Travels in Shanghai: Triple-fried Goodness – Porkchop with Niangao (排骨年糕)

Shanghai. It’s a place most Beijingers love to hate. The antithesis of Beijing, with its European flavor, narrow sycamore-dotted lanes, and a population inexplicably always in a mad rush. This last trip however, I’ve decided to give in to its charms and give up the mockery to embrace Shanghai – well, at least for a long weekend. It was a gluttonous weekend, where I thoroughly indulged in French dinners (crusty baguettes! real butter! fresh-preshed olive oil!) and burritos (thus far the best I’ve had in China), but it was the first meal of this eating marathon that I count as the food discovery of this journey. Triple-fried porkchop with fried glutinous rice cake (排骨年糕).

Maybe it was because this was my first mealoffood after a 13-hour, hard seat, jammed-packed train ride, or perhaps it was the long line of salivating customers, or even the cheery professionalism of the frymaster that did me in. Or maybe because it was just a damn good piece of pork. We were roaming a side street of downtown Shanghai in search of lunch, and in that post-lunch hour the food stalls were all empty but for one. Set up in an alcove street-side was this maker of porkchop, and there was a line of customers buying 2-5 sets of the porkchop each. We smelled a good thing (literally and figuratively) and promptly lined up for our share.

The man was a master. He obviously fries up at least a couple hundred porkchops a day, for god knows how many years now, and there is a rhythmic calm to the way he fishes a thin slab of pork from a plastic tub, swathes it in batter, and slides it into the old-school cast iron wok. Two chops at a time, until there are five in motion. He fishes them out to rest after the first fry, to let the oil heat back up to the right temperature, then goes for a second fry. Then, a third. YUM. As the pork rests, the glutinous rice cakes are popped into the oil to crisp up.

One customer requested that her pork only be fried twice – too oily! she proclaimed. He smiled and scolded her – it’s raw still after the second fry! you just let me cook, yeah? I love this man.

As he is frying the pork and slices of niangao (年糕), he preps the take-out containers. There’s no seating at this stall, you just bag your deep-fried goodness and run along. The first layer is a generous pour of the ubiquitous brown sauce loved in Shanghai. Slightly sweet, it’s a thick salty gravy that I never quite understood, but will gamely eat it since he pours it from a giant 4 liter tea kettle with such gusto.

Next, he places three slices of the deep-fried niangao (年糕) atop the sauce, then one lusciously fried giant porkchop on top of that.

A good douse of strong black vinegar tops the dish. The acidity helps to break up the fat, but good luck with that – this tray consists of triple-fried pork on top of fried cake. And then he bags it all up, and passes the five bags of that batch to the lucky customers, as the next eagerly awake their turn.

Verdict? Awesomeness. The porkchop itself is thin, tender and super flavorful – marinated in some combination of soy and spices that makes for a fragrant and smoky meat. The crunchy coating? Well, triple-fried does its magic and it’s fantastic. The occasional chew of the glutinous rice swabbed in Shanghai brown sauce added a nice balance of texture, and it was a damn fine lunch. Especially since we took our bag o’ porkchop to a little stall selling Shanghai’s famous  soup-filled steamed dumplings (xiaolongbao 小笼包) and had ourselves two trays as dessert. Nom nom nom.

(Oh, we went right back the next morning.)

Address: Shouning Lu and Renmin Lu. Can’t remember the name of the shop, but the lines will clue you in.