Just when I thought this week couldn't seem any longer, my car broke down on me. The silver lining? Having a free day! Lounging around watching a marathon of Gilmore Girls didn't seem so bad after all. In an effort to be somewhat productive, I did cook a little something special for lunch. Curious to try the famous Filipino fusion White Rabbit food truck but not wanting to travel to Las Vegas, I decided to create one of their menu items. This food truck has received rave reviews from day one, putting together classic Filipino dishes and wrapping them in a burrito, taco, or as nachos. It only made sense to try to create one of their most popular items, the pork sisig burrito. I'm sure the White Rabbit has its own special twist to their recipe but here is my recreation!
Pork Sisig Burrito
Ingredients
Pork sisig
- 2 lb slab pork belly cut in half lengthwise
- ½ cup coconut vinegar
- ½ cup water
- 2 bay leaves
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon pepper
- 1 tablespoon butter
- ½ small red onion chopped
- 1 inch ginger knob peeled and minced
- 3 garlic cloves minced
- 4 birds eye chilies sliced
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 ½ tablespoons coconut vinegar
- juice of ½ lemon
Garlic fried rice
- 1 tablespoon oil
- 6 cloves garlic minced
- 3 cups cooked rice
Burrito
- 4 large flour tortillas
- 4 medium fried eggs
- 2 cups shredded Mexican cheese blend
- pico de gallo optional
- tomatillo salsa optional
Instructions
- Place pork belly in a small pot with ½ cup vinegar, ½ cup water, bay leaves, salt, and pepper. Cover and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low and continue to simmer for 1 hour. Drain and discard bay leaves. Let cool.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
- Place pork belly on a sheet pan and roast in the oven for 40 minutes, flipping over halfway through. Remove from oven and chop pork.
- Melt butter in a medium saute pan over medium-high heat. Add red onion, ginger, garlic, and red chilies, and cook for 1 minute. Add pork, soy sauce, vinegar, and lemon juice, and cook until caramelized, about 2-3 minutes. Set aside and keep warm.
- In the same pan, heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium heat. Add garlic and cook for 30 seconds or until golden brown. Add rice and cook until rice is hot, stirring occasionally. Season with salt and remove from heat.
- Assemble the burritos. Spoon rice in the bottom ⅔ of the tortilla, followed by the sisig, fried egg, and cheese. Wrap and repeat with the remaining ingredients. Serve immediately with pico de gallo and salsa.
**Helpful tips and common mistakes
Literally translated, sisig means "to snack on something sour." You can make sisig with fish or beef but pork is the typical choice, or more specifically, pig's head and liver. I updated the traditional method by using pork belly instead.
Since I never prepared or let alone tasted sisig before, I had to refer to Google on how to prepare this dish. The one common factor between all the recipes is that the pork is prepared by using more than one cooking technique. It is marinated, braised, and finished in the saute pan or boiled, broiled, and finished in the saute pan; either way, it takes multiple steps to break down the pig. I decided to braise, roast, and finish on the stovetop.
First, slice the pork belly slab in two. This will help speed up the cooking time. Then, combine it with equal parts vinegar and water, a couple of bay leaves, salt, and pepper. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to low, and simmer for 1 hour. This step removes all impurities and will help make the pork tender. Remove the pork from the liquid and let it cool. You can also complete this step the night before.
Once the pork is ready for the second step, preheat the oven. Place the meat on a sheet pan and roast for 40 minutes, flipping it over halfway through. As it browns in the oven, it should get a lovely crust.
Remove from oven and chop the pork into small chunks. Since we're using the meat for a burrito, we want to chop the pork belly into smaller chunks.
Finish the pork belly with chilies and aromatics, seasoning it with the lemon directly in the pan. If you want the pork less spicy, use fewer chilies.
Although the sisig is the key component of the burrito, the garlic rice does play its part. If you love garlic, you'll love this garlic fried rice. Saute the garlic and use the garlic-infused oil to coat the rice. Can you taste the garlic yet?
Now comes the fun part: trying to fit all this goodness into one burrito! I do love a runny egg, but for the burrito, a medium-fried egg seemed more appropriate. The White Rabbit serves their burrito with a well-done fried egg, but I need a little runny yolk in my life.
This pork sisig burrito is fantastic on its own, but a little tomatillo salsa and pico de gallo on the side doesn't hurt. The sisig is tart and spicy, the garlic rice incredibly aromatic, the fried egg perfection, and the cheese oh so gooey. The burrito was exactly what I had wanted: comfort Filipino food!
For more pork inspiration check out this twice cooked black pepper pork belly!
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