Spare Ribs has its Own Attitude

Pork spare ribs are one of Chinese delicacy since long time ago. Spare Ribs can be cooked in different Asian styles. As we grow up, we were familiar with pork spare ribs  cooked with pork belly in Burmese Pork curry and spare rib broth with different vegetables.
After being in Minnesota for more than 10 years time, it is amazing to see the growing economy, growing diversity and different types of food.

More and more Asian groceries, Asian fusion restaurants and Chinese restaurants can be seen every year. It is also exciting to see diverse culture and people adapting their taste to Asian food. Raman Stores are now biggest trend in growing food culture also in the Food service industry.  When we arrived in 2001, City of Minneapolis not much choices of Ethnic food. Now we can have different type of food of our interest in Asian food. Every time, I shop at the Asian grocery store, I see more and more European people shopping for asian ingredients. It means that they have interest in those food and they open their option too. But  pork bones are used for broth when I learned at my culinary class and not more than that. In Japanese Raman broth, Pork bones are also playing the big part of making broth for Raman.

 One memory that stay with me is the walk with my dad in the weekends. On some Sunday Mornings, my eldest sister and I had to wake up early in the morning to go for a walk to Shwedagon Pagoda ( "Famous Landmark of Burma"). At that time we stayed in Downtown Government Residence which was walking distance to the Shwedagon Pagoda. Sometimes he treat us Authentic Chinese Tim Sum at a crowded little shop that on ( Maung Khine Street (old name) or Bo Ywae Road ( current) in Downtown Yangon. It was 1978 and China town was also popular food paradise as today.

But one sweet memory associated with the pork was the weekend dinner and movie treats with family. In some weekends, our mom and dad treated us at the Chinese restaurant followed by movies as a family outing. We packed the deep fried spare ribs to eat in the
movie theatre. He treated us dinner at Chinese restaurant and we watched the movie after that dinner. The regular item that we mostly ordered as an appetizer is the deep fried rib coated with bread cramp batter.

Now back to my recipe that I am going to write, as I am saying too much to sell my food story rather than food. You might think it is not fair. The steamed spare ribs with black bean sauce can be made at home like Tim Sum place. And it can be eaten with bread or Chinese style steam buns.

Steamed Spare Ribs with Black Bean Sauce

Ingredients

1 lb       Pork Spare Ribs
1 Tbsp   Dark Soy sauce
1 tsp     Oyster Sauce
1 tsp     Black Pepper
1 tsp     White Pepper
1 Tbsp   Sugar
1 Tbsp   Light soy sauce
1 tsp      Salt
1 tbsp    Corn Starch
1 tsp      Black bean sauce
1 tsp      Garlic chopped
1 tsp      Fresh Red thai chili Chopped
1 tsp      Fine chopped Ginger
1tbsp     Canola Oil

Instructions

1. In the wok on the stove top with medium high heat, heat the oil then add the sugar to make it brown in the heated oil.

2. Then add the pork ribs marinated with the rest of the ingredients other than oil, sugar, ginger garlic.

3. Stir fry until all the ingredients are blended and fragrant.

4. When all the water from the ribs are gone, transfer those into the ceramic bowl or steel bowl.

5 . Cover the bowl with aluminum foil and put that bowl in  bigger pot. The Pot should be filled with 2-3 inches of water to steam that bowl. Steam that pot with medium low heat for 1 hour. Add more water and cook more time if the meat is not tender.

6. We may also use the baking tray fill the water and cover everything and put in the oven with 380 Degree F. Bake it for 1 - 2 hr depends on your own preference of meat tenderness.

7. After testing the tenderness of the meat, we may  serve with Chinese style steam buns. or French Bread to skip the hassle of steaming buns.