Korean Barbequed Beef Short Ribs (Kalbi, 갈비)

This recipe was updated on 20 Mar 2016. Some instructions were changed and a link to the newer version of this recipe, using a homemade sauce instead of store bought, was added.

A newer version of this recipe using a homemade sauce, rather than store bought, can be found here: Los Angeles Style Korean Barbeque Beef Short Ribs - L.A. Galbi (L.A. 갈비). I would recommend using the newer recipe instead of this one.

Bottled Korean barbeque sauce is the basis for the beef marinade. Korean barbeque sauce uses pear juice as one of the ingredients and it gives the flanken cut beef short ribs a unique sweet flavor. You can now buy flanken cut beef short ribs at most supermarkets, otherwise you’ll have to get your butcher to cut the short ribs thinly for you. I use my outdoor barbeque to grill the ribs, but normally the ribs are cooked at the table in Korean restaurants.

Enjoy!

Steamed Pork Spareribs with Salted Black Beans (Dau6 Si6 Zing1 Paai4 Gwat1, 豆豉蒸排骨)

 

This recipe was updated on 04 Nov 2013. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

It seems like I’ve been making this dish forever, but I found a good addition to this dish – wet preserved plums (haam⁴ seoi² mui⁴, 鹹水梅) – after looking at the Steamed Pork Ribs with Black Bean Sauce recipe from The Waitakere Redneck’s Kitchen blog. The plums add an additional layer of flavor to the dish. You can easily leave the plums out of the recipe and it will still be tasty.

The pork spareribs needs some preparation time, so you’ll need a minimum of 2 hours for prep and marinating, but marinating overnight is preferable. The baking soda serves to make the finished cooked pork spareribs very tender – just be sure to wash it out before marinating. This step can be omitted, but try tenderizing your pork (or any other meat for that matter) this way and you’re likely to be a believer.

Enjoy!

Technique: Reheating a Chinese Glutinous Rice Tamale (粽, Zung3)

This posting was updated on 07 Feb 2016. The title and opening text were changed.

This is not a recipe, but a technique to reheat a Chinese glutinous rice tamale. I’ve also heard it referred to in English as a dumpling, but it’s too huge to be called a dumpling!

So what is a Chinese glutinous rice tamale? Unlike the tamale you’re probably familiar with consisting of corn husks wrapped around masa with a meat filling, the Cantonese version consists of bamboo leaves wrapped around glutinous (sticky) rice with pork belly meat, Cantonese pork sausage, and a salted duck egg yolk. In addition, you can also find mung beans, peanuts, chestnut, dried shrimp, Shiitake mushrooms, and other goodies in the tamale, depending upon the source (usually homemade). There are many other Chinese regional tamale variations, as well as sweet versions. Whether or not you’re lucky enough to know someone who makes the tamales themselves (homemade always being the best) or if you buy the tamales at an Asian market, you’ll need to reheat them. Here’s a (relatively) fast method to do so.

Enjoy!

Braised Pork Spareribs with Fermented Bean Curd (腐乳排骨, Fu6 Jyu5 Paai4 Gwat1)

This recipe was updated on 07 Sep 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

This is another favorite pork sparerib recipe using fermented bean curd. Since I like the taste of fermented bean curd, I use a lot. Unless you’re familiar with the taste of this ingredient, you might want to use less until you’re comfortable with the taste.

Black or wood ear fungus are available either fresh or dried, and either whole or sliced. The dried version needs to be rehydrated with hot water and the volume expands greatly, so don’t be deceived by the seemingly small amount of the dried version. The fresh version needs to be washed. The hard inedible stems should be removed from both versions. Whole or sliced cloud or wood ear fungus works well in this dish. If you can’t find cloud or wood ear fungus at your local Asian market, there’s really no substitute for this ingredient.

Enjoy!

