Humba is also known as hong ba or hong ma. The term hong means to braise, particularly with some caramelization involved, whether by searing the meat first for a Maillard reaction or by turning sugar into caramel over a hot flame.
Rum, made from sugarcane or molasses, imparts a complex, caramelly depth when slow-cooked into humba. The sweetness rounds out the vinegar while adding warm, aromatic undertones that matches perfectly with pork.
Does cooking with rum make your dish alcoholic?
Not quite, but we wouldn’t say it’s alcohol-free, either. While cooking does burn off most of the alcohol from the rum, small traces can remain in the dish.
In the case of this pork humba, the long simmer reduces the alcohol level to around 5%. If you’re cooking for someone who avoids alcohol for any reason, you can swap out the rum for pineapple juice—it's the sweetener we use in our pork belly humba recipe.
Ingredients
Ingredients
- 2 tbsp neutral oil
- 1 kg pork pata (knuckle), sliced
- ½ cup white onions, roughly chopped
- ¼ cup minced garlic
- ½ cup dried banana blossoms, soaked at least 30 min, drained
- ½ cup tausi (fermented black beans), drained
- 1 cup dark rum
- ¼ cup soy sauce
- ¼ cup white vinegar
- 3 tbsp brown sugar
- 3 bay leaves
- ½ tbsp star anise
- ½ tbsp ground black pepper
Sear pork: Heat neutral oil in a heavy-bottomed pot or Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add sliced pork, working in batches if necessary, and sear until golden brown on all sides. Remove pork from the pan and set aside.
Cook aromatics: Reduce heat to medium. Add onions and garlic to the remaining oil and rendered fat in the pan. Sauté until fragrant. Add banana blossoms and black beans and cook, stirring frequently, 1–2 minutes more.
Make rhumba sauce: Add dark rum to the pot and bring to a boil. Once boiling, reduce heat to medium low to maintain a steady simmer. Once rum has reduced to a syrupy consistency, add soy sauce, white vinegar, brown sugar, bay leaves, star anise, and black pepper. Stir to combine.
Finish pork: Return seared pork to the pot. Increase heat to medium-high to bring mixture to a boil, then reduce to medium-low to maintain a steady simmer. Cover pot and cook until pork is fork-tender, about 1 hour to 1 hour and 30 minutes. Check the pot from time to time and make sure to keep ½ or ¾ of the pork submerged in liquid—add ½ cup water at a time to maintain the liquid level. Serve hot with steamed rice.
