Sugar Snap Pea Fish with Cloud Ear Fungus (雲耳蜜豆炒魚, Wan4 Ji5 Mat6 Dau6 Caau2 Jyu4)

You need to use some technique whenever making a stir fried fish dish. First of all, the selection of the fish is important. You want to use a firm fleshed fish for stir frying so that it doesn’t break up when stir fried. The best advice is to pick the freshest firm fish fillet that you can find at your local market, but frozen works well too. Secondly, you want to cut the fillets into large pieces to help keep the pieces intact when stir fried. Small pieces of fish don’t survive stir frying very well. Finally, when stir frying the dish, you have to be gentle when mixing the dish together to minimize the fish breaking into small pieces. It’s also easy to mask the flavor of the fish with the sauce, so since a white fleshed fish was used in this dish, a simple soy based sauce was used.

Enjoy!

Ingredients

¾ lb.	375 g.	Firm fish fillet (魚, jyu4), cut into thin 2-inch (5 cm.) pieces
½ in.	15 mm.	Knob of ginger (薑, goeng1), crushed in a garlic press
1 Tbs.	15 ml.	Corn starch (粟粉, suk1 fan2)
2 Tbs.	30 ml.	Shaoxing rice wine (紹興酒, siu6 hing1 zau2) or dry sherry
½ tsp.	2.5 ml.	Ground white pepper (白胡椒, baak6 wu4 ziu1)
1 tsp.	5 ml.	Sesame oil (麻油, maa4 jau4)
1 lb.	500 g.	Sugar snap peas (蜜豆, mat6 dau6)
6 oz.	170 g.	One package cloud ear fungus (雲耳, wan4 ji5)
3 stalks	3 stalks	Green onions (葱, cung1), cut into 2-inch (5 cm.) pieces
½ in.	15 mm.	Knob of ginger (薑, goeng1), crushed in a garlic press
2 cloves	2 cloves	Garlic (蒜, syun3), crushed in a garlic press
		Oil for cooking

 

Sauce Ingredients

2 Tbs.	30 ml.	Soy sauce (豉油, si6 jau4)
1 Tbs.	15 ml.	Hoisin sauce (海鮮醬, hoi2 sin1 zoeng3)
2 Tbs.	30 ml.	Shaoxing rice wine (紹興酒, siu6 hing1 zau2) or dry sherry
½ tsp.	2.5 ml.	Ground white pepper (白胡椒, baak6 wu4 ziu1)
½ Tbs.	7.5 ml.	Sesame oil (麻油, maa4 jau4)
2 tsp.	10 ml.	Corn starch (粟粉, suk1 fan2)
4 tsp.	20 ml.	Water

 

Equipment

		Garlic press
14 in.	35.5 cm.	Wok or pan

 

Preparation Instructions

1. If using frozen fish fillets, thaw the fish in a covered container in the refrigerator overnight. Prepare the white fish fillet by removing any bones, and cut the fish into thin 2-inch (5 cm.) pieces. Marinate the fish in a covered container for at least one hour or overnight in the refrigerator with the ginger crushed in a garlic press, corn starch, Shaoxing rice wine or dry sherry, ground white pepper, and sesame oil. If marinating the fish overnight, take it out of the refrigerator at least one hour before cooking.
2. Open the cloud ear fungus package and wash. Remove any hard stems.
3. Wash and remove the string from the sugar snap peas by grasping each sugar snap pea in one hand and pulling the string the length of the sugar snap pea with the other.
4. Crush the ginger and garlic in a garlic press and put into a small bowl.
5. Wash and cut the green onions into 1-inch (2.5 cm.) pieces.
6. Prepare and mix the sauce in a small bowl: add the soy sauce, hoisin sauce, Shaoxing rice wine or dry sherry, ground white pepper, and sesame oil. In another small bowl, prepare the corn starch slurry by mixing the corn starch and water together.

Cooking Instructions

1. Heat a wok or pan over high heat before adding oil. Add the fish pieces to the wok in a single layer on the bottom and brown the outside. You may have to cook the fish in batches, so be sure to reheat the wok over high heat before adding more oil. Transfer the fish to a bowl.
2. Reheat the wok over high heat before adding oil and then the cloud ear fungus. Stir fry the fungus and then transfer them to the bowl with the fish.
3. Reheat the wok over high heat before adding oil and then the sugar snap peas. Stir fry the sugar snap peas to brown them. Add the bowl with the ginger and garlic, and then some oil to the mixture. Quickly stir fry all the ingredients until the ginger and garlic become fragrant. Add the green onions and the contents of the bowl with the fish back into the wok, and stir fry all the ingredients together.
4. Add the sauce ingredients to the wok and stir fry the ingredients together. If more sauce is desired, add some liquid (stock or water) to the wok. Add the corn starch slurry to thicken the sauce and mix all the ingredients together. Put the cooked ingredients into a serving dish and serve with steamed rice.