Steamed Fish (蒸魚, Zing1 Jyu6)

 

This recipe was updated on 18 Aug 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

When I was a small child, I didn’t like fish. Now that I’m and adult, it’s one of my favorites. Whenever my family gets together at a Chinese restaurant, a steamed whole fish is almost always on the menu. Whenever I prepare fish at home, a whole fish is usually too much (food), so I get a fish tail, in this case a black bass. The advantage to getting a whole fish is that you get the freshest fish (since you pick the fish from the tank to be dispatched) and you get to eat the fish cheeks (the most delectable part), while with the fish tail, the fish has already been dispatched and prepared some time before. While the best tasting fish is “freshly dead” (for you Young Frankenstein fans), almost “freshly dead” isn’t too bad. Regardless if the fish is whole or not, the cooking technique is the same.

 

I’ve always steamed the fish and just left it in its juices, but after looking at the Steamed Fish Recipe at Rasa Malaysia, removing the fish from cooking juice before serving is a better method. This also makes for a better presentation, since you can steam the fish in one plate and then place it on a platter with freshly cooked vegetables if you choose to do so. The recipe’s steaming time is for 8 minutes, which seems like a short amount of time since I’ve always steamed fish for 15 minutes, but 8 minutes works great. Now I steam fish for 8 minutes.

The fish is always finished with heated oil and a soy sauce mixture. You can use a small pot or a wok to heat the mixtures, but I’ve been using the microwave to heat the soy sauce mixture. As always, you need to be very careful when you pour heated oil and liquids on the fish, as the hot oil and liquid will pop and splatter off the fish. Finally, the fish was placed on a bed of baby bok choy. This is optional and while it does make for a good presentation, you need to precook the baby bok choy before putting the steamed fish on it. Again, I use the microwave to zap the baby bok choy on the presentation plate.

Enjoy!

Grilled Saffron Chicken Breasts

My sister gave me some saffron from Indonesia and I’ve been wondering how to use it since it’s not a familiar ingredient to me. The local newspaper published a recipe for Persian Grilled Quail that uses saffron, lime juice, and olive oil as a marinade before grilling, which can also be used for chicken. I adapted the recipe to also use saffron as the brining spice before marinating and grilling the chicken. Cook’s Illustrated has a good guide for brining, where I used the high-heat grilling instructions for the quantity of water, kosher salt, and sugar. I used enough brine to fill a glass bowl with the chicken breasts.

Enjoy!

Mexican Pulled Pork Enchiladas

 

This recipe was updated on 28 Oct 2013. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

This pork for the enchiladas is from the Mexican Pulled Pork (Carnitas) recipe. Since the pork preparation takes time, I always make more than is needed in order to make other dishes. Homemade salsa is used as part of the filling for the enchiladas, and the pickled vegetables (in this case carrots and onions) and chopped cabbage are the accompaniments to this dish. The enchiladas themselves don’t take very long to make, but if the Mexican pulled pork and/or the homemade salsa is not available, substitute another available ingredient.

Enjoy!

Mexican Pulled Pork (Carnitas)

This recipe was updated on 13 Aug 2013. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

This recipe was adapted from the Mexican Pulled Pork recipe at America’s Test Kitchen. Their original premise was to develop a recipe that did involve lard or deep frying to produce the carnitas’ crispy outside. Their solution, after oven-braising the pork in a Dutch oven, was to use the broiler after coating the pork with a reduction of the remaining liquid and fat. The method works great and I’ve modified their technique to use the barbeque grill instead of the broiler to get a smokier flavor incorporated into the pork. I also use beer and tequila, instead of water, and adjusted the spices to braise the pork. Any leftovers can be used to make Mexican Pulled Pork Enchiladas.

The resulting carnitas are soft on the inside and a crispy brown on the outside, with that distinctive smoked flavor from the grill. Homemade salsa and pickled vegetables (in this case carrots and onions), and chopped cabbage are the accompaniments to this dish. This is an all-afternoon type recipe, but the results are worth it.

Enjoy!

