Eggs with Bitter Melon (Pancake Style) (苦瓜炒蛋, Fu2 Gwaa1 Caau2 Daan6)

This recipe was updated on 14 Jun 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

I had this egg pancake dish at a Chinese restaurant recently and it was prepared differently than the dish I’m used to eating, which scrambles the eggs with the bitter melon. The recipe for the scrambled version can be found at Eggs with Bitter Melon (Scrambled Style) (苦瓜炒蛋, Fu² Gwaa¹ Caau² Daan⁶). The egg pancake dish’s preparation is the same as the scrambled version, but it’s harder to make than it looks. It took me two tries to get this dish to come out looking like the restaurant’s dish.

Unlike making the scrambled egg version of this dish, where you complete the cooking by moving the eggs around in the pan, there are two sides that need to be cooked. This means that the egg pancake needs to be flipped over in order to fry the second side, which means that you need to be good at flipping pancakes (made of eggs or otherwise) in a well-seasoned pan to make this dish. I didn’t flip the pancake high enough to clear the pan the first time I made this dish, used too many eggs, and ended up with a funny looking half circle pancake.

The other important piece of information needed to make this dish is to not use too many eggs and to evenly distribute the eggs in the pan. The egg pancake needs to be thin in order to cook quickly and not burn. Flipping the egg pancake is also easier when it’s thin. I used a well-seasoned 9-inch frying pan, so 3 eggs were enough to coat the bitter melon in a thin layer.

Enjoy!

Ingredients

3	3	Eggs (雞蛋, gai1 daan6), scrambled
½ tsp.	2.5 ml.	Salt (鹽, jim4) - optional
½ tsp.	2.5 ml.	Ground white pepper (白胡椒, baak6 wu4 ziu1)
1 tsp.	5 ml.	Sesame oil (麻油, maa4 jau4)
½ lb.	250 g.	Bitter melon (苦瓜, fu2 gwaa1), halved and cut into thin pieces
1 tsp.	5 ml.	Salt (鹽, jim4)
		Oil for cooking

 

Sauce Ingredients

		Lee Kum Kee brand premium oyster sauce (蠔油, hou4 jau4) or equivalent as a topping (optional)

 

Equipment

		Spatula
9 in.	23 cm.	Non-stick or well-seasoned frying pan

 

Preparation Instructions

1. Wash and cut the bitter melon in half. Using a spoon, remove and discard the pith and seeds from each bitter melon half. Cut thin pieces from each bitter melon half, as thin as possible to facilitate cooking. If the bitter melon is large, only one-half might be required for the dish since you want enough bitter melon to form one layer on the bottom of the frying pan.
2. Wet the bitter melon pieces and add salt for 5 minutes to remove any excess bitterness. Wash the salt from the bitter melon. The amount of bitterness removed by the salt is proportional to the time before washing from the bitter melon. If you like more bitterness, the salt can be omitted altogether or the time reduced. If you like less bitterness, the time can be increased (after 10 minutes, most of the bitterness will be removed).
3. Crack the eggs into a bowl. Add the salt (optional), ground white pepper, and sesame oil to the bowl. Vigorously scramble the ingredients together. If a frying pan larger than 9 inches (23 cm.) is used, the amount of eggs and bitter melon should be increased.

Lee Kum Kee Brand
Premium Oyster Sauce
(蠔油, hou4 jau4)

Cooking Instructions

1. Heat the non-stick or well-seasoned frying pan over medium- to medium-high heat before adding oil and then the bitter melon pieces. Stir fry the bitter melon using high heat until tender. When the bitter melon is tender, reduce the heat to low and evenly distribute the bitter melon on the bottom of the pan in one layer.
2. Add more oil to the pan with the bitter melon. The additional oil is needed to make sure that the cooked scrambled eggs will release from the pan when one side is cooked. Add the scrambled egg mixture to the bitter melon. The amount of eggs should form one thin layer on the bottom of the pan, just covering the bitter melon.
3. Pick up the pan and swirl the uncooked liquid egg mixture in the pan to evenly distribute the scrambled egg mixture. When the eggs have set in the pan (i.e. the eggs are not liquid anymore), use a spatula or physically swirl the pan to release the egg pancake from the bottom of the pan.
4. Now comes the tricky part – while physically swirling the pancake in the pan, toss and flip the egg pancake over in the pan to complete the cooking of the second side. Cook for one more minute over low heat.
5. Turn off the heat and put the egg pancake into the serving dish. Top the finished dish with Lee Kum Kee brand premium oyster sauce or equivalent (optional) and serve immediately.