Last weekend, Wei and I drove up to the Baltimore/DC area for his brother's wedding. We had an excellent time celebrating and hanging out with his family! While we were over at his parents' house one day, my mother-in-law gave me a copy of
Chinese Cuisine
by Huang Su-Huei.
If you're interested in learning authentic Chinese cooking from a beginner's standpoint, this book is a great resource. It has a lengthy "how-to" section with tons of pictures depicting different cooking techniques and ingredients. Most of the recipes don't seem terribly difficult, and each page has a large picture of the finished dish to point you in the right direction. The author also notes in which region the dish is found. I'm really looking forward to cooking my way through it!
Last night I chose to make this simple stir fry from Beijing. Since I didn't feel like making rice, I boiled up some spaghetti noodles and tossed them into the wok at the end. You could leave the noodles out and serve this over rice instead.
1 pork tenderloin, trimmed of excess fat and silverskin
2 cloves garlic, chopped
3 really fat green onions, or 6 normal sized green onions, cut into 2-inch lengths
1 tablespoon cornstarch
Soy sauce
Sugar
Rice wine or sherry
Corn or peanut oil
6 to 8 ounces spaghetti noodles, cooked
Ginger oil (or other flavored oil), optional
Sesame oil, optional
White pepper, optional
Cut the pork into 2/3-inch slices. Cover the meat slices with a piece of plastic wrap and bash them around a bit with a meat mallet to tenderize. In a medium sized bowl, mix together the garlic, cornstarch, 1 tablespoon of soy sauce, and 1/2 tablespoon each of rice wine or sherry, water, and sugar. Toss the pork slices in the soy sauce mixture and stir to coat the meat well.
Heat up a few tablespoons of oil in a wok over high heat. Add the pork and stir-fry until both sides are golden brown. Move the meat to one side of the wok and toss the green onions into the middle; stir fry until the onions are fragrant. Add 2 tablespoons of soy sauce and 1/2 tablespoon of sugar to the contents of the wok. Stir in the noodles and keep stirring until everything is mixed together. Finish off with a couple of dashes each of ginger oil, sesame oil, and white pepper. Remove and serve.
Rating: This is awesome
Though very simple, this dish was a satisfying dinner. I loved how it came together so quickly, and having all of my different bottles on the counter next to the wok made me feel like a witch concocting a potion!
