Recipes

Sweet and Sour Pork

Moo Tod Preow Waan

Lightly fried pork simmered in a sweet plum sauce with pineapple and tomato

Prep

10 min

Cook

20 min

Serves

4

Heat

mild

This dish shares a name and a general shape with the Chinese-American classic, but the flavor goes a different direction, building its sauce from plum sauce and a little tamarind rather than the usual vinegar and ketchup base. Pork cubes get a light milk marinade and a coconut-and-wheat-flour breading before a brief fry that leaves them soft rather than crisp, since they finish cooking in the sauce afterward. Onion and chili sautéed right in the sweet sauce add an herbaceous edge, and fresh tomato stirred in only at the very end stays bright rather than turning mushy, making the whole dish closer to a thick, sticky sweet course than a typical stir-fry.

Ingredients

• 267 g Pork tenderloin (trimmed, cut into bite-sized cubes)
• 2 tablespoons Evaporated milk, unsweetened (for marinating)
• 1/3 cup Coconut flour (for breading)
• 1/3 cup All-purpose flour (for breading)
• 1-2 Tomatoes (cut into thick wedges)
• 2/3 cup Pineapple (cut into small chunks)
• 2/3 Brown or yellow onion, large (halved and thickly sliced)
• 1-2 Red Thai long chilies (sliced diagonally)
• 3 1/2 tablespoons Sugar
• 1/3 cup Plum sauce
• 1 1/3 teaspoons Fish sauce
• 2/3 teaspoon Tamarind paste

Directions

1. Trim the pork and cut into bite-sized cubes. Marinate in the evaporated milk for 1 hour.
2. Cut the tomatoes into wedges, the pineapple into small chunks, the onion into thick slices, and the chili diagonally. Combine the coconut flour and all-purpose flour.
3. Roll the milk-coated pork pieces in the flour mixture until well coated.
4. Fry the breaded pork in deep oil over medium heat for about 2 minutes, until just barely browned and still soft — avoid letting it get hard and crispy. Drain on a wire rack or paper towel.
5. In a clean wok, stir together the sugar and plum sauce over low heat until the sugar melts, without letting it boil.
6. Add the chili and onion and cook in the sauce until the onion softens slightly.
7. Add the pineapple and bring back to a boil.
8. Add the fried pork and stir well. Cook slowly over low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring constantly, until hot and sticky.
9. Turn off the heat and stir in the tomatoes, letting them soften slightly in the residual heat as the dish cools a little.
10. Serve on a shared plate, garnished with mint, cilantro, or parsley.

Notes

Fry the breaded pork only until barely browned, not crisp — it finishes softening in the sauce afterward, so starting too crunchy leaves it tough by the time it's served.

Substitutions

Regular all-purpose flour can replace the coconut flour in the breading if that's what's on hand.