Savory steamed pork belly with pickled mustard greens

Public reference · Home adaptation Despite the name, shaobai is steamed, not braised: the word says “burnt” but every step is steaming. The local-history account is blunt — without rice-flour pork, savory shaobai and sweet shaobai, however well laid a table is, it counts as a feast only in name. The two versions are two directions of the same dish. The savoury one rests on Yibin pickled greens for its salty-sweet depth; the sweet one on red bean paste with glutinous rice and brown sugar. The account glosses sweet shaobai as “jiasha rou”, pork with a filling. Another source records that Chengdu favours the savoury and Zigong the sweet, so even within Sichuan there is a local preference. This version takes only the steaming technique and does not claim any jiudouwan-specific formula. **This entry previously cited several `newton.com.tw/wiki/<dish-name>` links (such as 燒白, 紅燒肘子, 燒什錦 and 夾沙肉). On checking, every one of them returned 404 — those pages do not exist on the encyclopedia; the links had been constructed by pattern. They have all been removed. The method here rests on the openable sources listed above. If a matching entry does exist for this dish, cite the page that actually exists rather than guessing a URL from the dish name.****The seat record names the dish but not the method**: the local-history account lists savory shaobai among the three steamed dishes, by name only. This version's method is taken from the public encyclopedia entry for shaobai (boil the belly 15 minutes, rub the skin with dark soy, fry the skin down until brown-red and blistered, cut into slices 6 cm long and 3 mm thick, pass the slices through a seasoning liquid and pack them skin-down, cover and press with Yibin pickled greens, steam 40–60 minutes, invert under a large plate), using the ingredient list from the separate entry for savory shaobai (500 g pork belly, 150 g pickled greens, 50 g dry rice flour, peppercorn, ginger, soy, salt, rapeseed oil, MSG, white pepper) for the composition. It has no exclusive correspondence to jiudouwan. **The distinction from sweet shaobai is a firm constraint here**: the savoury version is built on Yibin pickled greens and its salty-sweet depth; the sweet version is built on red bean paste, glutinous rice and sugar. There is no red bean paste and no glutinous rice in this entry, and its ingredients must not be swapped with the sweet shaobai entry. **The “eight slices per bowl” rule is applied**: the account records the three steamed dishes at strictly eight slices each. This version works to six servings. **Deep-frying is downgraded to pan-searing**: the entry's word “fry” implies a wok of hot oil over a naked flame, which is risky at home. This version uses a little oil to sear the skin until brown-red and blistered, and states that this is a disclosed downgrade. **Quantities are editorial and untested**: 500 g pork, 150 g pickled greens and 40–60 minutes of steaming are editorial settings for six servings. The entry specifies 6 cm by 3 mm slices, which is very hard to cut evenly; this version relaxes it to “as even as you can safely manage”, with safe knife work taking priority. **Technique only, no therapeutic claims**: the cited entries contain claims about iron-deficiency anaemia and iron supplementation, none of which is adopted. Contains soy (light soy, dark soy), wheat (cooking wine; pickled products may contain it) and sesame. Contains a great deal of fatty pork, so this is a high-fat dish — those monitoring blood sugar or lipids should eat it in moderation. Yibin pickled greens are a preserved food high in salt; preserved products may carry additional soy, wheat or sesame, so check labels. Contains meat; not a vegetarian dish. 阿坝州地方志办公室：传统川菜“九斗碗”（发布 2013-08-09） — Menu source 1. It records jiudouwan as also called tianxi and san-zheng-jiukou-xi; the three steamed dishes as rice-flour pork, savory and sweet shaobai (jiasha rou); the braises as braised or steamed pork elbow, pork with bamboo shoots, mixed braise (shaoshijin), re-cooked chicken and fish with chili-bean paste; the cold dishes as rice-flour pork, savory shaobai and sweet shaobai (jiasha rou); the stir-fries as bamboo shoots fried in lard, gong bao diced pork and shredded pork with yellow chives; the stew as stewed tuotuosu pork; spinach and flash-fried cabbage as table fillers. It also records that a feast without the three steamed dishes is not a feast, that each bowl holds eight slices of pork, and the serving order of cold dishes, steamed dishes, stir-fries, braises, stews and soup. https://dfzb.abazhou.gov.cn/abzdfsbgs/c104049/201308/e7ab6e8e28a04dc9836c6b82d420b5c9.shtml 中文百科全書：九斗碗（又称坝坝宴、九大碗） — Menu source 2. It records jiudouwan as a Sichuan feast whose “dou” means a large vessel in Sichuan speech, with nine bowls as a minimum and versions of seven or eleven; its contents as home-style dishes made from whatever chicken, duck, fish, pork, eggs and seasonal vegetables the household has, listing sweet shaobai, savory shaobai and rice-flour pork as representative dishes, served in farmyards on improvised stoves. https://newton.com.tw/wiki/%E4%B9%9D%E6%96%97%E7%A2%97/2750801 FDA: Food Allergies — Basis for declaring soy, wheat and sesame allergens. https://www.fda.gov/food/food-labeling-nutrition/food-allergies AI-generated illustration; not kitchen-tested.

Source: WorldBite · public-reference adaptation · Source-attributed editorial adaptation; AI illustration; not an authenticated original recipe.