Bak Kwa is a must during Chinese New Year! Since small, my mum would queue up in the supermarkets or market just to get her hands on a few packets of Bak Kwa. Bak Kwa consists of many types of meat but the type of meat depends on the flavour. So for this year, why don’t you try making homemade bak kwa?
Typically, Bak Kwa is made of pork, but there are other types of meat as well such as chicken. During my high school years, I would gift some of the chicken Bak Kwa to my Malay friends and neighbours as they love it very much. After a few years, as we grew into adults and have decided to make our own homemade Bak Kwa instead of buying out.
The History Of Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky)
Bak Kwa is a type of dried pork meat snacks. It is often eaten during Chinese New Year. This delicacy originated from Fujian, China during the 1900s. In Ancient China, this was a way of meat preservation.
This snack was considered a luxury during that time as the meat was only for the higher class society. Therefore, Bak Kwa was an exclusive snack during the Chinese New Year among the Chinese community in Fujian.
The Introduction Of Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky)
Traditionally, the proper way of making Bak Kwa was to slice the meat into thin slices and marinate them with some sugar and herbs or spices. Then, it was left to air dry and cook them over a hot plate.
Now, with the advancing technology, we usually just grilled the meat over charcoal fire to give it a smokier flavour. The typical marination for Bak Kwa consists of sugar, rice wine, soy sauce, salt, white pepper, honey, five-spice powder and fish sauce. Bak Kwa is usually marinated over a few hours or overnight to ensure the flavour gets into the meat itself.
How To Make Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky)?
Homemade Bak Kwa is a cost-saving way to get this delicious snack without spending huge bucks. Furthermore, it is healthier to make this on your own as it has zero preservative properties. With that, it means that Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky)’s shelf life is not as long as the one you buy at the department stores.
First of all, you will need to prep your pork meat. For this, you will need to marinate your ground pork meat with some soy sauce, fish sauce, sugar, five-spice powder, white pepper and honey. You will need to marinate this for a couple of hours so that the flavours can be absorbed by the meat. Besides ground pork meat, you may use pork slices as well. Either way, both are great for Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky).
Typically, Bak Kwa tastes better when it is grilled over a charcoal fire. However, you may choose to bake them in an oven as well. It tastes as great as grilling them. So, depending on your preference, you may choose either grilling or baking them. Once your Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky) is fully baked or grilled, you may cut them up into smaller pieces.
After grilling or baking them, let the Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky) rest for a couple of minutes or up to an hour. You may then store them in a container or gift boxes to give to your friends and family members! This type of Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky) can be stored up to a week or so. It is better to consume them as early as possible as the meat contains no preservatives.
Tips :
- When choosing your ground pork or chicken, make sure to get meat with some fats. If you get lean meat, your Bak Kwa would not taste as nice. Meat with some fats tend to be more tender and the flavour can be absorbed better.
- Make sure to get fresh meat instead of frozen ones. This is because once you defrost the frozen meat, you will get some moisture in them and it will affect the quality and the taste of the meat.
- You will need a get a good pan ratio to prep for your Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky). This is to ensure that your Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky) is not too thick and not too thin. The perfect measurement for roughly five hundred grams of meat is 15 X 10-inch jelly roll pan.
- When baking or grilling your Homemade Bak Kwa (Chinese Pork Jerky), you may choose to slather honey mixture over the meat over and over again until you get the desired honey-glazed appearance you want. Lastly, we wish you all a prosperous and happy Chinese New Year!
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