Pig Ears in Chili Oil

Pig ear is a standard cut in Sichuan's cold-plate and lu-wei (master-stock) repertoire, where economical pork offcuts — ear, tongue, snout, tripe — are brined and dressed cold as drinking food. Dressing them in red oil belongs to the same hong-you ("red-oil") flavor family as the famous offal cold dishes of Republican-era Chengdu, where street vendors turned cheap cuts into prized tapas-style plates. No founding shop or date attaches to ears specifically; the dish is documented as common household and cold-counter fare rather than a single creation, and it sits beside the brined tongue, tripe and trotter of any Sichuan lu-wei stall.

The slices are shaved thin and laid flat, glossy with red oil, a layer of chili sediment pooled at the bottom of the plate. The texture is the point: the skin is soft and gelatin-rich, but the band of cartilage running through it stays crisp, so each slice is soft and snapping at once — cool, springy, never rubbery. The flavor lands savory and a touch sweet from the re-cooked soy, then the red-oil heat, then a slow numbing lift of Sichuan peppercorn. Garlic and cilantro sharpen it; served at room temperature, where the chili aroma reads fullest.

Two stages make the dish: the brine and the dressing. Pig ear is mostly skin, cartilage and connective tissue, so it must be simmered slowly in spiced master stock — star anise, cassia, ginger, scallion, peppercorn — long enough to break the collagen into gelatin and turn the skin tender while the cartilage keeps its crunch; a hard boil only toughens it. The cooked ear is then chilled hard, which sets the gelatin firm so it can be shaved thin and clean across the grain — warm ear tears and will not slice. Cutting across the cartilage, not along it, is what gives every slice that snap inside the soft skin. The dressing is built on the same Sichuan cold-dish base as the white-meat plates: red chili oil (红油) for heat and aroma, re-cooked sweet soy (复制酱油) — soy reduced with sugar and spices — for a rounded salty-sweet body, raw mashed garlic for sharpness, and ground Sichuan peppercorn for the numbing finish; a little of the brine tying the dressing back to the ear.