Cured Pork and Sausage · FFET10173
Larou (Chinese cured pork)
Pork cured in winter and then air-dried or smoked: smoked in Xiangxi, soy-wine-sugar marinated and air-dried in the Cantonese style.
A round white china plate holds red-brown baijiu-cured pork belly slices with white fat over amber-brown oil, ginger, star anise, cinnamon, Sichuan peppercorns and bay leaves, with wooden chopsticks resting beside the plate.
Pork cured in the twelfth month and air-dried or smoked, and sausages.
Larou is pork, often belly, that is cured and then air-dried or smoked. It is cured in the 12th lunar month and made across the south, including Sichuan, Hunan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Jiangxi and Guangdong; the available material identifies no single place of origin. A February 22, 2026 report links Xiangxi larou with the fire-pit smoking of the Tujia and Miao peoples; a January 26, 2026 report describes Cantonese cured meats as mainly lap cheong and larou, made by selecting, processing, curing and air-drying.
What
Larou is pork, often belly, that is cured and then air-dried or smoked. It is cured either with salt or with a marinade of soy sauce, cooking wine and sugar. Dishes such as yan du xian use it.1,5,6
When
No dated record of larou itself was found. A variant reading of the Zhou Yi, hexagram Shi He, line six-three, refers to eating dried meat; the consulted text has no date and shows only that dried meat appears in an early classic, not a method for larou. A January 26, 2026 report notes that Guangzhou already had cured-meat shops such as Huang Shang Huang in the Republic period.2,4
Where
Larou is made in Sichuan, Hunan, Chongqing, Guizhou, Jiangxi and Guangdong, with no single place of origin identified in the available material. In Xiangxi, smoked larou is connected with the fire-pit smoking of the Tujia and Miao peoples; Cantonese cured meats are marinated in soy sauce and air-dried.1,3,4
How
Smoked style: the pork is cured for about 1 week in stir-fried coarse salt, then washed, dried and smoked. The 2026 Xiangxi documents specify curing below 4 degrees Celsius, smoking for at least 30 days, and no nitrite. Cantonese style: the pork is marinated in soy sauce, cooking wine, sugar and spices, then hung to air-dry.1,3,5,6
Why
The available material does not directly explain why larou is made. It is cured in the 12th lunar month and suited to hanging in cool, dry weather, suggesting a winter task.1,5,6
Impact and influence
Xiangxi is preparing a regional brand for larou, with 44 licensed makers. The craft is reported as a provincial heritage item, but the official list was not seen. Guangzhou's October 18, 2022 notice on the 8th batch of municipal heritage expansion items includes the craft of making Cantonese cured meats, number VIII-12, declared by Likoufu; the notice does not name larou itself.3,7
No tale about this food has been found.
Grandma Li
This is a simplified home version, not the traditional restaurant method.
This is the Cantonese soy-marinated larou, not smoked, in a simplified home version; the smoked larou of Xiangxi and Sichuan is made differently and is not covered here. Both recipes come from food blogs, their authors are named, and both are Cantonese and unsmoked. The soy sauce, wine, sugar and baijiu are recipe A scaled down in proportion to 600 g of pork belly, and the spice amounts are my own choice; the 3 days of marinating come from both recipes, the days of drying differ between the recipes, so I judge by how dry the meat feels.
Ingredients
- Pork belly 600 g
- Light soy sauce 45 ml
- Dark soy sauce 30 ml
- Shaoxing wine 90 ml
- Sugar 50 g
- Baijiu (Chinese white liquor) 15 ml
- Ginger 3 slices
- Star anise 1 pod
- Cinnamon bark 1 small piece
- Sichuan peppercorns 1 teaspoon
- Bay leaf 1
Steps
- Put the light and dark soy sauce, Shaoxing wine, sugar, ginger, star anise, cinnamon, peppercorns and bay leaf in a small pot and simmer for a few minutes until the sugar dissolves. Let it cool completely, then stir in the baijiu.
- Cut the pork belly into strips about 3 cm wide and 20 cm long and put them in a deep dish or box.
- Pour the cooled marinade over the pork, turn the strips so every side is coated, cover, and marinate in the refrigerator for 3 days, turning once a day.
- Lift out the pork and wipe off the surface liquid. Make a small hole near one end of each strip, thread a cotton string through, and hang the strips in a cool, airy, dry place. The recipes say 4 to 6 days and 5 to 7 days; I hang the strips until the outside is dry, the inside is slightly soft and nothing feels sticky.
- Store the dried larou in the freezer, which is how recipe B keeps it.
- To eat it, rinse the larou, slice it thin and steam it until cooked through and no longer pink at the cut. It can also be stir-fried after steaming.
Tips
- Both recipes advise hanging the pork in cool, dry weather; on a muggy, damp day I do not make it.
- I begin with one small strip to see whether my weather and number of drying days suit it, then make more.
Allergens: soy, wheat