This recipe will serve four to six as part of a Chinese meal. To make it go further, add more stock or water and a vegetarian ingredient that will soak up the sauce most deliciously. Puffy, deep-fried tofu is a fine addition to red-braised pork, as are hard-boiled eggs, dried tofu "bamboo" and the little knotted strips of dried tofu skin that can be found in some Chinese supermarkets (the latter two should first be soaked in hot water until supple). In rural households in China, they often add dried vegetables such as string beans and bamboo shoots, which should also be pre-soaked. You can also use root vegetables such as potato, taro or carrot, or peeled water chestnuts: just make sure you cook the vegetables with the pork for long enough to absorb its flavors, and adjust the seasoning as necessary.
To reduce the amount of oil in the final dish, make it in advance and refrigerate overnight. Then scrape off the layer of fat on the surface and keep it in the refrigerator to add to your stir-fried mushrooms or other vegetables. If you prefer a less fatty cut, pork ribs or shoulder are also magnificent red-braised. And you can, if you like, cook the pork slowly in an oven instead of on the burner—not very Chinese, but often more convenient (for this, preheat the oven to 300°F/150°C/gas mark 2).
