Rice congee is cooked with yam or taro, pork, shiitake mushrooms and served with toppings on condiments on the side. Can be cooked on the stove or Instant Pot.
Place the pork in a large mixing bowl. Add marinate ingredients. You can marinate overnight or for at least 1 hour before using
Cooking on the stove:
Heat up 2 Tbsp of cooking oil. Add dried shrimp and saute until you smell a wonderful flavor, about 10-15 seconds. Add in the pork and saute until they turn color, add shiitake mushrooms and yams. Saute for about 1 minute and then add the rice grains. Add the chicken stock. Bring it to boil and add the rice then lower the heat and continue to cook until the rice is soft and thickened, about 20-30 minutes or so. You can season the porridge with salt to your taste if you like
Cooking with Instant Pot:
Press saute on Instant Pot. When it's hot, add 2 Tbsp cooking oil. Add dried shrimp and saute until you smell a wonderful flavor, about 10-15 seconds. Add pork and saute until they turn color, add shiitake mushrooms and yams. Saute for about 1 minute and then add the rice grains. Add the chicken stock and give it a stir. Make sure nothing gets stuck at the bottom of the pot. Turn off saute mode
Close the lid and turn the steam release valve to "sealing". Press "pressure cook" and make sure it's on high pressure. Set timer to 30 minutes. You can also use the "porridge" mode, it will cook at high pressure for 30 minutes too
When the timer is done, wait 5 minutes and then fully release pressure. If the texture is too thick, you can always thin it out with a bit of water until it reaches the consistency you like
Season the porridge with some salt if you like
Serving:
Serve hot with sesame oil, ginger, chopped green onion and pepper
Notes
If you are questioning why we need to rinse the rice grains before cooking porridge, to me is to get rid of some impurities (for example arsenic). I know some of you do not like to loose that extra "starchiness" when you cook rice porridge, so, it's your call to rinse or not to rinse the rice!