Salsa

This recipe was updated on 20 Jan 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

Homemade salsa tastes best with homegrown tomatoes and hot peppers, but store-bought tomatoes and peppers work well too. The heat of the salsa will depend upon how hot the peppers used in the recipe are, which means that you can never tell until a batch of the salsa is made and tasted. The recipe below is for a “normal” batch of salsa to be used with the Mexican Pulled Pork (Carnitas) recipe. I actually made a huge batch of salsa because I intended to also use the salsa as a part of the filling for the Mexican Pulled Pork Enchiladas recipe. You actually can’t make too much salsa since it goes well with tortilla chips.

Enjoy!

Pickled Vegetables

Homemade pickled vegetables are very easy to make. All you need are the vegetables – in this case sliced carrots and diced onions – vinegar, salt, and some sugar. Just be sure to refrigerate the pickled vegetables and the flavor will develop over time. This recipe also works well for hot peppers. Eat the pickled vegetables with MexicanPulled Pork (Carnitas) and Mexican Pulled Pork Enchiladas.

Enjoy!

Shrimp and Scrambled Eggs (蝦仁炒蛋, Haa1 Jan4 Caau2 Daan6)

This recipe was updated on 11 Aug 2016. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

This is a real easy dish to make. All you need are eggs, shrimp, green onions, and red peppers (mainly for color contrast). You can choose to make this dish more “eggy” by using more eggs, or more “shrimpy” with fewer eggs, so the amount of eggs to use is a personal preference. For this recipe I used fewer eggs to highlight the shrimp in the dish.

Enjoy!

Seafood Pasta Salad

 

This recipe was updated on 11 July 2013. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

I was thinking about making a pasta salad with seafood, and low and behold, shrimp came on sale. So my timing was good since you can really use any available seafood to make this salad. I decided to add two “fake” seafood ingredients, imitation crab flakes and imitation shark’s fin. Most people are familiar with imitation crab flakes, but probably not with imitation shark’s fin. I’ve always used imitation shark’s fin in soup, so this is the first time I’ve used it in a salad.

Imitation shark’s fin is a gelatin-based product that is made to resemble the real shark’s fin long transparent cartilage strands. Both the real and imitation shark’s fin have no taste, but it’s the texture that makes it an interesting ingredient. The imitation version comes packaged frozen and when defrosted, look like transparent brown noodles. I prefer to use the imitation given how the real version is obtained.

Another interesting ingredient is fresh seaweed. You can get fresh seaweed (and the imitation shark’s fin) at your local Asian market and it comes as long strips or tied into bow-ties. I used the bow-tie version in this dish and it gives an added crunch to the dish, as well as a distinct flavor.

Enjoy!

Grilled Chilpotles Salsa Turkey Thighs

This dish mixes both Chinese and Mexican ingredients using turkey thighs, bottled salsa, canned chipotle peppers, and chilpotles sauce. Salsa makes a surprisingly good marinade for meats and the chilpotles peppers, which are dried smoked jalapeño peppers, adds a smoky spiciness. Add soy sauce and other Chinese ingredients, and you get a tasty meal.

Enjoy!

Stir Fried Beef with Chinese Okra (勝瓜炒牛肉, Sing3 Gwaa1 Caau2 Ngau4 Juk6)

 

This recipe was updated on 18 July 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

Chinese okra is an odd looking vegetable and is nothing like normal okra; it’s much larger and doesn’t have the thickening ability of okra (i.e. no sticky goop). It also has hard skin and inedible spines that must be removed before eating. When my brother-in-law first cooked this vegetable, he unfortunately didn’t know this (and I guess my sister forgot to tell him) and they ended up picking out hard skin and spine pieces from the finished dish. So don’t forget to remove the outer skin and spines when using this vegetable. You can combine Chinese okra with any ingredients, in this case its beef and red peppers (from my garden) in a simple brown bean sauce.

 

Enjoy!

