Sisig is the street food dish of The Philippines. Today on Passport Kitchen, Chef Anton Dayrit demonstrates how to make traditional pork sisig with its famously complex flavors and textures.
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00:00 Sisig is the street food dish in the Philippines.
00:02 Traditional sisig is made out of chopped pork
00:05 with calamansi juice, chilies, onion,
00:08 a little bit of garlic, and soy.
00:10 It hits all notes in the Filipino palate,
00:12 like crispy, sour, porky, soft, creamy.
00:15 My name's Anton Derrit.
00:17 My family's from Pampanga, Philippines,
00:18 and this is how we make pork sisig.
00:20 ♪♪
00:23 Sisig originated in Pampanga,
00:25 which is the culinary capital of the Philippines.
00:27 Traditional sisig from Pampanga
00:28 is made with pork belly and pork mask,
00:31 maskara, as we call it.
00:32 So we're gonna start by cutting up this pig mask here
00:35 to make the cooking time quicker.
00:36 So using a pig mask adds a lot of texture into sisig.
00:40 It definitely adds this beautiful,
00:42 succulent, fatty texture
00:44 that you cannot get from any other protein.
00:46 Now we're gonna blowtorch this and then remove any hairs
00:49 that are still evident in there.
00:50 So here we've cut the pork belly into your desired size,
00:53 and then we're gonna braise it separately
00:55 with the same aromatics but into two different pots.
00:58 So here are aromatics.
00:59 These aromatics for both the pork face and pork belly.
01:01 We have bay leaves here, black peppercorns,
01:04 two Spanish onions, and half a bulb of garlic,
01:06 and then we cover with water.
01:08 Turn the heat on into medium-low,
01:11 and then we cover with a lid.
01:12 So this will cook for approximately
01:15 one hour and a half.
01:17 And now here on this side, we have our pork belly.
01:19 Same aromatics, and then water.
01:23 Turn the flame on again to medium-low.
01:25 This one will cook a lot faster.
01:27 So we're simmering for about one hour,
01:29 and in the meantime, we're gonna get all our vegetables
01:31 and aromatics ready for the sisig mixture.
01:33 ♪♪
01:36 Our first ingredient here is calamansi,
01:38 which for me is one of the most important ingredients
01:40 of the recipe of sisig.
01:42 It has a lime and tangerine flavor,
01:44 which is really irreplaceable.
01:46 So in the Philippines, we use calamansi a lot
01:48 as a juice for breakfast in the morning
01:50 or even to mix with a little gin, you know?
01:53 I can use one right now. [ Laughs ]
01:55 We're gonna probably use three tablespoons of calamansi.
01:59 We're gonna dice the garlic.
02:01 You can never have too much garlic in sisig.
02:04 It's much easier to crush garlic with a cleaver.
02:07 ♪♪
02:10 We're gonna mince this garlic.
02:12 ♪♪
02:16 We're gonna small-dice this onion.
02:18 So the onions eventually will add, like,
02:20 a little bit of crisp and sweetness
02:21 later on to our sisig dish.
02:23 So we have all our aromatics done here and ready to go.
02:26 Let's set this aside and let's get back to the pork.
02:28 ♪♪
02:31 We're gonna be checking up on the pig mascara.
02:34 So now it's tender. We're gonna remove it.
02:35 And we'll set this aside
02:36 and cool it down in the refrigerator.
02:38 So our pork mass is cooled off.
02:40 We all have different portions here.
02:42 So we're gonna cut it into similar thinness
02:45 so we can grill it all evenly and dice it up all together.
02:48 You can actually reuse a whole pig face
02:50 because all of the different parts of the pig face
02:52 have different textures, and it just adds more to the dish,
02:55 makes the dish much better.
02:56 The grill is smoking, smoking hot.
02:58 So we're gonna get this on right now.
02:59 Skin side down first.
03:01 'Cause if you put the fat side down right now,
03:03 it's gonna smoke up the shrimp.
03:05 The reason why we're grilling this
03:06 is because it's much easier to work with after grilling,
03:09 and number two, it imparts this really smoky flavor
03:12 to the sisig.
03:14 This is exactly how my family used to make it
03:15 in the Philippines.
