One of My Favorite Confinement Foods

Hmm...this is one of the confinement food that I like. This dish can be 
taken even normal occasion (just reduced the ginger by half). Chinese 
believes that black vinegar able to cleanse arteries and purify blood, 
while pig's trotters provides the lubricant the bone joints need as well as rich in iron and calcium. The extract from the trotter marrow have the gelatinous that provide the collagen.This dish keeps your body warm. One more thing, if you are breast feeding, you may want to stay away from 
ginger. 

Here is the ingredients used 
2 tbsp of sesame oil
1 whole pig's trotter 
1/2 bottle of black vinegar (double orange brand recommended)
600 gram of buntung ginger (old ginger may server well too)
1/2 cup of black beans
6 cloves of garlic 
6 cloves of small onion 
2 big pieces of black fungus

5 tbsp of palm sugar (or gula melaka up to your taste)

Salt (to taste)
Method :  

1) Wash trotter and cut into appropriate size (My lazy way is to get butcher to cut into convenient size) Wash it and blanch the trotters. This method is to clean the meat thoroughly as washing with tap water is 
just not enough to clean. 

2) Boil black beans till slightly soft. Pour away the water and leaving the black beans 

3) Soak black fungus into water until expand 

4) Slice Onion and garlic 

5) Slice ginger and marinate with salt for 30 minutes (to make it crunchy if you love eating ginger). Wash off the salt after then. 

6) heat sesame oil in wok. 

7) Saute garlic and onion till fragrant. 

8) Add in ginger and saute for a while. 

9) Add in trotters and fry until just cooked. 

10) Mixed in black beans and fry a little. 

11) Add in black vinegar and simmer for 6 minutes.Add a cup of water. 

12) Add in brown sugar and salt to taste.  

13) Simmer over low heat for 1 hour minutes 

14) Add in stripped black fungus and simmer for 10 minutes 

 Tada...done and serve with hot rice.