Twice-Cooked Pork

🎯 Twice-Cooked Pork · Judging the Authentic Core

Twice-Cooked Pork is not a dish Chen Songru improved or invented, and no gram-precise recipe for it survives in the record. This dish's value isn't in "technique demonstration" — across all the source material, it is the clearest, most concrete example of the principle that "the authentic core cannot be lost." No chili, and it isn't Twice-Cooked Pork — this is the only authenticity standard in the archive backed by an explicit counter-example and an approved alternative. First-hand account

⚠️ None of the surviving materials in Chen Songru's own hand — his autobiography, The True Craft of China's Sichuan Cuisine Masters, the Sichuan Restaurant Cookbook, and 160 Authentic Sichuan Dishes — contain a gram-precise recipe for Twice-Cooked Pork. All three books have been checked in full, and none contains a complete recipe entry for this dish. In this material, the value of Twice-Cooked Pork has always been Zhu De's directive as the standard for "the authentic core cannot be lost," not a technique record.

📜 Zhu De's Directive · One of the Highest-Grade Quotations in the Whole Archive

"Qinghai and Hubei have already come to Beijing to open restaurants. Now that Sichuan has arrived, you must get the Sichuan flavors right — don't mess with them arbitrarily… Stay true to Sichuan flavors. Someone suggested toning it down to suit local tastes, using less chili — that won't do. If someone wants Twice-Cooked Pork but can't handle chili, serve them Saucy Stir-Fried Pork instead, and tell them to come see me."

— Zhu De, as relayed in Chen Songru's own autobiography (newly obtained material, 2026) First-hand account

⚠️ The ellipsis in the quotation was left in place during transcription in the 02_research.md research report and is reproduced here as-is, without completion or alteration; whether that ellipsis reflects an omission already present in the original text of Chen Songru's autobiography cannot currently be confirmed. A more complete version, recorded in the dialogue transcript of the research draft, includes the additional rhetorical line "then would that still be Twice-Cooked Pork?" — since this page presents only the quotation verified word-for-word against 02_research.md, that additional line has not been included here as a direct quotation.

🏆 Corroboration · Chen Yi's Memory of Home Flavor

• Chen Yi (recalling his work-study years in France):
  "Back then, getting a taste of authentic Twice-Cooked Pork was simply sheer bliss." Biographical retelling

📋 Twice-Cooked Pork · General Reference Recipe (not from Chen Songru's manuscripts)

The recipe below is a common household method for Twice-Cooked Pork circulating as general Sichuan-cuisine knowledge — it is not Chen Songru's own recipe or something recorded in his manuscripts: none of the three books he left behind contains gram amounts for this dish. It is included here purely as a reference for anyone who wants to try making it at home; it carries a different evidence grade from the rest of this page, so please do not treat this recipe as something personally passed down by Chen Songru. Not from the manuscripts · General common-knowledge recipe

Core seasoning ratio (using Pixian doubanjiang at 20g as the baseline):

Bar lengths are proportional to gram amounts and are for visual reference only.

Method: place the pork belly in a pot of cold water with ginger slices and cooking wine, and boil until a chopstick pierces it easily (about 20 minutes). Remove, cool, and slice thin. Heat a small amount of oil in the wok and stir-fry the pork slices over low heat until they curl up, release their fat, and turn lightly crisp at the edges (the "lantern cup" shape). Push the pork aside, add doubanjiang and fermented black beans and fry until the oil turns red, then add sweet bean sauce, sugar, and light soy sauce, stir well, and toss together with the pork. Finish by adding the garlic sprouts and stir-frying until just cooked. Regarding Zhu De's directive that "no chili won't do" — the heat in Pixian doubanjiang itself is this dish's source of chili.

Source: a common household recipe from the Sichuan cuisine trade, not written or dictated by Chen Songru himself — for reference only.