It’s no secret around these parts that I’m happy with our choice to buy a house in the suburbs—we’ve got a big kitchen with lots of counter space, a deluxe gas grill and a huge deck to host summer shindigs, and even a basement man-cave for Dan. But there is one severe drawback: unlike you city dwellers with amazing Thai that can be delivered to your door, I’m stuck with nothing but sub-par Chinese. Yikes.
So instead, when I’m jonesing for the flavors of the Far East and there’s no Wondee Siam in sight, I do my usual thing and make my own. This lemongrass pork recipe, adapted from Food & Wine, is completely addictive and a great introduction to a Thai flavor profile for those of you out there ready to try something a little different than General Tso’s or beef and broccoli.
I just need to warn you in advance, if you’ve never used fish sauce before, it’s crucial to the flavor of the dish, but there’s no other way to say this—it’s going to smell like feet. It’s going to do this right up until the last minute, when through some bit of culinary alchemy, the brown sugar overtakes it and meshes with the aromatics to make the most heavenly, sweet-and-sour/umami craziness that will leaving you craving this fortnightly.
I like the Tiparos brand of fish sauce
Lemongrass Pork
- 1/2 cup white vinegar
- 1/2 cup sugar
- 3 medium carrots, julienned
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/4 cup fish sauce
- 2 tablespoon canola or grapeseed oil
- 1 pound ground pork (or ground turkey)
- Chili peppers to taste; I like things extra spicy so I’ll use one or two big hot Portugal peppers from the garden but you can even use red pepper flakes in a pinch (ha!)
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 large shallot, minced
- 3 stalks of lemongrass (tender inner bulb only), minced
- 1 tablespoon grated ginger
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- rice, noodles, or other starch for serving (and mopping up the delicious sauce)
First: whisk the vinegar and sugar together until the sugar is completely dissolved, then add the carrots and let stand at least an hour. Ideally, I do this step the night before and leave the carrots in the fridge so they’ll make a cold counterpart to the hot pork and sauce.
In a small saucepan, cook the fish sauce and brown sugar over medium heat until the brown sugar has dissolved and the sauce thickens. It will boil and bubble a little. Remove from the heat and set aside.
In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium-high heat and brown the ground pork, about 5 minutes (you may have to do this in batches so it browns instead of steams.) Remove the pork from the skillet and reserve.
Add the chiles, garlic, shallot, lemongrass, and ginger to the same large skillet and cook, stirring, for about a minute while the shallot and chilies soften slightly and the mixture becomes incredibly fragrant. Add the chicken broth and deglaze the pan while the broth reduces, about a minute. Return the pork to the pan and add the brown sugar-fish sauce, stirring to meld all the flavors for another minute.
Remove the skillet from the heat and stir the carrots into the mixture. Serve with your choice of starch and try not to inhale the whole thing in one serving.
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Tiparo fish sauce! Thanks for the tip because I fear fish sauce due to smell + I saw little ladies cutting up fish heads etc. & stuffing them in bottles on TV so a tip toward a good fish sauce will set me straight!