Hunan Pork Stir Fry

Super easy Hunan Style Pork stir fry with limited ingredients.

There is a general rule that hotter peppers are more aromatic!!That’s a bad news for those who don’t love spicy food. Hunan cuisine is featured by the top level of hotness among all of the eight cuisines in China. I ate chili peppers and hot dishes from my childhood, and I still feel that some of the Hunan dishes are too spicy for me. The hot from Hunan cuisine is slightly different from those in Sichuan cuisine. Sichuan cuisine uses lot of combination of different levels of hot peppers to create red looking but not that spicy food. 

One of the good example of Hunan dish is this Hunan style pork stir fry, we call this as 湖南小炒肉 “little pork stir fry”. Similar name of our Chongqing’s small noodles. This “small” indicate that this dish is super humble and can be easily made at home.  Ingredients for Hunan style pork stir fry is slightly different from regular ones because it use pork belly as the main ingredient in addition to pork tenderloin or butt. Pork belly obtain the most popular ingredient in China all across the country. My returning visitor may know lots of pork belly recipes on the blog, including super famous Sichuan style twice cooked pork belly, Cantonese roasted pork belly, red braised pork belly and Sichuan style pork belly in garlic sauce. The wonderful part of this dish is using pork belly and further using lard from pork belly to be the cooking oil.

However in order to balance the ratio of lean meat and fat, usually a small portion of lean meat (tenderloin or butt) will be also added in the dish. Remove the skin of pork belly and cut into thin slices. In order to get a tender texture, lean meat should be marinated with seasonings and starch before using.

Instructions

The hot pepper used in this recipe is Chinese long line pepper (线椒) which has a hot level higher than 15000 SHU. This superior line peppers have a fresh and spicy taste, which can reduce the greasy feelingof pork belly. On the other hand, after absorbing the fat oil coming from the pork, the peppers will become quite savory. If you ever visited China, you may have tried this dish in many restaurants offering stir fry dishes. I guess the impression might be how hot this dish is! So in order to keep the spiciness within an accepting degree, we need to pan fry the peppers at the very beginning to reduce the hotness. After 2-3 minutes frying, The skin begins to winkle and the hot level slightly lowered down. 

Fry the pork belly until slightly cured, if you feel there is too much oil, remove the extra oil and save it for dark leafy vegetables or noodle soup.  Then add garlic and ginger and fry until aromatic. 

 Place the marinated tenderloin in.

Cook for 15 to 20 seconds until the lean meat turns color, add peppers and garlic sprouts in, add sugar, salt, light soy sauce, oyster sauce and dark soy sauce. Mix well. 

Caution at the end, don’t eat the pepper at the very beginning. Start with the meat. I usually don’t eat the peppers in this dish but some of the hot pepper loves found peppers in this collection is extremely delicious. 

Other easy stir frying dishes

Pork stir fry in black bean sauce
Pork and green pepper stir fry
Pork and Chinese scallion stir fry
Szechuan beef stir fry
Beef and snow pea stir fry
Pork and mushroom stir fry

Hunan Pork Stir Fry

Chinese Hunan Style Pork Stir fry

5 from 6 votes

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Course: Main Course, stir fry

Cuisine: Chinese

Keyword: hunan, pork

Prep Time: 15 minutes minutes

Cook Time: 5 minutes minutes

Total Time: 20 minutes minutes

Servings: 4

Calories: 252kcal

Author: Elaine

Ingredients

• 150 g pork belly
• 100 g pork tenderloin or butt
• 2 garlic sprouts or scallion white , cut into 5 cm sections
• 2 garlic cloves , finely chopped
• 1 inch root ginger , finely chopped
• 1 tsp. dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp. light soy sauce
• 6 long chili peppers , use hotter peppers as a substitute
• 2 Thai chili peppers
• pinch of salt
• 1/4 tsp. sugar
• 1 tsp. oyster sauce

Pork Tenderloin treatment

• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1 tbsp. light soy sauce
• 1 tbsp. cooking wine
• 2 tsp. cornstarch
• 1/4 tsp. white pepper
• 1 tbsp. vegetable cooking oil

Instructions

• Cut the pork belly into thin slices, set aside. Then cut pork tenderloin into thin pieces too, marinate with salt, pepper, starch, light soy sauce and cooking wine for 15 minutes. Then add 1 tablespoon of cooking oil. Mix well.
• Cut the long chili peppers into 5 cm sections.
• Heat up a wok or pan firstly, add chili peppers in to fry for around 1 to 2 minutes until they are slightly soft and wrinkled. Transfer out.
• Fry the pork belly until slightly cured, if you feel there is too much oil, remove the extra oil add garlic and ginger and fry until aromatic.
• Place the tenderloin in, fry for 15 to 20 seconds until the lean meat turns color, add peppers and garlic sprouts in, add sugar, salt, light soy sauce, oyster sauce and dark soy sauce. Mix well.

Notes

Recipe firstly published in 2014 and updated in 2020.

Nutrition

Calories: 252kcal | Carbohydrates: 5g | Protein: 5g | Fat: 24g | Saturated Fat: 10g | Cholesterol: 27mg | Sodium: 649mg | Potassium: 97mg | Fiber: 1g | Sugar: 1g | Vitamin A: 102IU | Vitamin C: 8mg | Calcium: 3mg | Iron: 1mg