Fried Pumpkin with salted egg
1 small pumpkin (about 400-500g)
3 salted egg yolks
1 small fresh egg
¼ tsp of salt and pepper
1 cup all-purpose flour for coating
Vegetable oil for deep frying
- Steam the duck salted egg yolks for 8-10 minutes. Crush the egg yolks with a fork for later use.
- Peel and remove the seeds from the pumpkin, and also remove the fibrous layer beneath.
- Cut pumpkin thinly into the size of fries.
- Mix the pumpkin with the small egg, salt and pepper, leave it for 10-20 minutes.
- Coat the pumpkin fries evenly with flour.
- Heat oil in a pan until hot, fry the pumpkin pieces until a golden colour.
- Remove the pumpkin fries from the pan and drain excess oil with paper towels.
- Heat ½ tbsp oil in a pan; add in the crushed salted egg yolks.
- Stir fry the salted egg yolks until they are light and fluffy. (They should start foaming).
- Add in the pumpkin fries and stir well with the egg yolk.
- Serve immediately.
This dish tastes great.. I order it every time I go out to eat.. so I learned how to make it at home.
Dongpo pork is a famous Chinese dish, believed to be created some 900 years ago in Hangzhou by Chinese poet Su Dongpo (苏东坡).
There are a few ways to make Dongpo pork, as the original recipe of the Dongpo pork was probably not documented properly. The common traits of the dish are the aroma and the tenderness, where the fat of the meat would melt in your mouth without the greasiness.
The general ingredients for Dongpo pork are pork belly, wine, ginger and Welsh onion; and it involves a long cooking time (2-3 hours) to give the tenderness.
Ingredients (2-4 persons)
My first attempt on Dongpo pork, had to make shift a bit as I didn’t have the proper ingredients.
450g pork belly, 500ml Chinese rice wine, 250ml white wine, 4 tablespoons light soy sauce, 2 tablespoons sugar (and 250ml water).
Methods (Preparation time: 80-90 minutes)
1. Cut the pork belly into cubes (~ 4×5 cm).
2. Blanch the pork belly… put the pork in boiling water for a minute and clean it with cold water.
3. Put the pork belly into the cooking ware with the skin facing the bottom (important!). Add in 500ml rice wine, 4tb soy sauce and 2tb sugar and boil it before turning the heat to the lowest possible. Simmer for 45 minutes.
No need to stir, just make sure that the stock doesn’t dry up. Add in some wine when necessary.
(The original dish should be cooked with clay pot, which I don’t have… I had to use a corning ware instead)
4. After 45 minutes, turn the pork around with the skin facing the top. Simmer for another 30 minutes. Add some wine (or water*) if the stock is drying up.
* 500ml rice wine was used at the beginning, 250ml white wine was used in between (out of rice wine) and at the end 250ml water was used (out of all wine). If possible, you might want to try using just rice wine all the way.
Extra note
Lots of Chinese restaurants that serve Dongpo pork actually took a short cut by deep frying the pork before simmering it, which could reduced the cooking time greatly while giving similar taste and texture… but with that cooking method the pork simply becomes a red-cooked dish and shouldn’t be named as Dongpo pork at all.
I have eaten this several times and it is one of my favorite dishes over here.
Chinese Cabbage Soup
Ingredients:
Directions:
Cut pork into thin slices and mix with sugar, pepper, soy sauce, cornstarch and sesame oil.
Heat oil in large saucepan and saute the ginger mixed with the salt for 1 minute.
Add boiling water to ginger.
Slice cabbage and add to the soup.
Return soup to a boil.
Reduce heat, cover and simmer for 10 minutes.
Stirring constantly, add pork mixture.
Replace cover and simmer for 15 minutes.
Dry-Fried Green Beans
Serves 2 to 4 as part of a multi-course meal
3 tablespoons peanut or vegetable oil
1/2 pound green beans – rinsed, dried, and chopped to 2-inch lengths
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 pieces ginger, finely chopped
1 tablespoon Sichuan preserved vegetable (mustard root) – rinsed, shredded, and finely chopped
1/2 tablespoon dried shrimp, chopped
5 or 6 dried red chillis
1/2 tablespoon chilli bean sauce
1 to 2 drops sesame oii
1 teaspoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt, or salt to taste
Heat oil in a wok until just beginning to smoke. Add green beans and stir-fry, keeping the beans constantly moving, for about 5 minutes, or until the outsides begin to blister and the beans are wilted. Remove and set aside to drain on kitchen towels.
