UPDATED POST ON 29-11-2016

Many readers have been asking me about how to wash the pig maw or pig stomach. Prior to this, I have no confidence how to wash the stomach at all but I can vividly remember what my late mum have done. I googled and none is closed to what my late mum did. I have decided to buy a pig maw and share with readers. After preparation, both my wife and me concluded that the pig maw has no foul smell.

When you buy a pig maw, the outer surface looks rather nice and clean but when you turn over the stomach and smell it, you will have stinky smell. When you touch it, it is slimy and very slippery to touch. You cannot basically do anything with it. It is these sticky slimy mucus membrane that causes the foul smell and the objective of getting rid of the smell is to get rid of this membrane. 

WHAT IS REQUIRED

• a pig maw
• 5-6 lime or lemon or  2 tablespoons of white vinegar
• 2 tablespoons of tapioca starch 
• 1 tablespoon of salt

STEPS OF PREPARATION

• Squeeze the lime juice, add the tapioca starch and salt. Massage the pig maw (both sides) with these acidic starch mixture.

• Heat up a wok (without oil) until very hot, place the internal side of pig maw and use a ladle to press down again the hot wok. Repeat until both side curls up.

• Take up and wash under the water. If there are any yellow membrane, use a knife to scrap off until the inside is smooth . You can smell and see if it still have a foul smell. 

• Turn out the other side put a bit more starch and lemon juices. Put it back to the hot wok and dry fry both sides. Take out, clean and cut off any fats attached to it.

• The pig maw is done and you can cook in the manner you like. What is left in the wok is the tapioca starch and the membrane. All the stinky mucus is glued to the wok via the tapioca starch. The acidic juices and salt help to break down the protein attached to the mucus and lime is used to provide a refreshing aroma. 

INTRODUCTION

Eating pig maw, hog maw or some called it pig stomach, is a love hate relationship. Some people will like pig offal whereas some will strongly rejected the consumption of it. I am not as adventurous as my wife and I only eat a few types of pig offal, among which, is pig’s maw and pig liver. Other than these two offal, psychologically I can’t convince myself to having the others.

I have eaten pig’s maw since a very young age prepared by my late mother. There were not much changes throughout these years in the way we cooked and we usually prepared it with white peppercorns. It is quite a spicy soup and will heat up your body making your body sweat in the hot weather like in Malaysia and Singapore.

My late mum usually prepared this once in a while when she is able to find some good quality pig maws from the market. At her time, a lot of works need to be done. The uncooked maw will have to be washed thoroughly. She will turned the pig maw inside out, cut off any impurities, washed it with lots of corn flours or tapioca flours, put it in the hot wok without any oil, pan fried the maw until all the dirty, slimy layers in the maw stuck to the hot wok. She then took it out, washed it again with vinegar or lime before she cut it into small pieces and started the soup preparation.

That is quite a lot of work involved. Apparently, the supermarkets in Singapore knew that foodies hate doing all this tedious works, they started to sell the semi cooked pig maw in package form. This will save a lot of works associated to the preparation of the pig maw soup. However, minimal works still needs to be done to ensure pig maw is “cleaned” as per individual likings.

Since young, the house recipe for pig maw is only one, pig maw cooked in white peppercorns soup. Chinese believed that whatever offal of an animal that one eats, it will be nutritious to that part of his/her body! Meaning, if you are eating pig maws, it will beneficial to your stomach. Whether or not this is true is definitely up to reader’s own judgements and believes.

White pepper is added because Chinese believed white pepper can chase away the “winds” and heats up your body. This is especially beneficial to ladies who are having mensuration or after giving birth. Therefore, pig maw cooked with white pepper is commonly served in confinement meals for ladies after giving birth. However, its popularity have also expanded to include male members in the family…

Yesterday I am doing my marketing and I saw some rather nice semi-cooked pig maw at a reasonable price, I bought and I prepared the soup yesterday. This was the kids friendly version, meaning, it was not overly peppery spicy and certain ingredients that kids loved were added. It was cooked using pressure cooker instead of the traditional slow cooker or “double boiled” method before the slow cooker were introduced. Preparation of the dish requires the most 2 hours from (preparation to serving in the table).

WHAT IS REQUIRED

Serve 3-4 adults

• 1 package of ready semi-cooked pig maw (about 500 grams)

• 250 grams of lean meat or pork ribs (if preferred, chicken legs can be substituted)

• 3 tablespoons of white peppercorns (lightly crushed)

• 1 tin of canned mushrooms

• Some green vegetables like lettuces.

• Pinches of salt to taste

• 6 cups of water

STEPS OF PREPARATION

• Slice off any impurities or fats and cut into your desired size. Clean the maw in plain water.

• Use a pestle and mortar to lightly crunch the pepper corn and put it in a soup disposal bag.

• Put the cut pig maw, crushed pepper corns and meat in the pressure cooker. Add the water and pressure cook the maw by selecting the soup function or meat functions (if any).

• After the cycle completed, release the steam (HOT AND BE CAREFUL) and add in cut mushrooms, salt to taste and cooked for another 10 minutes.

• Just before serving, has  a big serving bowl ready. Take out the big piece of meat and use fork to pull the meat apart. Put the pulled meat on the serving bowl.  Scoop out all the mushrooms and pig maw and placed on top of the meat. Set aside for latter assembly.

• In another smaller pot, transfer the soup from the pressure cooker. Heat it until it is boiling hot and blanch the lettuce using the hot soup. Transfer the blanched lettuce into another serving bowl, put some hot soups on both bowls.  Best served hot with rice.

Note that this heating step is OPTIONAL if you are having the soup immediately after it is cooked. You can blanch the vegetables in the pressure cooker directly if the soup is still hot. I am doing this because my soup was ready one hour before my meals were served.

CONCLUSION

This is another cut short method of preparing the traditional cuisines due to the availability of the new kitchen equipment. I have toned down the spiciness by using less peppercorns. The addition of a piece of meat will help to sweeten the meat broth or soup. Additions of mushrooms will make the soup appeal to my kids and having some greens with this meat soup will tone down the greasiness of the soup.

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