Pork and Century Egg Congee
As seen on TV
Which Show?
Who made this dish?
A toast to Laurence's mother.
While prepping: "For the first course I'm toasting my mother. She opened a bakery and 22 years later handed me the keys. The only thing she asked was that I keep the congee and the you tiao on the menu. Congee is normally done with just water and rice. What I want to do is build flavor in the stock, so we're putting in a bunch of smoked pork bones that add this deep flavor."
On the you tiao: "It's airy, it's light. I want them to see the skill it took to make that youtiao as a vessel to hold a lot of that congee."
At service: "My mother operated an old school Cantonese bakery for 22 years. The only thing you have to do is keep the congee and the you tiao. The you tiao is a fried dough stick, and we have a pork and century egg congee." Final table on temperature: "I wanted it hot."
{Guest}: "In Laurence's congee, with all the different layers of flavor, each time I took a bite I'm getting a highlight from a different flavor profile."
{Guest}: "The umami is great, but the texture is on the thicker side for me."
{Judge}: "I wish it was a little warmer. I think that's why it thickened up, because it's set."
Final table: {Judge}: "It was room temperature. Because you plated it in a very thin layer, it cooled off really quickly. That being said, I thought it was a beautiful bowl of congee."
{Guest}: "All that complexity came through. The youtiao is airy, not greasy."