Remove all but 1 tablespoon of oil. Add garlic, ginger, preserved vegetable, dried shrimp, and red chillis; cook until fragrant, about 1 minute. Return beans to the wok, and add chilli bean sauce and sesame oil. Add sugar and stir until well-combined. Salt to taste. Dish out onto serving plate and serve while hot.
Bao Zi (Pork Buns)
The yeast dough:
3 cups of bread flour
1 cup warm water (110° F)
1-1/2 teaspoon dry yeast
2-1/2 Tab sugar
2 Tab peanut oil
1-1/2 teaspoon baking powder
The Filling:
1-1/2 lbs Pork (pork belly or rib meat)
1-1/2 lbs Napa Cabbage
1″ x 3″ washed, unpeeled ginger
1 cup water
2 scallions, minced
1/2 tsp white pepper
1 Tab soy sauce
1 rounded tsp salt
1″ x 1/2″ pc peeled ginger, minced
1 medium clove garlic, minced
1 tsp Shaoxing wine or dry sherry
2 tsp sesame oil
1 tsp cornstarch
Smash the unpeeled ginger with the flat of a heavy cleaver so that it will release its juices. Put the ginger in the cup of water, stir, and set aside–1 to 2 hours is preferable.
To the cup of lukewarm water, add the sugar and the yeast and stir until it dissolves. In the meantime, sift the flour into a bowl. When the yeast mixture is foaming, add it to the flour and mix vigorously until the mass begins to stick together. Add the oil, and when the dough coheres enough to remove to the counter and knead for 10 minutes, until it is smooth. It is very important that the dough be soft. Do not add more flour unless necessary to keep it from sticking to your hands and the kneading surface. Once the dough is kneaded, oil the surface with peanut oil and place in a covered bowl in a warm place.
Separate and blanch the cabbage leaves for 2 or 3 minutes in a large pot of boiling water. Remove, drain, and cool. When it is cool enough to handle, roughly chop the cabbage and put in a clean hand towel. Wring out as much of the water as possible, then mince.
Mechanically grind or chop with a cleaver all of the pork into a dice of approximately 1/4″. Set aside about a third of this, and mince the remaining pork very fine. Mix together the cabbage, the minced ginger, minced scallion, minced garlic, salt and pepper. Mixing thoroughly with a wooden spoon or paddle of a kitchen mixer, add the cup of strained ginger water, soy, wine and sesame oil. Add cornstarch, and mix in one direction for several minutes. The filling should be moist, almost like batter; add chicken stock if the filling seems stiff or dry.
Making the Baozi:
Have the steamer ready before you begin.
When the dough has doubled in bulk, and you are ready to make the baozi, punch down the dough and make several indentations in the dough with your fingers. Sift the baking powder into these holes, fold up the dough and pinch the edges together to contain the baking powder. Knead for five minutes, or until the baking powder is thoroughly incorporated. Cover the dough ball and let it rest for five or ten minutes. Form the dough into two ropes, approximately 1-1/2″ in diameter, then cut the ropes into sections approximately 1-1/2″ long. Roll each segment into a ball, place, separated, on a tray, and cover.
(Editor’s note: Zhu Rou Bao Zi can be frozen, once they are steamed and cooled, with very little deterioration. They can also be microwaved to re-heat, but steaming for 12 minutes (from frozen) is far superior.)
chinese cooking, bao zi, pork buns
Related Articles
- Sesame Noodles with Ginger Scallion Sauce (foodthinking.wordpress.com)
- Hot and Sour Soup and Braised Pork with Spicy Soy Sauce (foodthinking.wordpress.com)
- Sweet and sour pork (independent.co.uk)
- Recipes: Sautéed Baby Bok Choy (nytimes.com)
- Thai Meatballs with Ginger Sauce (comfycook.wordpress.com)
