My Auntie's Sweet and Sour Sticky Ribs

My Auntie is a very good cook. And an adventurous one too. She will tune in to all those Taiwanese cooking shows and replicate the dishes in her kitchen.

She had loads of cookbooks too. All very well used as she actually tries the dishes, though not all. And some of her recipes are picked up from here, there and everywhere from friends and even from interrogating the restaurant staff.

And from stalking the CKT (Char Kway Teow) man. She will watch him with her eagle eyes and observe how he adds his ingredients and how he adjusts the flame on his stove. And lo and behold my Auntie can whip up CKT in her kitchen. 

I have a small collection of her recipes, dictated by hand which I have neatly filed away in a clear holder. In fact I have 5 of these clear holders, where I neatly kept recipes from newspaper and magazine cuttings. But of course in my case, they stayed there undisturbed hah..hah...

When I first tasted my Auntie's ribs dish, I was very impressed. It was delicious, as is all of my Aunties dishes. My Auntie is very generous in sharing her recipes and hence, I did attempt this dish once or twice but it did not taste as good as my Auntie's. Why? Because I misplaced the recipe and used ingredients which I thought was right (aka simply hentam).

Well, I found the recipe and I quickly filed it into a folder together with all the other recipes that my Auntie gave me. And not surprisingly I had to flip through all 5 folders before I found the recipe again. I am seriously in need of a better filing system. 

Thankfully, this attempt was successful but even then I had to do it twice. The first time, I missed out garlic. As far as I am concerned, no garlic, no taste.

If you think that these ribs are difficult to prepare, I can assure you that they are not. There is no deep frying involved. What you need to do is throw a bunch of sauces and some minced garlic into a pot, stir, stir and throw in the ribs. 

Stir some more to coat the ribs with the marinade. Then add some water and put the pot on the stove, bring to a boil and lower the heat to simmer till meat is just tender.

After that you pour the whole lot (or you can call it  a mess) onto a lined baking tray and grill at 200C for about 20 minutes until the sauce is thickened and caramalized. Easy? Of course it is easy. After all that trouble what you get is this :

You want to get proper meaty ribs for this. What I used was not really meaty as these ribs are more suitable for soups. This dish can be prepared ahead of time, or even one day ahead. Just before grilling, just take it out from the fridge. Bring it  to room temperature and then simply grill away.












Sweet and Sour Sticky Ribs
Recipe source : Phong Hong

Ingredients :
- 600g meaty pork ribs (scalded and rinsed)

For the sauce (please adjust to your own taste) :
- 3 tbsp Tomato sauce 
- 2 tbsp Sweet chilli sauce
- 3 tbsp Light soya sauce
- 1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
- 1 tbsp Honey
- 1 tbsp Brown sugar
- 2 tbsp Vinegar

- Some water

To thicken the sauce :
- Add one teaspoon tapioca flour/cornflour with 2 tbsp water.

Method :
1. In a pot mix all the sauces, honey, brown sugar and vinegar together.
2. Add ribs and stir to coat with the marinade.
3. Add some water just to barely cover the ribs.
4. Bring the a boil and them lower the heat to a simmer.
5. Simmer for about 40 minutes or until just tender.
6. Increased heat to bring back to a boil.
7. Add the tapioca flour/cornflour mixture and stir to thicken the sauce.
8. Pour the ribs and sauce onto a lined baking tray and grill at 200C for about 20 minutes or until the sauce is sticky and caramalised. Baste every now and then by stirring the ribs to coat with the sauce.