Pork Tendon and Beef Tendon As an Ingredient in Dishes

Pork tendon and beef tendon as a food is something quite unique.  So far, I have eaten more of pork tendon than beef tendon.  Now I thought that the preparations are really difficult so you better prepare some and store the semi-prepared ones.

Deep frying them in oil is not a walk in the park.  It can burn the skin of any amateur.  From what is done, the process involves a pot full of vegetable or coconut oil, then the tendons are placed inside it.  It must be five percent open to allow air to enter.  The process is pretty noisy, it's a lot noisier than preparing popcorn and it requires uttermost care and attention.

As far as what my late paternal grandmother and late maternal grandmother would do, they would prepare it by the batch.  They fried the whole pack and stored them in an airtight container.  The reason for all that is because, if she wanted to cook some, they can have it anytime.  My mother later followed her mother's methods in preparing for the pork tendon.  The preparation method is all done at once as so they can be ready to use until they are consumed.


Pork tendon or beef tendon are usually served for Chinese dishes.  Some of them are used as light snacks, the others are used as extra ingredients for various soups and mixed into stews, tofu dishes or vegetable chopsuey.  While I normally don't like having meat into my tofu dishes or vegetable dishes but this happens to be an exemption to the rule for me.