Neck Bone and Sweet Potato

What a bizarre combination. Pork neck bones and sweet potatoes cooked in a spicy sauce. How much meat can neck bones have anyway? Surprisingly, a lot. The sweet potatoes add a nice sweet break between the spicy bites.

This reminded me a lot of something my mother makes, with pork ribs and potatoes. That could probably work really well here. Probably chicken too.

Ingredients
- 2 scallions with roots trimmed, sliced in the middle (or however you want)
- 3 red peppers sliced on a bias (medium hot), keep the seeds unless you're a sissy
- sliced ginger - I love ginger, so I used a large chunk for this
- sweet potatoes, peeled, and sliced in 0.25-0.5 inch thickness (i don't have a picture of this). Keep them in a bowl of cold water until ready to use. Do it or you'll be sorry. I used 5 tiny ones, but I would imagine you can use 1-2 regular sized ones.



Sauce
- 6-8 spoonfuls soy sauce
- 4-6 spoonfuls 고추장 (go choo jang)
- 3-4 spoonfuls 고추가루 (go choo ga ru) - i like coarse ground
- 1 spoonful sriracha
- 10 garlic cloves, minced finely (it's not as much as you'd think)
- 2 spoonfuls sesame oil
- 1 spoonful mirin
- 1 spoonful rice wine vinegar
- 1 small asian pear, finely grated,* with juice
- 1 small yellow onion, finely grated, with juice
- some ginger, finely grated, with juice
- a few turns of the pepper mill

Mix the sauce together in a bowl. taste and adjust seasoning, if needed. If the pear is not sweet enough, add 0.5-1 spoonful of sugar. The original recipe did not call for the mirin or the rice wine vinegar, but i think these add more depth to the sauce. Also Sriracha. It's probably unnecessary, but I like to add it to everything. And next time, I will probably reduce the amount of go choo jang. I found out that not everyone can handle the heat in the songo household.



* if possible, use an Asian grater like this one



Oh, before all of this, you should have been soaking your neck bones in cold water in a large bowl. Change the water a few times.

Place the neck bones in a pot with enough water to cover and then some. Turn the heat on high and bring to boil. You may add aromatics you have on hand. I had some leftover ginger peel, onion skin, and extra scallion, so i tossed them into the pot.

After it starts to boil, lower the heat to medium and continue to cook. As the meat cooks, skim off any scum or oil that comes up to the surface. Cook about an hour or more. It is impossible to overcook this.



Place the neck bones aside for now.



Throw out any solids, strain, and reserve 2-3 cups of stock for this dish. The rest, you can save and freeze to use for another dish (eg, arroz al horno).



Add the sauce you made earlier to the stock and stir. Add the meat back into the pot. Place the scallions, ginger, and red peppers into the pot while you're at it. Bring to boil then reduce to medium heat without a cover. Cook until the liquid is reduced by more than half. The meat should be falling off the bone.



Add the sweet potato slices and place the cover. Reduce the heat to low and cook until sweet potatoes are tender, about 25 minutes. Check often, but resist the urge to fish out and eat all the sweet potato pieces.

Plate your dish with rice and eat.