Capital spare ribs, or Peking ribs, is a tasty Chinese takeaway dish that's savoury and tangy with a crispy crunch on the meat. If you love fried tender meat coated in sauce, one bite into this will make you a fan.
In our recipe, we'll share our favourite way to make it at home, our cooking tips, and variations you can try. We've tried many versions of this dish from restaurants and takeaways, and we're happy to say our dish is close to restaurant quality but healthier.
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What Is It Made Of?
Capital spare ribs are made of spare ribs and capital sauce or Peking sauce. After marinating, cooks double-fry the pork meat before finally smothering it in Peking-style sauce once again.
Sometimes, the dish includes sauteed vegetables like onions and peppers. Many people also eat this protein-rich side dish with rice.
What Is Capital Sauce?
Chinese capital sauce is a sweet and spicy marinade similar to a barbecue marinade. Similarly, you can enjoy it as a dip, marinade, or rub.
You can make Peking sauce in many ways. However, the marinade recipe usually contains garlic and some variation of soy. Therefore, this Asian mix tastes fantastic on many types of meat, such as pork, duck, chicken, and beef.
Ingredients
For our capital spare ribs recipe, you’ll need the following ingredients. Some are more particular to achieve this signature taste.
- Spare ribs, cut into 1-inch pieces (you can also use lamb or beef ribs)
- cooking wine
- salt
- ground black pepper
- cornstarch
- egg
- Vegetable cooking oil for frying
Capital sauce
- ketchup
- garlic
- light soy sauce
- sugar
- sesame oil
- Green onions for garnish
- Sesame seed for garnish
Spare Ribs
Traditionally, meat from the belly of a pig is used for this Chinese takeaway dish. However, we've found that you can also make it with other meat, like baby back ribs, lamb ribs and beef short ribs. We're using lamb ribs in our recipe to demonstrate this works with other meats.
When this part of the meat is cooked right, it has a crispy exterior and a very tender texture inside.
With whatever meat you use, you need to cut it to 1 inch. Using a cleaver or a heavy knife will help you easily cut through the rib bones. If you don't have one or are not confident in cutting it, ask your local butcher to do it when you buy the meat.
Seasoning
Ketchup is one of the main ingredients of our dish. It adds sweet, sour, and tangy flavours and a primary red colour.
Light soy is essential to the capital sauce, but you can replace it with tamari or liquid aminos if necessary.
Garlic provides the marinade with its unique and robust flavour profile. We also like to add a small amount of sesame oil to our recipe for its nutty aroma.
We recommend using either Shaoxing wine, Chinese rice wine, or dry cooking sherry for the cooking wine.
Our recipe won't come out as red, as the dish from Chinese takeaways, as we're not using red food colouring. If you want to recreate this look at home, add ½ teaspoon red food colouring.
You can easily spice them up with red pepper flakes if you prefer spicy flavours.
Capital Spare Ribs Recipe
Ingredients
- 500 g spare ribs cut 1-inch pieces
- 1 tablespoon cooking wine
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ teaspoon ground black pepper
- 1 tablespoon cornstarch
- 1 egg
- 2 tablespoon ketchup
- 4-5 clove garlic minced
- 4 tablespoon light soy sauce
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 1 teaspoon sesame oil
- 2 green onions for garnish
- sesame seeds for garnish
- 2 cup vegetable oil for fying
Instructions
- Marinate the rib in cooking wine, salt, pepper, cornstarch, and egg for 1 hour.
- While they are marinating, make your capital sauce. Mix ketchup, minced garlic, light soy sauce, sugar, and sesame oil in a small bowl.
- In a wok, heat enough oil to fully cover the meat over medium heat until about 160-170°C (320-340°F). Cook the meat for about 5 minutes until it turns light brown. Then, remove it from the oil and let it rest for at least 5 minutes.
- Then, reheat the oil to about 180°C (355°F) and cook again for another 2 minutes or until golden brown. Remove the meat from the oil and let it rest on a kitchen towel to remove excess oil.
- Over medium heat, cook the capital sauce until slightly thick and simmering.
- Add the fried meat to the capital sauce and cook until they are fully coated.
- Garnish your Capital spare ribs with green onions and sesame seeds.
Notes
Nutrition
Calories have been calculated using an online calculator. Nutritional information offered on Honest Food Talks is for general information purposes and is only a rough estimate.
Cooking Tips
To get the most out of our recipe, make sure you double-fry. Double-frying refers to the step of frying the meat once, then letting it cool down before finally frying it again. This technique is imperative to achieving a crispy texture. Therefore, make sure you don't skip this step when you try our recipe.
Don't overcrowd, as it will drop the temperature of the oil a lot.
Temperature control during frying is the key to tender yet crispy meat. First fry, fry at about 160-170°C (320-340°F). Second fry, fry at about 180°C (355°F).
Capital Spare Ribs Vs BBQ
The two dishes are very similar, but Peking ribs use capital sauce, while barbecue meat use barbecue sauce. Although the marinades have many variations, they are rooted in the same base ingredients.
As mentioned, you usually prepare capital sauce using ketchup, soy and garlic. Meanwhile, you typically make a barbecue marinade with vinegar and some type of tomato ingredient.
Variations
You can easily adapt the recipe to accommodate your personal taste. For example, some of our favourite variations are:
- Fried chicken in capital sauce: Instead of pork, try making this recipe with chicken. It's just as delicious too.
- Dry version: This is a unique way to change the dish, giving it a slightly different texture.
If you're in the mood for other Chinese takeaway dishes, some of our favourites are:
- Chinese lemon chicken: This tangy, citrusy chicken dish is simple and tastes incredible.
- Chicken and sweetcorn soup: You'll love this hearty soup on a cold night. It is also considered a healthy dish for those feeling under the weather.
- Jing du style spare ribs: This is a slightly different variation of capital spare ribs, but it is still delicious.
How did your homemade Chinese fakeaway dish turn out? Share photos of your fakeaway masterpieces with us by tagging them on Pinterest @honestfoodtalks.
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