Sea Cucumber, Shrimp, and Chicken Hong Kong Noodles (海參蝦雞雲吞麵, Hoi2 Sam1 Haa1 Gai1 Wan4 Tan1 Min6)

This is not the typical noodle dish that I would make for an everyday lunch because of the ingredients and effort involved in making it. As with many Chinese dishes, seafood and meat are combined together for a tasty combination. In this case, the seafood is sea cucumber and shrimp, and the meat is chicken. In my experience, sea cucumber was served for special occasions and often at banquets celebrating those occasions. While there wasn’t a special occasion for making this dish, just having sea cucumber in a dish signifies that the meal is out of the ordinary. Sea cucumber is available in the USA either frozen or dried. The dried version takes a few days of preparation, so I prefer using the frozen version. Sea cucumber can be black or white in color, with the black type being more common and the white being less available (and more expensive). There’s no difference in taste that I can detect, so use whatever type is available.

Hong Kong noodles are used to make this dish and, in keeping with a dish that’s out of the ordinary, are specially prepared by forming a disc of noodles, and then making them crispy and slightly burnt for flavor on the outside, while still being soft on the inside. This can be accomplished by using a hot wok to crisp and brown the outsides (which is the method I used) or by baking the noodle disc in a hot oven after spraying oil on the surface. Since crispy noodles are used in this dish, the other ingredients used as the topping are “wet”, meaning that the toppings are contained in a corn starch thickened sauce. Finally, the dish is prepared in reverse from most noodles dishes, in that the noodles are cooked first, followed by the toppings.

Enjoy!

Sea Cucumber, Shrimp, and Chicken with Abalone Sauce (鮑魚醬海參蝦雞, Baau1 Jyu4 Zoeng3 Hoi2 Sam1 Haa1 Gai1)

Happy Lunar New Year! Sea cucumber is an ocean sea slug treasured for its texture and (supposed) medicinal properties, and is a special occasion ingredient. White sea cucumber is prized over the black sea cucumber, and I used it in this first recipe for Lunar New Year’s. Sea cucumber (either color) is itself tasteless, so the taste of the dish comes from the other ingredients. It is available either dried or frozen at your local Asian herb store (dried version) or Asian market (frozen). So there is some preparation work that must be done before sea cucumber can be used in a dish. I prefer the frozen version since all you have to do is thaw it the day before using it.

There are really two cooking techniques needed to make this dish: stir frying and braising. The chicken, shrimp, and snow peas need to be stir fried before the coin mushrooms and sea cucumber are braised in the sauce and mushroom rehydration liquid to generate the flavor for the dish. This dish is made with a lot of sauce, which is provided by the mushroom rehydration liquid, adding the necessary volume for this dish. Since this is a festive dish, abalone sauce and brandy is used to make the sauce, but you can use oyster sauce and Shaoxing wine (which I normally use to make sauces).

Meat and seafood is a classic combination in Chinese dishes. Usually the meat part of the combination is pork and you’ll find may recipes using various parts of the pig with sea cucumber (I want to try making pig’s feet and sea cucumber!). Chicken as the meat with sea cucumber is unusual, but it certainly is tasty.

Enjoy!

Pork Ribs and Sea Cucumber with Shiitake Mushrooms (冬菇海參排骨, Dung1 Gu1 Hoi2 Sam1 Paai4 Gwat1)

This recipe was updated on 22 Apr 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

 

So what do you do if you have some defrosted sea cucumber left over after making the Sea Cucumber with Shiitake Mushrooms (冬菇海參, Dung¹ Gu¹ Hoi² Sam¹) recipe? You look on the internet for some ideas, where I found recipes using pork spareribs and sea cucumber. So I adapted the Sea Cucumber with Shiitake Mushrooms recipe to add pork spareribs. The combination actually tastes pretty good. Try it, you’ll like it.

 

Enjoy!

Sea Cucumber with Shiitake Mushrooms (冬菇海參, Dung1 Gu1 Hoi2 Sam1)

This recipe was updated on 07 Jun 2014. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changes, and metric measurements added.

Sea cucumber is an ingredient usually reserved for special occasions. I remember eating this dish at every birthday dinner for my maternal Grandparents. Sea cucumber also makes appearances at Lunar New Year’s dinners, so this dish came to mind and seemed appropriate as the first recipe for the Year of the Snake.

The ingredient is not only expensive, but in its dried form takes some time to prepare and after rehydration you have to clean out the intestines before cooking. I used to be able to buy sea cucumber already rehydrated and cleaned at my local Asian market, but no more. It is now available frozen, so it needs to be thawed first before cleaning. Sea cucumber can be black or white in color, with the white version more highly prized and more expensive than the black. Another name for sea cucumber is sea slug, which doesn’t sound very appetizing, and it has a firm, jello-like texture (my brother-in-law calls it, “fish jello”). No matter what you call this ingredient, it really is quite tasteless and acquires the flavor of the other ingredients it’s cooked with and the sauce.

Enjoy!