Spice creations

Slow-roast five-spice pork belly & gravy

With its blend of cinnamon, fennel seeds, star anise, Sichuan peppercorns and cloves, Chinese five-spice provides a simple shortcut for aromatic pork. If you only have the option of buying pork belly pieces, go for the thicker end. If the ribs are attached, ask your butcher to remove them, then freeze them to cook another time.

SERVES 5-6 PREP 20 mins plus optional overnight marinating COOK 3 hrs EASY

1 tbsp Chinese five-spice powder
3 tbsp soy sauce
1 tbsp honey
100ml Shaohsing rice wine or dry sherry
2 tbsp malt vinegar thumb-sized piece of ginger, peeled and finely grated
4 garlic cloves, finely grated
½ red chilli, roughly chopped (optional)
1-1.2kg piece of boneless pork belly, lightly scored all over
1 tsp sunflower oil
200ml chicken stock
2 tsp cornflour
sliced spring onions, chillies and roughly chopped coriander, to serve (optional)

1 Mix together the five-spice powder, soy, honey, rice wine, vinegar, ginger, garlic and chilli. If you have time, pour the mixture into a shallow dish and sit the pork in the dish skin-side up, so only the meaty side is in the marinade and the skin stays dry. Salt the skin lightly and chill overnight if you have time, or for up to 24 hrs. (If you don’t have time to marinate the pork, skip this and move straight to step two.)

Heat the oven to 150C/130C fan/gas 2. Pour the marinade (the excess if you’ve chilled the pork overnight) into a roasting tin. Sit the pork on top, skin-side up – it should fit snugly in the tin. Roast for 2 hrs. Remove from the oven, then lift the pork onto a board. Pour the fat from the tin into a bowl, then pour the juices through a sieve into a small.