Gua-tsi-rou: Steamed Pork Patty with Soy Marinaded Cucumbers (瓜子肉)
My attempt to glam up a humble Taiwanese bento dish didn't quite go as planned
Since last week’s recipe was Taiwanese Soy Marinaded Cucumbers, it’s only natural that I follow that up with gua-tsi-rou (瓜子肉), a steamed pork patty made with ground pork, flavored by and dotted with little bits of the pickles and other aromatics. It’s homey enough to quickly whip up on a weeknight, but since the holidays are coming up, I wanted to see if I could give it a glow-up to earn a place at the holiday dinner spread this year.
Traditionally the ground pork and minced pickle mixture is very simply mixed and steamed right in the same bowl, left immersed in its own juice, and sprinkled with chopped scallions. I had great ambitions to give it the Taiwanese banquet treatment. It would have my homemade soy pickles and not canned. It would be enrobed in thickened, glistening gravy made from the meat juice. It would be inlaid with homemade salted duck egg halves, and covered with specks of gold fitting for the holidays. Well, things didn’t go as I had planned.
I opened the glass jar of salted duck eggs I made dated June 30, 2023. They had been sitting in salt water solution for almost 6 months, 5 months than what was called for, and they have now gone BAD. I had a feeling but didn’t want to face the fact that I was supposed to boil the eggs and store them in the fridge in July. On the other hand, the pickles I made couldn’t be used either, as I had accidentally dumped a container of cold-brew coffee into my pickles, thinking it was just another jar of pickle juice. I accepted defeat, went to the store, and grabbed some canned soy pickles and salted duck eggs. After working hard in the kitchen for 2 days, tweaking the recipe, and documenting the process, the result looks like, well, what do you think?
In my head I’m thinking, oh it looks like something out of a Sci-Fi movie. A developing embryo maybe? But you know what, even if the appearance of the dish didn’t do it for me, the texture is fantastic! The use of fatty ground pork gives it a tender and juicy mouthfeel. The technique of working the pork to develop the protein strands provides bounciness and gives shape to the patty. The subtle hints of white pepper and ginger go very well with the anticipated whiff of gameyness of pork. So I still want to put out this recipe today for you, I had a promise to fulfill from last week after all.
So I hope you give it a try during the holidays, “glammed up” or not. Because it’s not perfection that brings people together, but simply showing up for each other. I’m often in my own way with my perfectionistic tendencies, but I want to look back at this dish and say I worked hard on it, it’s not how I expected it to look, but I finished it and shared it with the world, with you, who have supported my Taiwanese food journey so far. If you dig the kitschy look, I appreciate you!! If you made this recipe as is it would be delicious and a be a great conversation piece!
This dish will show up for you to comfort you whether it looks like a cousin of Scotch eggs, an embryo, or an alien concoction. With this, I wish you a restful, joyful, and yummy holiday!
INGREDIENTS
1 lb ground pork
123g (6 oz) of soy pickled cucumbers, minced, juice saved1
2 scallions, finely diced
2 tsp grated ginger
1 tsp white pepper
1 tbsp rice wine
4 tsp potato starch, divided evenly
2 salted duck eggs, whole
steamed broccoli florets
edible gold leaf (optional)
DIRECTIONS:
Prepare the pickles: drain soy pickles from the jar and save the juice. Finely mince the pickles with a knife or in a food processor.
Prepare the ground pork: If you have coarse ground pork, lay it flat on a cutting board and chop to give it a finer texture, for about 3-5 minutes or until the fat and meat bits are smaller and evenly distributed.
Mix everything: In a medium bowl, combine the pork, pickles, scallions, ginger, white pepper, rice wine, and 2 tbsp of pickle juice. Work the mixture with your fingers or with a pair of chopsticks going in one direction (either clockwise or counterclockwise) until the pork loosens up and starts to develop strands, and the mixture becomes a cohesive mass.
Transfer mixture to a bowl: cut the salted eggs in half with a sharp knife with the shells on. Scoop out the halves, and lay them flat side down in a bowl in a concentric layout. Place the pork mixture into the bowl in batches, and pat firmly. Press and create a circular dent in the middle of the pork mixture (this helps with even cooking)
Steam the patty: set on a rack in a steamer filled with 5 cups of water. Prop the lid ajar with 2 chopsticks, and steam until clear juice comes out when poked into the middle with a chopstick, about 40-50 minutes.
Assemble to dish: Let rest for 10 minutes before removing the patty with a slotted spoon and invert onto a serving plate with upright rims. Mix 2 tsps potato starch and 1/4 cup water into a slurry, set aside. Drain the meat juice through a sieve. With a spoon, remove as much fat as you can and boil on the stove top with the slurry added until thickened. Garnish with edible gold leaf if desired, and pour all over the patty. Arrange broccoli around the patty and serve.
Any brand would do, but I recommend the IGV brand (red logo, 愛之味 in Chinese) “Pickled cucumber in soy sauce,“ which is conveniently the exact amount needed for this recipe. It is a good idea to use soy cucumber pickles made in Taiwan, as they would all have similar flavor profiles and are good for this recipe.
just looking at the photos makes me hungry!