Filipino Recipe
Pork
Humba is a Visayan specialty. It is their equivalent of Adobo. It is a dining table mainstay during fiestas and celebratory events such as birthdays and anniversaries.
Did you know?
Humba was coined from two words: Humok and baboy. Humok means malabot (soft) and baboy is pork.
Pork Humba, Photo by Arnold Gamboa
Pork Humba (Visayan Pork Adobo)
INGREDIENTS:
1 lb. pork belly, sliced into cube bite sizes
5 cloves garlic, minced
2 red onion, finely chopped
3 tbsps. oyster sauce
2 tbsps. Demerara sugar
2 tbsps. calamansi or lemon juice
1/2 cup vinegar
1 cup Sprite
2/3 tbsp coarsely ground pepper
5 star anise
3 bay leaves
a pinch of oregano powder
a pinch of thyme powder
2 tbsp black bean sauce (Tausi)
3 pcs. saba banana or plantain, sliced crosswise into three
1 cup banana blossoms; Use sliced mushrooms as a substitute
1 cup water or as needed
salt to taste
cooking oil
PROCEDURE:
In a bowl, mix the calamansi or lemon juice with the soy sauce, oyster sauce and sugar. Use the mixture to marinate the pork for at least half an hour.
Heat a sauce pan or a wok, put the pork including the marinade sauce. Add water just enough to cover the pork. Drop the star anise and bay leaves.
Bring to a boil and then reduce the heat to a simmer. Cook the pork for about 1 hour or until the meat is ‘melt in the mouth’ kinda tender. Add more water as necessary. Drain the meat but do not throw away the sauce but set it aside for later.
Using a separate large sauce pan, heat the cooking oil and saute the garlic and then the onion.
Add the pork pieces and stir fry for about 5 minutes.
Add the sauce that has been set aside and then add tausi or black bean sauce, saba banana or plantain as well as the sprite.
Continue to simmer until most of the liquid has evaporated.
Pour vinegar, do not stir, otherwise the vinegar will sour the dish too much.
Add the banana blossoms or mushrooms.
Adjust the seasoning.
Serve with rice. (When washing the rice prior to cooking, set aside the second and third washing water from the rice. Use these liquid instead of the plain water added to the pork humba, the rice water will make for a thicker sauce.