03:17 This step in the seasoning process
03:18 is very, very important.
03:19 You need to dry out the pork face.
03:22 It's because of the gelatinous texture from the cartilage.
03:25 That's the whole point of doing this,
03:27 because you don't want to end up with a really gummy,
03:30 wet, and gross-like sisig.
03:32 So we're starting to get there.
03:33 We're achieving char.
03:34 So I'm gonna flip these guys over.
03:37 My favorite piece is the cheek and also the snout
03:39 because they're much fattier.
03:41 They have, like, a really, really good texture
03:43 and flavor, in my opinion.
03:44 So the pig face is all done.
03:45 Now we're gonna cool this off for about an hour
03:47 or just until it's cold,
03:49 and then we're gonna move on to the pork belly.
03:50 Pig face is cooled down. Now let's dice it.
03:52 I'm gonna start up with my favorite part, the cheek.
03:57 Ooh. Oh, my God.
04:00 So good.
04:01 Hear that crunch?
04:02 Oh, I already know this is gonna be good.
04:04 It's a pretty laborious job to make sisig,
04:07 but I would tell you that all this labor
04:09 that we're doing right now,
04:10 it's definitely gonna be worth it.
04:13 Now let's move on to the pork belly.
04:14 ♪♪
04:17 Our pork belly is done.
04:19 I'm gonna take them out.
04:20 Set them in a sheet tray here with a rack.
04:23 We're gonna season it with salt, like, a good amount of salt.
04:26 So when we pop it in the oven,
04:27 it's gonna dry out the skin and make it crispy.
04:30 We're gonna pop this into a 350-degree oven
04:32 for 1 hour and 20 minutes until the pork is dry.
04:36 The pork belly is out of the oven and cooled off.
04:39 We're gonna cut off a little piece here
04:41 'cause we're gonna bake this into little chicharrones
04:43 on top of our sisig later.
04:45 Now we're gonna deep-fry.
04:46 You need to make sure it's pat down dry
04:48 before you drop it in here
04:49 'cause it may explode.
04:51 So just be very, very careful.
04:52 Lay it in there gently, as so.
04:56 All right, we're gonna deep-fry this for about 10 minutes.
05:00 While this is happening,
05:01 we're gonna cut our leftover pork belly
05:04 into small pieces for our chicharrones later on.
05:09 Set this aside.
05:12 So you can see how beautiful it's getting right now.
05:15 So we're getting there.
05:17 Almost 10 minutes are up.
05:19 That's all ready.
05:21 Drop that in.
05:23 Everything that goes out of the fryer,
05:25 rule of thumb, season with salt.
05:28 Now we're gonna deep-fry our chicharrones.
05:32 Sisig basically has, like, multiple preparations of pork.
05:35 There's grilled pig face, deep-fried pork belly,
05:38 pork cracklings, and then you put it all together.
05:40 Basically, it's like the ultimate pork dish for me.
05:43 All different textures and flavors put together.
05:46 Our chicharrones are ready,
05:47 so now we're gonna add some salt to it.
05:51 Our pork belly is now cooled off.
05:52 We're gonna take this pork belly,
05:54 chop it up Morimoto-style.
05:56 ♪♪
05:59 So you see?
06:01 See that crunch?
06:04 That's what you want.
06:06 Yeah.
06:07 ♪♪
06:11 This is what I mean when I mean Morimoto-style.
06:15 Like, Chef Morimoto used to do this, an Iron Chef.
06:18 He would use the chop up, like, proteins.
06:21 This is exactly how they do it in Pampanga in the Philippines.
06:23 When they make sisig, they do it with two cleavers.
06:26 Our pork belly's all minced. Let's move on.
06:28 ♪♪
06:31 Before we cook the fried rice, we're gonna season our wok.
06:33 ♪♪
06:36 Put a little bit of salt in.
06:38 So when you season the wok, it cleans the wok,
06:40 and at the same time, it also imparts
06:41 more flavor into the food.
06:43 So we're gonna use a whisk.
06:45 Normally, this is used with a brush,
06:46 with a Chinese brush, like a bamboo brush.
