Humba

I did not grow up with humba.  I discovered it on one of my Filipino recipe research binges and kind of wonder where it's been all my life.  I'm still working on perfecting a recipe.  But with each attempt I get closer to something I can call my own.

Humba is a braised pork belly dish originating from somewhere in the southern Philippines, the Visayas or Mindanao.  It shares a striking resemblance to Chinese braised pork belly, so I wouldn't be surprised that that's its origin.  It also shares similarities with Filipino adobo which is a more prominent dish in the northern Philippines.  What sets humba apart from the these dishes are two things - sugar and fermented black beans.

Traditionally, palm sugar is used.  A common sweetener in south east asian cuisine, it's extracted from the sap of palm trees, date palms, sago or coconut generally.  You'll find it sold as little disks or blocks in asian markets.  But you can also find it granulated (and pricier) at specialty grocery stores or food sections.  It's a brown sugar, so you'll find it light or dark brown in color.  Your regular brown sugar from your everyday market is a fine substitute, however, for any recipe calling for palm sugar.

Fermented black beans are known as tausi in Tagalog or douchi in Chinese.  They are soy beans which have been fermented and salted.  They are not to be confused with the black bean commonly used in South and Central American cuisines.  Used as a seasoning, they are very strong in flavor.  Generally found dried, they need to be soaked in water before using to wash off alot of the salt and soften them back up.  There are, however, moistened ones you can find vacuum packed.  And you can also find black bean paste.


The bean paste is much easier to find than the dried beans.  And so at the moment, that's what I use.  I do hope to be able to find the actual dried beans one day, but no such luck as of yet.  I might have to make a trip to Chinatown for it if I can't find it on my next trip to the Filipino store.  Bean paste is plentiful at the nearby Korean market, but no dried beans, which somewhat boggled me.  But, oh well.  The bean paste is a fine substitute for now.

Though pork belly is the traditional meat, this is the first time I've used it for humba.  And I've made it a few times.  The first time I used belly, it didn't turn out so well.  So I avoided it and simply used other cuts of meat while I perfected the sauce.  Doing this was helpful actually.  I realized what the problem was with the first belly.  Not enough meat.

Pork belly is a fatty cut of meat.  It's the cut used to make bacon.  Everyone's seen a package of bacon.  Those strips are just layers of meat and fat, and depending on the package, some have more fat than meat.  So that's what I had to fix.  I had to find a piece of belly that was simply just meatier.  You'll find pork belly sold skin on or skin off.  If you use the skin on, you'll want to score the skin to allow the fat to flow out while you brown it.  When I make this again, and I will make it again because I need to do it with the dried beans, I'll remember to show how I prep the belly to cook.

This is another easy one pot meal.  I season my pork belly on all sides, then on a low to medium low heat, set the piece skin side down and let it slowly brown and crisp up the surface.  It also allows some of the fat to render out as well.  Once crisp, I'll turn it over and brown the other side.  Then I'll remove it from the pot, drain out the fat, return the pork to the pot and pour the braising liquid over it.  In the braising liquid is the soy bean paste, soy sauce, vinegar, garlic, ginger, brown sugar, star anise, bay leaf and pepper and enough water to cover the piece of pork three quarters of the way.  Putting the cover over the pot, I then let it simmer for a couple hours until the meat is pull apart tender.  Once there, the pork is removed from the pot.  It's size will have reduced considerably because alot of fat has slowly oozed out during the long braising time.  Then we let the braising liquid continue to reduce until it reaches a desired consistancy of thickness.  This sauce ends up being very pungeunt and rich, caramel sweet and tart.

Slice the pork, lay it on the plate and pour some of the sauce over it.  Serve it with rice and a side of green vegetable.  We used broccoli this time around.  But a braised bok choy or green beans would work great as well. Balance the dish out with a nice veggie crunch.  You could maybe even season the veg with a little garlic and sesame oil.  Though with the rich sauce and equally rich and flavorful piece of pork, I think a simple pure clean veg side is ideal.