Tag Archives: pork

Gyoza – Crazy Sushi

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Gyoza Crazy Sushi

Deep fried pork potstickers with gyoza sauce.
Crazy Sushi, San Francisco

An order of gyoza at Crazy Sushi only comes with 4 potstickers, but they are delicious!  Oh, how I love gyoza!  Hey, you can’t go wrong with deep fried pork in a crispy dumpling wrapper.  These were steaming hot out of the fryer, and dunking then in the salty/umami gyoza sauce puts them over the top.  I could seriously eat a tray of these.

Oranges Crazy Sushi

I don’t even like fresh oranges that much, but I do appreciate when sushi bars serve complimentary fruit like these segmented oranges because it’s nice when they take the time to cut and prepare extra treats for their guests. Yay!

Tocilog – Kuya’s Asian Cuisine

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Tocilog Kuya's Asian Cuisine

Sweet marinated pork tocino with garlic fried rice and eggs over medium. The rice is garnished with more fried garlic pieces and chopped scallions. Cucumber and tomato slices are thrown in for good measure.
Kuya’s Asian Cuisine, San Bruno CA

This is a classic Filipino breakfast! Tocilog comes from combining the Filipino words for sweet marinated pork (tocino) and egg (itlog). We didn’t have tocino very often growing up, but it was one of my favorite breakfast items along with longanisa. Probably because they are both so flavorful and fatty, a common thread in Filipino food, lol! I have to say that Kuya’s tocina was a bit on the hard and dry side for me, but it still tasted great. There are some amazing flavors in this dish: the sweet and salty from the tocino and the intense garlic from the fried rice. The runny egg (and you have to order it runny!) blends everything together. So familiar, so delicious!

Xiao long bao – Shanghai Dumpling King

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Xiao long bao Shanghai Dumpling King

Steamed soup dumplings with a pork filling atop a napa cabbage leaf. $5.50
Shanghai Dumpling King, San Francisco

These dumplings were SO delicious!  I only ripped one or two while trying to eat them with chopsticks so I was particularly proud of myself.  When I first had these, I wondered how they got the soup inside the dumplings.  Apparently, the dumplings are made with a pork filling and a gelatin aspic.  The aspic melts into a “soup” when the dumplings are steamed – genius!  These are very fun to eat and Shanghai Dumpling King’s are some of the best in San Francisco.

7×7 Magazine’s The Big Eat San Francisco: 100 Things to Eat + Drink Before You Die – 2010, 2011, 2012

Xiao long bao - Shanghai Dumpling King
November 17, 2013. So I guess they’re not using the napa cabbage on the bottom anymore. That’s a shame.

Porchetta sandwich – Roli Roti

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Porchetta sandwich Roli Roti Gourmet Rotisserie

Tender slices of slow rotisserie roasted pork on an Acme roll with caramelized onions, arugula, and herb sea salt.
Roli Roti Gourmet Rotisserie, San Francisco

Can you say fatty, salty, tasty, tender, amazing, deliciousness!?  I’m in love with this sandwich.  And apparently, so is everyone else if the long lunch line at the Ferry Building food stand is any indication.  Roli Roti rotisserie roasts the porchetta right out of their cart/truck, and it’s mesmerizing to watch the beautiful fat drip down the stacked spits.

After slicing the pork, they soak up all the delicious juices left on the cutting board with a split Acme roll before piling on the meat, onions and arugula.  They make sure to add pieces of the crispy skin for good measure.  What results is heaven in a to-go bag!  Count me in!

7×7 Magazine’s The Big Eat San Francisco: 100 Things to Eat + Drink Before You Die – 2010, 2011, 2012

Lumpia Shanghai – Kuya’s Asian Cuisine

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Lumpia Shanghai Kuya's Asian Cuisine

Filling of seasoned pork and beef, minced onions and carrots, and beaten eggs in a lumpia wrapper, deep fried, and cut into bite sized pieces.
Kuya’s Asian Cuisine, San Bruno CA

I grew up eating lumpia prito (fried lumpia) which are much larger and have more vegetables: sprouts, carrots, string beans, peas, onion, and sometimes potatoes.  My family always used ground beef in our lumpia, and it was great sitting around the table wrapping them to be stored in the freezer.  I’m sure my parents still have trays of it in their freezer, ready to be given to guests to take home.

As a kid I only had lumpia Shanghai at parties and, later on, at Filipino restaurants in the city.  Both lumpia varieties have their advantages, but lumpia Shanghai are less labor intensive to make and because of their small size, make excellent finger food at parties.  I’ve been known to order trays of it to serve at my house.  You can get a traditional “lumpia” sauce at Asian markets, but I prefer a regular sweet chili sauce because it has more flavor.  Beware, lumpia is VERY addictive!

Country style pork pate – Bar Agricole

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Pork pate Bar Agricole

Slice of pork pate served with toast, aspic, mustard and caper berries.  $10
Bar Agricole, San Francisco

The server explained that the pate was “country style” since it consisted of chunkier pieces, not the smoother pates you usually see.  This pork pate was absolutely delicious and filling!  I just wish it came with more bread because the pate slice was pretty sizable.  I’m guessing that the aspic was also from pork, but I’m not sure.  Regardless, everything tasted great together!