06:48 We don't have that right now, so we're using a whisk to do that.
06:53 Just dump that out.
06:55 ♪♪
06:57 Little bit of oil.
07:00 Half of this butter.
07:01 I know that looks like a lot.
07:03 Half of that garlic in there.
07:06 All right.
07:08 So we're gonna get that butter.
07:09 We're gonna let it go brown a little bit.
07:11 So now we're gonna add your rice.
07:13 All right.
07:15 We're gonna season it with some of our magic seasoning.
07:19 The mushroom seasoning is not very traditional.
07:21 I just feel like, you know, it's an organic MSG.
07:24 It's actually just dehydrated mushrooms and salt,
07:26 and it adds, like, an umami flavor.
07:28 Filipino fried rice is super simple
07:30 just because Filipino food
07:32 already has a lot of flavor already in it,
07:34 so you don't want, like, an overpowering rice
07:36 to go with that.
07:38 Our Filipino fried rice is done.
07:40 All right.
07:43 So that's why you season a wok.
07:44 See? Nothing sticks, nothing left over.
07:46 We have our garlic fried rice.
07:49 Let's move on. Let's finish our seasoning.
07:50 ♪♪
07:53 It's time to put everything together.
07:54 We got our ingredients set aside here.
07:56 So put all of our pork belly in.
07:59 Some of our pig face.
08:02 So put a little bit of onion in.
08:04 Little bit of garlic.
08:05 Little bit of soy sauce.
08:07 This is a Filipino soy sauce that you can get
08:09 in any Filipino or Asian market.
08:11 It's very traditional to cooking adobo
08:13 or making sisig or anything
08:15 that uses soy sauce in the Philippines.
08:17 We're gonna use some of our calamansi juice as well.
08:20 And then a little bit of your magic mushroom seasoning.
08:24 A touch of salt.
08:25 So nori is kind of like soy sauce,
08:26 but also kind of different in a way.
08:28 It has a little bit more umami, a little bit more sugar.
08:31 It is very traditional to using for sisig.
08:33 Traditionally, pampanga, sisig started off
08:36 by using pig brain.
08:38 They used to take the pig brain,
08:39 pulse it with a little bit of garlic,
08:41 and then fold it into the sisig.
08:43 But because I don't like using pig brain,
08:44 that's why we use mayonnaise.
08:46 I like using Kupi mayonnaise.
08:47 You can use Hellmann's or whatever brand of mayo you like.
08:50 What the mayo does, also binds the whole sisig
08:52 together when you eat it.
08:53 Don't forget our black pepper.
08:55 All right.
08:57 So we're gonna mix this baby up.
08:59 I already know this is probably gonna be
09:01 one of the best sisig I've ever made.
09:02 ♪♪
09:05 Yeah.
09:06 ♪♪
09:08 So we have our platter heated up.
09:10 We're gonna put the butter in, the sisig mixture.
09:12 All right.
09:14 [ Sizzling ]
09:18 All right. Crack the egg in.
09:20 You can have sisig without an egg,
09:22 but growing up, this is how it's done.
09:24 Add some of the green onions, Spanish onions.
09:29 Some of the chilies.
09:30 I like it spicy.
09:32 If you don't have green, you can use red.
09:34 And then we'll put the little bit of chicharron here on top.
09:38 And then our beautiful calamansi here.
09:42 There you go.
09:44 And this here is traditional kampampangan sisig.
09:47 I'm gonna take my spoon and fork here.
09:48 This is how we do it in the Philippines.
09:50 See that bottom part all crusted up?
09:52 Oh, yeah.
09:54 Let's see.
09:55 ♪♪
10:00 Goddamn good. Oh, yeah.
10:02 This is the best sisig I've ever had.
10:03 The meatiness, the fattiness from the pig face,
10:06 the sourness from the calamansi, the soy sauce, everything,
10:09 everything just comes together with the garlic fried rice.
10:13 It's another level.
10:14 This reminds me of my childhood, basically.
10:16 If you've never had sisig before, I think you should try it
10:19 because it's probably one of the most complex dishes
10:21 in the Philippines.
10:23 It's basically the history of the Philippines in a plate.
10:26 (electronic music)