Asian Barbecued Pork Loin —rsquo; The Recipe We Wrote Down Before the Summer Ran Out

May, and the summer begins with the annual Lowcountry declaration of warmth: the air thickening, the flowers rioting, the tourists returning with their cameras and their appetites and their willingness to pay eighteen dollars for shrimp and grits that I make for three. The declaration is welcome. The warmth is welcome. The tourists are welcome because they love this city and the loving is a form of attention and the attention is what keeps Charleston alive.

Carrie is home for the summer — home from Emory, home for the last summer before Japan, home in the kitchen where she learned to cook and where she is now the cook, or the co-cook, the partner who stands beside me at the stove and who brings to the cooking the Japanese precision that Kyoto taught her and the Lowcountry abundance that Charleston taught her and the combination is a cuisine that does not exist in any cookbook but that exists in this kitchen, between these two women, and the existing is enough.

She will leave for Fukuoka in September. The summer is three months long, and the three months are the last uninterrupted time we will have together for a year, and the uninterrupted-ness is the gift, and I will not waste it. We will cook. We will write. We will sit with Mama and listen to what the disease has not yet taken and we will write it down, because the writing down is the saving, and the saving is the work, and the work is the book.

I began documenting Mama's recipes with new urgency — not the cookbook chapters, which are the polished versions, but the raw documentation, the systematic recording of every recipe I can coax from memory and from Mama's occasional moments of clarity. Carrie joins the documentation project. She brings her journal. She brings her Japanese precision. And the documentation is now a collaboration between a daughter and a granddaughter, and the collaboration is the preservation, and the preservation is the love.

I made Mama's Hoppin' John — not for New Year's, not for luck, but for the documentation, for the recording of the recipe in its most precise form, every measurement verified, every step confirmed, every instruction captured. The Hoppin' John is in the journal now, preserved in ink, and the ink will outlast the memory, and the outlasting is the point.

The Hopp’in John went into the journal first—Mama’s recipe, precise and preserved—but it was this pork loin that Carrie and I cooked for ourselves that week, a dish that felt like the collaboration made edible: the lacquered, soy-deepened glaze she had learned to love in Kyoto laid over the slow-roasted abundance that is just how we cook here. We wrote this one down too. Everything this summer goes into the journal.

Asian Barbecued Pork Loin

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cook Time: 1 hour 15 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour 35 minutes (plus 4 hours marinating) | Servings: 8

Ingredients

• 1 center-cut pork loin roast (about 3 lbs), trimmed
• 1/3 cup soy sauce
• 1/4 cup hoisin sauce
• 3 tablespoons honey
• 2 tablespoons rice wine or dry sherry
• 1 tablespoon sesame oil
• 1 tablespoon fresh ginger, finely grated
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 teaspoon five-spice powder
• 1/2 teaspoon white pepper
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 1 tablespoon rice vinegar
• 1 teaspoon chili garlic sauce (optional)
• 2 green onions, thinly sliced, for garnish
• 1 teaspoon sesame seeds, for garnish

Instructions

1. Make the marinade. In a medium bowl, whisk together the soy sauce, hoisin sauce, honey, rice wine, sesame oil, ginger, garlic, five-spice powder, white pepper, brown sugar, rice vinegar, and chili garlic sauce if using until fully combined.
2. Marinate the pork. Place the pork loin in a large zip-top bag or a shallow baking dish. Pour about two-thirds of the marinade over the pork, turning to coat all sides. Reserve the remaining marinade for basting. Seal or cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours, or overnight for deepest flavor.
3. Prepare for roasting. Remove the pork from the refrigerator 30 minutes before cooking. Preheat your oven to 375°F. Line a roasting pan with foil and set a rack inside. Lift the pork from the marinade (discard used marinade) and place it on the rack.
4. Roast and baste. Roast the pork for 45 minutes, then brush generously with the reserved marinade. Continue roasting, basting every 15 minutes, until an instant-read thermometer inserted in the thickest part reads 145°F, about 25 to 30 minutes more. The exterior should be deep mahogany and lacquered-looking.
5. Rest before slicing. Transfer the pork loin to a cutting board and tent loosely with foil. Let it rest for 10 minutes so the juices redistribute before slicing.
6. Slice and serve. Cut into 1/2-inch slices. Arrange on a platter and spoon any pan drippings over the top. Garnish with sliced green onions and sesame seeds.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 310 | Protein: 34g | Fat: 11g | Carbs: 16g | Fiber: 0g | Sodium: 720mg