Pork is such an underrated type of meat since most people don’t know how to cook and season it properly. Tasting Olly’s pork rib burger proved that this is absolutely true. Juicy and seasoned with a wonderful blend of spices, this perfectly highlights just how good pork can get.
Since pork has an inherently mild flavour, it acts as the perfect vehicle for bolder flavours. Olly’s took advantage of this in a big way by pre-seasoning it with a blend of spices that immediately made me think of Asian-inspired flavours. The pork rib burger is glazed with a quick home-made hoisin sauce and topped with a tangy, cooling Asian slaw to keep the sandwich from getting too heavy. This recipe is perfect for making ahead of time to take down to the beach, or to eat relaxed by the poolside. The fact that the pork is pre-cooked negates all the usual downfalls of pork needing to be cooked up to a certain temperature, which is a problem especially at barbeques, making this a perfect cook-out alternative to the usual beef burger. While the flavours in this recipe are pre-dominantly Asian, the basic ingredients could be used to create a more Western twist, by swapping the hoisin sauce out for a barbeque sauce, and making a traditional coleslaw to top it off. The slaw is whipped up in minutes and can be made before-hand and left in the fridge for the flavours to deepen until you need to use it; this also applies for the sauce. If you’re really pressed for time, you can even swap out the home-made hoisin for a good quality store-bought alternative. The recipe is overall one that’s perfect for creating big flavours for people who don’t have a lot of time to make them.
Ingredients:
- 2 Olly’s pork rib burgers
- 1 cucumber, sliced into ribbons
- olive oil, to brush the pan
- 2 fresh ciabattas
Hoisin Sauce:
- 4 tbsp soy sauce
- 2 tbsp peanut butter
- 1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
- 1 ½ tbsp. sesame oil
- ½ tsp garlic powder
- ¼ tsp ginger
- 1 tsp brown sugar
- pinch chili flakes
Asian Slaw:
- 1 cup red cabbage, shredded
- 1 carrot, shredded
- ¼ cup green onions
- 2 tbsp sesame oil
- 1 tbsp soy sauce
- 1 tsp rice wine vinegar
- 1 tbsp sesame seeds
- pinch salt
Method:
1. Leave Olly’s pork rib burgers in the fridge to defrost the night before.
2. In a bowl, add all the sauce ingredients and mix until smooth.
3. In a large bowl, mix together the cabbage, carrot, green onions, sesame oil, rice wine vinegar, sesame seeds, soy sauce and a pinch of salt. Mix and set aside.
4. Heat a grill pan to high heat and brush with olive oil. Cook the pork rib for about three minutes on each side, until you get nice grill marks. In the last minute of cook time, brush the pork generously with hoisin sauce.
5. Transfer the pork rib to a fresh ciabatta, then top with cucumber ribbons and slaw.