The bits of pork skin have a pleasurable soft crispness to them and I liked eating them on their own.
Quick Bite
All in all, it’s a slightly toned-down version of the braised pork I normally see in Singapore, but I can imagine this would be a great alternative for people who aren’t fans of the more common, thicker braised sauce. Even after the eating the whole bowl, it almost felt like I had eaten something vaguely healthy. However, it still has the allure of being one of the best comfort foods to beat a rainy afternoon, and I can imagine my own skin will thank me for eating this.
I love Lu Rou Fan (Taiwanese Braised Pork Rice). It’s a comfortable, homely dish that has its origins from Taiwan. Nothing beats a cold, rainy Singaporean afternoon than a bowl of hot rice with braised meat with an egg on the side. There’s many variations of this dish in Singapore, some with thicker and stickier sauces while some use larger chunks of pork belly. But this one from Dudu Rice claims to be authentically Taiwanese, and who else to help me review it than my authentically Taiwanese colleague.
The food came nicely packaged in a nice container separating all the ingredients, so your rice won’t get soggy on the way to your house. The chunks of braised pork with slices of pork skin, topped with bright green spring onion is a beautiful sight to behold. For people who are more used to hawker fare, the skin might be something new.
First thing you’ll notice is that it’s lighter on the mouth than most braised pork. It doesn’t have any greasy or oily flavour or aftertaste. The sauce itself is light and not overly salty, and drinking it by the spoonful feels like drinking a braised soup. However light it may be, the collagen from the skin is definitely present in the sauce, which I can imagine does wonders for your skin. I didn’t feel overwhelmed by the flavours as I shovelled spoonful after spoonful of my favourite food into my mouth. It’s a more “diet” flavour than the common braised pork, much suitable for softer palettes like my mom’s, which I didn’t mind. My Taiwanese colleague mentions that it’s not as authentically Taiwanese as he liked, and it was more akin to a fusion version.
The meat itself was soft and smooth and I didn’t find myself biting into any hard cartilage or grit. The bits of pork skin have a pleasurable soft crispness to them and I liked eating them on their own. The pork itself was cut large enough to give me a meaty texture in every bite. It’s so commonly overlooked, yet so important that the pork isn’t cut up into excessively tiny bits, otherwise it’d be the same as eating minced pork, so kudos to Dudu Rice for that. The sauce just gets absorbed into the rice, the egg and the Tau Kwa, giving everything a beautiful and complex braised flavour. There was just enough so that no part of my rice was still white.
