Crispy Roasted Pork Belly- "THỊT HEO QUAY" Air Fryer Recipe Method
Watch my Instagram cooking -reel here- for my Air fryer Crispy Roasted Pork Belly recipe!
Crispy roasted pork belly is one of the most coveted Vietnamese dishes and it was definitely one of my dad's favorite dishes that he was very proud of. It's not an easy dish to make, it's actually one of the trickiest and most finicky dishes where anything can go wrong. 8 or 9 times out of 10 this dish would turn out to my dad’s liking but he would be so nervous and anxious during the whole cooking time. I still have memories of my dad sitting in his white apron and boxers in front of the oven watching the pork belly with the oven light on like a hawk over it's prey. My dad tried many different techniques from using different oils, different drying methods, brushing on vinegar or citrus oils, different salting methods etc to find the best way to make this dish.
So, what is the key to a successful roast? It's that experience of biting into a SUPER crunchy and bubbly pork belly skin then getting that gush of juicy pork belly and tender meat.
I remember as a kid my dad was always so happy to make this for us because he knew it was one of our ultimate favorites. As kids, my sisters and I would always fight over the best pieces (the pieces with the crunchiest skin). We would take our chopsticks, jab around and peer into spinning dish to find the perfect crunchiest pieces. None of us wanted the chewy or non-crunchy skin pieces and my dad would say things like, "no, not that piece, that's not a good one, eat this one instead", and he would grab a better piece and place it into our bowls. It was the Vietnamese way, my parents would give us the best pieces while they ate the less desirable pieces like the pieces without any pork belly skin or pieces with chewy flat skins. As kids we just expected it, but now as adults it makes me feel really loved reflecting back on those memories.
As a kid the pork belly fat was the best part next to the skin for me. My parents would tell me to cut some of the fat off but I would eat the entire fat with the skin first then I would eat the meat with some Maggi sauce.
So enough family memories- There's actually dozens upon dozens of recipes on how to make this but I chose to follow one of my dad’s best techniques, the vinegar and refrigerator drying out method. I didn't want to spend hours in front of the oven so I got a huge slab of pork belly cut them into smaller sections to cook them in the air fryer.
I used the air fryer method since because it took only 30 min and turned out super crispy, but I also included an oven recipe. This method doesn’t require a salt crust like my other air fryer recipe.
For traditional baking instructions (not in the air fryer), click below link!
CRISPY SKIN TIPS
Seasoning & Marinating: When marinating your pork belly make sure your marinade does not touch the skin. The skin needs to be absolutely dry to achieve a crispy skin.
Prepping skin: The key step to crispy skin is making small punctures/holes into the pork belly skin that breaks through pork skin's surface but not too deep into the fat layer (if you do fat will come up through the pores). I tried 2 different methods: I used paring knife to puncture and score, and a small sewing needle to puncture skin. The best was just using a needle and puncturing like hundreds of holes into the skin, each hole essentially would blister up during the roasting process.
Slicing: As much as you are craving to cut into the pork belly after it comes out of your oven, resist the temptation and wait til it gets to room temperature or else you'll let all the juices out and you'll also get a soggy pork belly skin!
Vinegar: Vinegar makes the skin super dry and crispy! Nom Nom Nom!
PORK BELLY MEAT MARINADE
3 lbs pork belly (ask butcher for one with a decent amount of meat and nice layer of pork belly skin, I try to find pieces that have at least 1 1/2” of meat)
1 tbs Rum Liqour or vodka
1 tbs hoison sauce
2 tbs of maggi or soy sauce
1/2 tsp Chinese bbq powder (red color)
1 tsp honey
1/2 tbs black pepper
1.5 tsp salt
3/4 tsp 5-spice chinese powder
PREPARATION
1. Clean pork belly step 1: Mix 2 tbs vinegar, 1.5 tsp salt and 4 cups and cover pork in baking pan for 10 min. Place pork skin facing up in the vinegar solution, if the vinegar solution does not cover the skin, you’ll need to do 10 min in the vinegar solution with meat side submerged, then another 10 min with skin side submerged.2. Clean pork belly step 2: Wash and clean pork under water and scrape the skin with sharp knife along the pork belly skin to remove any dirt and dead outer layer/skin from pork belly (Skin should be a clean white throughout entire skin, no dirty patches, this sounds gross but if your pork belly is hairy you’ll need to use a razor to shave off the hairs).
3. Pat dry and let dry for 10 min
4. Cut long slices about 2” apart to the bottom of pork belly vertically along the longest part of your slab of meat (meat part only up to the fat, do NOT cut into fat/skin).
5. If you are using a bucket style air fryer you'll need to cut your pork belly into sections that will fit in your deep fryer, my pieces were about 4” x 6 1/2” sections.
6. Marinate bottom of pork belly (Do not marinate the skin!) and onto the sides of the meat and be careful not to touch the marinade onto the pork belly skin, if you do, just wipe it off with a paper towel. Be sure to get the marinade up into all the cut slits you made as well.
7. Transfer pork belly (skin side up) onto a foil lined pyrex pan that is almost the same size as the pork belly.
8. Score the pork belly skin a few times in a hatch mark pattern, just barely slicing into the skin. Or prick pork belly skin with a needle or sharp tenderizer (sharp paring knife or meat pricking tenderizer) and make sure you break into the skin but not too deep into the fat layer.
9. Brush skin top with vinegar, and lightly salt with skin and rub the salt evenly across the top of the skin (about 1/2 to full tsp of salt). Let dry for 1 to two days uncovered in the fridge (two days total drying time preferred).
ROASTING DAY:
1. Wipe and brush the top skin of pork belly with vinegar and let pork belly come to room temperature about for 20-45 min.
AIR FRYER DIRECTIONS
1. Sprinkle about over 2-4 tbs coarse sea salt on top generously so you have nice salt crust layer on top of the pork belly skin. You want a nice layer of salt, don’t worry you’ll remove this salt layer off later.
2. Place foil wrapped pork belly and place into air fryer for 20 min- at 300 degrees on “air fry” mode. Wipe off salt layer. Brush pork belly skin with sesame oil. Then air fry again for about 5-10 minutes at 400-450F until skin is crispy and bubbly (careful not to let skin burn, mine took about 6 min at 450F for that perfect crisp). Meat is done at 145F in the thickest part of the pork meat.
FINISHING
1. Remove from oven/air fryer and place on wire rack and let cool for 15 minutes.
2. Cut along bottom cut lines that you made with skin side down.
3. Then cut each slice into many 1/2” slices by slowing cutting down on the meat and through the skin, and then press firmly down to snap/cut through the skin.
SERVING
1. Serve with fish dipping sauce, Nuoc Mam or Nuoc Mam Gung
2. Plate with fine rice noodles fresh lettuce and herbs
After 10 min in air fryer at 300 degrees this is what it looked like.
After another 10 min in air fryer at 375 degrees it looked perfect like this!
Make sure your pork belly meat is at least 145, this was after like 8 min so I put it back in for a couple more minutes till it reached 145.