The impossible: lean yet tasty taiwanese Lurofan 台灣魯肉飯

One of the street foods that brings a lot of fond memories for people who have lived in Taiwan is the flavor of Lu ro fan. If you have never had it, I don't even know how to describe the flavor profile. You just have to try it. It does require some prep and cooking time similar to the ragu but like the ragu once it's on the stove simmering you can pretty much forget about it for the next 3 hours. The traditional taiwanese recipe calls for fat cuts of pork like pork belley, however this adds a ton of calories and saturated fat. my lean version results in incredible yummy and low calorie guilt free pork that your can add to your noodle or rice any time

There are only a few simple steps
1) dice about a pound of shallots and slice about 10 cloves of garlic. I have sometimes sliced the whole head of garlic. What can I say, just really love garlic. Put 1 cup of shiitake mushrooms in warm water to hydrate

2) add about 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a heavy pot and add shallots and garlic. Sauté for may be 5 min or more in medium heat until they shallot is translucent. Remember to add a pinch of salt

3) add 1 lb of ground pork of the highest quality ( I like Berkshire pork from local farmer market) but today I gave a try of whole food cage free organic ground pork a try because I didn't have time to go to farmers market. Cook until meat change color to white

4) add 1 teaspoon Chinese 5 spice powder, 1 teaspoon of white pepper, 1 teaspoon of sugar, 3 tablespoons of Taiwanese rice wine, 2 tablespoon of soy sauce, chopped hydrated shiitake mushroom and mushroom water and stir well

5) when it boils reduce the heat and simmer for 3 hours. You can add a few pealed hard boil eggs into this mix at some point of the cooking process.

Once it's done and cooled you can put containers and refrigerated. Add a scoop or two over rice or noodle and it is a quick way to make comfort food.