Braised Pork Belly in White Wine

In my favorite braiser

The study topic for August is pork! A half pound slab of free-range pork belly was braised in white wine with onions, red bell peppers, potatoes plus a large handful of fennel seeds and whole star anise for 2 hours in a 180°C oven. I forgot the bay leaf. Would have used fennel bulb instead of onion but the boy won’t eat fennel bulb.

A search on Google for “braised pork belly” would turn up recipes for the Chinese styled 红烧肉 or 东坡肉, or the Japanese styled 角煮 on the first page, but despite being ethnically Chinese I have never cooked with Shaoxing rice wine (a kitchen staple here, I am sure), five-spice powder, or ginger. I don’t even have soy sauce in my pantry, so I turned to more familiar ingredients like wine or beer for the braising liquid. The fennel seed and star anise was from a video by Gordon Ramsay for his version of the braised pork belly that I must have watched at least a hundred times.