How To Make Lechon Kawali (Filipino Crispy Pork)

Crispy bubbly skin, juicy tender pork, and tangy spiced vinegar. On this episode of Tasty 101, we're making Filipino lechon kawali with James Beard award-winning chef Lord Maynard Guerra. Lechon kawali is a traditional Filipino dish. Lechon is basically crispy pork. This is a regular dish that you cook for lunch, dinner, or breakfast in the Philippines the same way as adobo or sinigang. The characteristics of lechon kawali is a really crispy skin and really juicy in the inside. The secret of lechon kawali is first the quality of the meat. We use the belly part of the pig. The meat should be pink instead of pale. The skin should be smooth and not wrinkly. When you're roasting a pig over a coal, you're like cooking it slowly so you're rendering the fat towards the meat so the meat slowly cooks by itself. So I poke the skin to make sure to open up the pores so when you deep fry it, the oil penetrates through the fat and the fat melts to the meat. And that's the same process of slow cooking in a coal. So after that, I'll set that aside. I need to make my braising liquid. So we'll start with garlic, onions, some bay leaves, so sage, black pepper, salt, and my favorite ingredient, fish sauce. Once the braising liquid is boiling, we're going to start adding pork bellies. We're going to braise the pork belly for one and a half hours. Checking now the consistency of the meat. The knife should go cut all the way through like really soft and that's it. Next, what we're going to do is we're patting the skin dry with a towel just to remove some of the liquid and moisture and then we're seasoning the skin with salt to make the skin drier. And then after this, we're gonna refrigerate them so when you deep fry it, it's gonna be more crispier. So after you air dry for 24 hours or overnight, now you see the skin is more dry, a little bit more firmer. So like you know, the excess moisture is already out from the skin. So now we're ready for frying. We have the oil for 365 degrees and then we're gonna put the pork bellies side down. The reason why we drop the skin side down is to make the skin crispier and make sure the skin is on the hottest part of the wok. The quality that I'm looking for is the skin is crispy, meaning the skin is hard and you know it's gonna crispy and also it's gonna be like golden brown. So now we're trying to look for a golden brown and I think this should be good. Perfection, just like how my wife cooks at home. So lechon kawali always comes with some kind of sauce with acid. At Kuya Lourdes restaurant, we serve it with our housemate vinegar. So this is a half cup of apple cider vinegar, half a cup of coconut vinegar, garlic, a little bit of black pepper, salt, and thai bird chilies. Mix them and now you have the dipping sauce for the lechon kawali. So if you're offering this dish to your guests, typically like Filipinos will offer you the first pick and the last bite and if no one wants to eat it then that's the time you pick.