Zhenjiang Pot Cover Noodles

Ingredients

• 400g fresh thin wheat noodles
• 500ml chicken or pork stock
• 5 tbsp light soy sauce
• 1 tsp dark soy sauce
• 2 tsp caster sugar
• 1 star anise
• 1 small piece cassia bark
• 1 tsp fennel seeds
• 4 slices ginger
• 2 spring onions, halved, for the broth
• 1 tbsp lard or neutral oil
• 200g pork loin
• 1 tbsp Shaoxing wine
• 1 tsp cornflour
• 100g pressed spiced tofu
• 2 handfuls leafy greens such as pak choi
• 1/4 tsp ground white pepper
• 8 tsp Chinkiang black vinegar, to finish
• 2 spring onions, finely sliced, to finish
• 1 small untreated wooden or bamboo lid about 15cm across (optional but traditional)

Before you cook

• Slice the pork loin as thinly as you can across the grain and toss it with the Shaoxing wine and cornflour.
• Cut the pressed tofu into matchstick strips.
• Wash the greens and separate the leaves.
• Scrub the wooden lid in hot water and leave it soaking so it neither scorches nor sheds splinters.

Steps

1. Put the stock, both soy sauces, sugar, star anise, cassia, fennel seeds, ginger and halved spring onions in a small pan.
2. Bring it to a gentle simmer and cook for fifteen minutes, until the broth smells strongly of the spices.
3. Strain the broth into a jug and discard the aromatics.
4. Melt the lard in a frying pan over high heat and cook the sliced pork for ninety seconds, until it has just turned opaque.
5. Add the tofu strips and toss them with the pork for one minute, then lift everything onto a plate.
6. Bring a wide, deep pan of water to a rolling boil and float the wooden lid on the surface.
7. Drop the noodles into the water around the lid and cook them for two minutes, prodding them apart with chopsticks.
8. Add the greens to the same water and cook for a further thirty seconds.
9. Divide the spiced broth between four warmed bowls and add a good pinch of white pepper to each.
10. Lift the noodles and greens straight from the pot into the bowls, letting a little cooking water come with them.
11. Pile the pork and tofu on top and scatter over the sliced spring onions.
12. Pour two teaspoons of black vinegar round the edge of each bowl and serve at once.