Skip to main content
Main

Pork Braised with Garlic and Onions of Indonesia

A braised pork dish with garlic, onions, soy sauce, ginger, and pepper.

From the Wikibooks Cookbook · 7 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Clove and ginger match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,038 recipes. Both carry estragole, which smells anise, licorice. The science ↓

Pork Braised with Garlic and Onions of Indonesia

Serves 6
Timeone hour

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Cut the meat into 1‑inch (2.5 cm) cubes.

Cook the pork

  1. Add the onions, garlic and ginger to a pan and cook at around 200 °C.

  2. Add the pork and mix with the soy sauce and black pepper (and chili pepper if desired).

  3. After about 3–4 minutes, reduce the heat to around 120 °C and cook, covered, for one hour.

Serve

  1. Serve with nice‑tasting rice.

Nutrition, whole recipe (rough)

307Calories
29 gProtein
14 gFat
14 gCarbs
What these numbers assume: 6 portions
IngredientPortion assumedkcal
Pork100g cooked242
Onion1 medium (110g)44
Soy Sauce1 tbsp (15ml)9
Black Pepper1 tsp ground (2.3g)6
Garlic1 clove (3g)4
Ginger1 tsp grated fresh (2g)2

One typical portion per ingredient; the recipe's quantities are not counted. A rough guide only, not for medical or dietary planning.

Recipe from the Wikibooks Cookbook.

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Clove + gingertop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together6,038 recipes

    Shared aroma: estragole (anise, licorice).

  2. Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together29,058 recipes

    Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).

  3. Clove + peppertop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together17,451 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl octanoate (fruity, wine).

  4. Garlic + gingertop 6% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together6,402 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

  5. Garlic + peppertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together27,090 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Pork
Provides the meat that becomes tender during long, covered, gentle cooking.
White onions
Soften and sweeten as they cook, forming the body of the sauce.
Garlic
Adds sharp, savory aroma that mellows during cooking.
Soy sauce
Adds salt, savory depth and darker color to the pork.
Ginger
Adds warm, fragrant aroma that complements the pork.

The step that matters

Reducing the heat and cooking covered. Too high heat dries and toughens the pork and can scorch the onions and sugars. A gentle, covered heat lets the meat stay moist while its connective tissue slowly breaks down, making it tender.

Swap the clove

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (pork, onion, garlic, sauce, ginger, pepper):

  1. Cuminfits better
  2. Turmericfits better
  3. Thymefits about as well
  4. Clovethe original

Fit is the average pairing score against pork, onion, garlic, sauce, ginger, pepper. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

You might also like

Pork CakePork Cake107 recipesRoast PorkRoast Pork82 recipesTomato SoupTomato Soup526 recipesBrown BreadBrown Bread461 recipes