Someone at the table didn’t know what aspic was, and I smiled because I remembered having to look it up while reading Anthony Bourdain’s “Kitchen Confidential”, lol!  I was happy to explain that it’s a jelly made from a stock (usually meat or fish) and gelatin.

Pan fried pork buns – Shanghai Dumpling King

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Pan fried pork buns Shanghai Dumpling King

Oil steamed and fried buns with a pork filling and garnished with sesame seeds and scallions.  $5.25
Shanghai Dumpling King, San Francisco

I consider my co-worker, Alan, to be a Chinese food expert since he’s a native San Franciscan/Chinese American and I’ve learned quite a few things from him. I sometimes wish he doesn’t tell me certain things, like how these pork buns are cooked, lol! This was the first time I’ve tried these pan fried pork buns and I naively assumed they were first steamed, then fried since they are brown on the bottom. The dough has a different consistency than other buns so I also assumed that they used a special dough batter. I was wrong! It’s the same dough batter is used as in other pork buns, then the buns are steamed and fried simultaneously in a pool of oil! The hot oil sears the bottoms while the steam cooks the rest of the buns to a soft, squishy consistency. No wonder they’re so flavorful! Even knowing how they’re made now, I will order these again in a heartbeat since they are addictingly delicious!

Chiu chao fun guo – Clement Restaurant

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Chiu chao fun guo Clement Restaurant
Steamed dumplings filled with ground pork, shrimp, chopped peanuts, and garlic chives.  The wrapper is made of de-glutenized wheat flour, tapioca flour, and a corn or potato starch.
Clement Restaurant, San Francisco

I wasn’t a fan of these dumplings.  They were quite large and the wrapper was too thick, glutinous, and easily torn.  It’s always sad when you lose the dumpling filling because of a weak wrapper.  This dim sum was weak, indeed!

Shark fin dumplings – Clement Restaurant

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Shark fin dumplings Clement Restaurant
Lye water dough (shiu mai wrapper) filled with a mixture of chopped shrimp, pork fillet, shark fin, spring onion and Chinese parsley. The dumplings are then steamed.
Clement Restaurant, San Francisco

So California Assembly Bill 376 would ban the possession, sale, and trade of shark fins in the state of California.  It’s suppose to be heard before the Senate Committee on Appropriations on Monday, August 15th in Sacramento.  We’ll see what happens!  I have to admit that I’ve never wondered if I’m eating real shark fin in dim sum.  For some reason, I always assumed it was imitation shark fin.  I know that’s ignorant of me, so I’m curious to see what happens with AB 376.  I definitely don’t agree with the practice of shark finning, but would this bill also ban shark fins that were harvested without finning?  My assumption would be YES, but I’ll have to read more about the debate. 

Regardless, I don’t know if I can even distinguish the shark fin flavor or texture in these dumplings from any other similar dumplings.  In that regard, I probably wouldn’t be affected by the shark fin ban but opponents of the bill cite cultural reasons.  Sounds fishy to me (pardon the pun)!

Pork shiu mai – Clement Restaurant

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Pork shiu mai Clement Restaurant
Steamed dumplings with seasoned ground pork, chopped shrimp and Chinese black mushroom wrapped with a thin sheet of lye water dough.
Clement Restaurant, San Francisco

These suckers were large compared to other shumai I’ve had! I’m not sure why I always order siu mai though. They don’t have much flavor compared to other dim sum and the filling tends to be really fatty.  But they do soak up soy and chili XO sauce really well and I enjoy the combination of the filling and dough textures. Since dim sum tends to be really cheap on Clement Street in San Francisco I think I’ll keep ordering them, lol!

Cha siu bao – Clement Restaurant

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Steamed bbq pork bun Clement Restaurant
Bbq pork bun. Cantonese steamed bun filled with slow roasted pork tenderloin in a salty sweet, bbq sauce mixture.
Clement Restaurant, San Francisco

I love dim sum, and I love bbq pork buns whether steamed or baked!  I didn’t know they use different doughs depending on whether they are steamed or fried, but it makes sense.  The filling is always SO good! The bbq bun from Clement Restaurant had the thickest bun I’ve ever tried, and I admit that I wasn’t a fan.  For me, the bun is there to hold the delicious filling together and there was just too much of it here.

* Also spelled “char siu bao” among others.

Chinese BBQ platter – Mission Chinese Food

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Chinese BBQ Mission Chinese Food
Smoked beef brisket, pork trotter and hot link with smoked cola BBQ sauce. Side of pickled cucumbers, onions and jalapenos.
Mission Chinese Food, San Francisco

I randomly read on Eater.com that Danny Bowien, the chef at Mission Chinese Food, had acquired a smoker and was going to start having bbq on the menu.  So I HAD to order the Chinese bbq platter when I finally saw it on the menu.  I must say that the brisket tastes pretty amazing with a great smoky flavor and oh so tender.  The hot link was ok, didn’t taste very different from others I’ve tried.  I was pleasantly surprised how much I liked the pork trotters – very flavorful.  I was afraid that I wouldn’t like the texture of the skin, but I hardly noticed it from the rest of the meat. And of course, the homemade pickles were great!