Spareribs cooked in Instant pot, Chinese style 中華風豚のスペアリブ

 At the beginning of the COVID pandemic, many workers at the major meat packing plants came down sick and some of the plants had to shut down leading to concerns about an impending meat shortage. So, we stocked up on meat, buying and freezing, some cuts we usually don’t get but were available at the time. My wife (a.k.a. Freezer inventory control officer for the household) informed me that we have frozen pork spareribs from that period dated April 2020 which were not getting any younger. With no impending meat shortages in sight, it was with some relief that at least that part of the epidemic was over, we decided it was time to reduce our “Covid stockpile”. The ribs turned out to be quite meaty. Some pieces contained 2 ribs (country style?). In any case, we decided to cook these in the Instant Pot rather than in the oven. The way the ribs were cut, made it possible for me to easily divide the ribs into shorter pieces.  We decided to make two different kinds of spareribs: one with BBQ sauce and the other in Chinese style. This worked well due to the capacity of the Instant Pot. The latter recipe based on what we saw on YouTube, but I had to modify it, as usual, due to the lack of some ingredients. In any case, the picture below shows the final product. It was definitely “off-the-bone” tender and had a sweet and sour taste which was quite good.

Ingredients:
5 3-inch pork spareribs (#1), seasoned with onion powder, garlic powder, salt and black pepper
Vegetable oil for sautéing and searing the meat
(Herbs and aromatics, #2 below)
3 shallots finely minced
4 garlic gloves finely minced
1/2-inch ginger finely minced
one cinnamon stick
2 star anis
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
(Seasoning liquid #3 below)
4 tbs soy sauce
2tbs brown sugar (I used mixture of dark molasses and sugar)
2tbs oyster sauce
2tbs red miso (instead of hoisin sauce* since I did not have one)
1 cup sake
2 tbs rice vinegar

*I usually have hoisin sauce, but I do not use it often. I must have thrown out the opened one which I kept in the fridge some time ago. Red miso appears to work in the recipe.

Directions:
Using  the “sauté” function of the Instant Pot and a small amount of oil (wait until the oil gets hot), I browned the ribs (#1) in all 4 sides (despite our belief that browning of the meat in a stew is not needed).
Take out the meat and add a bit more vegetable oil and bloom the spices (#2) add the aromatic vegetables (#2) and sauté for several minutes.
Add back the ribs and add the liquid seasonings (#3)
Add 1/2 cup water and pressure cook at high-pressure for 35 minutes with natural de-pressurizing.
Remove the lid after de-pressurized and turn on “sauté” function and let it reduce for 20 minutes or until the sauce thickens.
We tasted a finished rib. (The result after the tasting shown in #4. As you can see it was so good not much was left for the picture after our “tasting”.) The meat easily came off the bone.

This is a good sparerib in oriental/Chinese style. The meat is very tender and falls off the bone easily. With sweet and salty flavor with anis and cinnamon flavors are very nice. I was afraid that the seasoning may become too salty, but it was just fine. Using the Instant Pot made the entire process easy.