger, minced garlic, table salt, Rice Vinegar, Light Soy Sauce, vegetable oil, and lard, Level: Superior."
TSK, this Skill is really nice. From now on, just by standing at the kitchen door and watching everyone’s dishes one by one, it’ll be crystal clear who slacked off during the cooking process.
He then looked at other chefs’ dishes, and their levels were all above Excellent Level.
This meant that everyone’s cooking skills were good, and they had all put their hearts into the cooking without cutting corners.
The Eye of Discrimination is really handy. Lin Xu decided to take advantage of his abundant points to exchange for another special item while on this winning streak. The sooner you buy it, the sooner you enjoy it, right?
However, after opening the special item column, a prompt popped up on the page:
[This page will refresh after 167:58:35. Pay 3,000,000 points for an immediate refresh.]
What the...? Is it trying to learn all the bad habits of domestic game companies? Why introduce an immediate refresh of all things? This setting is just freaking brilliant—brilliantly infuriating! 167 hours... that’s one week. Guess I’ll check back in a week then. Although I have points now, I don’t want to spend them on an immediate refresh. With so many points, wouldn’t it be better to exchange them for Basic Techniques?
Putting aside those thoughts, he continued to cut scallion threads and carrot shreds.
In the dish Sweet and Sour Pork, shredded Scallion and Ginger, and carrots are used for garnish. Not much is needed, but they must be cut finely enough.
This way, when added to the wok, they will cook through the instant they are heated.
The flavor of the Scallion and Ginger shreds will also seep into the meat.
As for cilantro stems, they are used to add aroma and reduce greasiness. Adding them gives the meat a fresh cilantro flavor and effectively lessens the oiliness of the pork slices.
Once these garnishes were ready, Lin Xu took a small bowl and began to mix the sauce for the Sweet and Sour Pork.
Two large spoonfuls of White Vinegar, two large spoonfuls of White Sugar, half a ladleful of Rice Vinegar, a tiny bit of Flavoring, a little sesame oil, and finally, a touch of Dark Soy Sauce to give the sweet and sour sauce a slight color.
White Vinegar sharpens the sourness, while Rice Vinegar enhances the fragrance. Only by mixing them can the desired enticingly sour and aromatic effect be achieved.
As for Dark Soy Sauce, it’s purely for coloring.
With Dark Soy Sauce, the Sweet and Sour Pork achieves a richer golden hue, making the dish look more attractive.
Normally in a restaurant kitchen, the ratio of sugar to vinegar is one-to-one. However, with more meat today, the sauce needs to simmer a bit longer.
Therefore, more vinegar is needed to compensate for the evaporation during the extended cooking time.
If cooking this on a home stove, the ratio of sugar to vinegar should be at least 1:1.5. Otherwise, by the time the sweet and sour sauce is ready, the vinegar will have mostly evaporated, leaving only a sugary syrup in the wok.
A dish made with such a sauce wouldn’t be Sweet and Sour Pork anymore; it should be called candied pork loin or sugar-glazed pork loin.
He stirred the sauce in the bowl, ensuring the White Sugar dissolved as much as possible.
Then, he set up the wok with oil, preparing to deep-fry the pork slices.
"Boss, are you using peanut oil or salad oil?"
"Soybean Oil!"
Since I’m making a Northeast dish, it’s natural to use Soybean Oil, which people from the Northeast commonly consume. Only then will the Sweet and Sour Pork be truly authentic.
As the oil heated up, Lin Xu brought over the soaked potato starch.
When making Sweet and Sour Pork, one cannot use common cornstarch or sweet potato starch; instead, potato starch, commonly found in the Northeast, must be used.
Only this way will the Sweet and Sour Pork turn out crispy and delicious, with a more beautiful and tempting color when fried.
After pouring off the excess water from the surface, the white starch inside felt as hard as a brick when patted. However, it could still be dug into by hand and even flowed slowly when the container was tilted.
He poured this starch into the bowl with the marinated meat and drizzled in half a spoonful of cooking oil.
This step was essential for making the pork slices crispy and could not be skipped.
After adding the oil, he first mixed the semi-liquid starch by hand to incorporate the oil. Then, he combined it thoroughly with the pork slices, ensuring every piece of pork loin was evenly coated with the white starch.
When the oil was about seventy percent hot, he started adding the pork slices to the wok.
There was a technique to adding them too: one couldn’t just toss the slices in. Instead, holding a corner of a slice, he would dredge it through the starch batter in the bowl a few times, ensuring both sides were evenly coated.
The purpose of this was to fully stretch out the meat slices, making them appear larger and more impressive when fried.
It also helped to spread the starch batter evenly, resulting in uniformly fried pork slices without any large clumps of batter sticking together.
After both sides were evenly coated, he slowly lowered the meat slice into the hot oil.
He didn’t just toss it in. Instead, he held the slice, allowing its lower half to fry for a moment before releasing it completely. This effectively prevented the meat from curling up as it entered the oil.
We folks from the Northeast don’t fuss about much when eating, but the presentation has to be lavish. If the fried meat looks shrunken and unsightly, it’s an eyesore, and it’s embarrassing to serve.