Tomato Beef Chow Mein (番茄牛肉炒麵, Faan1 Ke4 Ngau4 Juk6 Caau2 Min6)

This recipe was updated on 02 Sep 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

Tomato beef chow mein is a classic Chinese-American dish that you can get at any Chinese restaurant. The dish is a mixture of beef, noodles, tomatoes, and other vegetables in a sweet and sour sauce (not that thick red gloppy stuff). Depending upon on your preference, the dish can be sourer than sweet or sweeter than sour. Curry powder can also be added and the amount again depends upon personal preference (this dish has some). You can think of this dish as the noodle version of the Spicy Tomato Beef Curry (咖哩粉番茄牛肉, Gaa³ Lei¹ Fan² Faan¹ Ke⁴ Ngau⁴ Juk⁶) recipe.

Tomatoes and beef are important components of this dish. I only make this dish when I have tomatoes available from my garden, and I use beef flank or flap meat sliced against the grain and marinated. Other than that, you can throw in any ingredient your heart desires. In this instance, I used bean sprouts, fried tofu puffs, baby bok choy, and from my garden: red bell pepper and green Thai chilies.

Enjoy!

Spicy Jellyfish with Bell Peppers and Eggs (Ceng1 Ziu1 Caau2 Daan6 Hoi2 Zit3,青椒炒蛋海蜇)

I had dinner with my sister not too long ago and we went to one of the local Chinese restaurants in the area and ordered Jellyfish in XO Sauce. The dish was very good and it’s a dish that I had never eaten before. Jellyfish (hoi² zit³, 海蜇) is normally not the main ingredient in a cooked dish, so this was rather unusual. Jellyfish is usually prepared as an appetizer or as part of a cold dish, such as the Cucumber and Jelly Fish Salad recipe that I posted earlier.

I was looking for a dish to make with the package of salted jellyfish that I had and while this recipe is not that dish, it was inspired by that meal. If you search for jellyfish recipes on the internet, you’ll find that many include chicken. Since I wanted to have jellyfish as the main ingredient, I figured that eggs would be a good addition while keeping the dish centered on jellyfish. You want to use the salted jellyfish rather than the instant variety because you want large pieces of jellyfish in the dish rather than the strips you get with the instant.

XO sauce is a combination of many ingredients, including, but not limited to dried shrimp, dried scallops, hot peppers, garlic, and shallots. I decided to make my own sauce (not XO) by including the previously mentioned ingredients, minus the dried scallops. I also used red bell peppers and green Thai chilies from my garden.

Enjoy!

Spicy Pork and Long Beans with Vermicelli (豆角粉絲炒豬肉, Dau6 Gok3 Fan2 Si1 Caau2 Zyu1 Juk6)

 

This recipe was update on 25 Aug 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

I made this dish because I wanted to use up some remaining long beans and I wanted a dish with mung bean vermicelli. Long beans are a favorite vegetable of mine and differ from regular green beans in the most obvious way; they are really long in length. If you can’t find long beans at your favorite market, you can easily substitute regular green beans.

Mung bean vermicelli is also called bean thread noodles. The “noodles” (made from mung beans) are very thin and brittle when dry, and become transparent and soft after soaking in hot water. The dry version can actually be fried quickly in a wok, where it will puff up and then usually serves as the crispy base for another dish (you see this in Chinese restaurant dishes). After soaking in water, the soft vermicelli is added to a dish, where it soaks up and takes on the flavor of the sauce (so you’ll need to add more water or stock to get a sauce or gravy).

The natural additions for this dish are ground pork and dried shrimp. In this case, I used dried shrimp that are very small and added it to the pork before marinating. You need to add a good amount of these very small dried shrimps to make them noticeable in the dish. The next time I make this dish, I might use the medium sized dried shrimp so that their presence is obvious.

After I made this dish and took my first bite, I immediately noticed that the texture of the dish wasn’t right. I should have added black, cloud ear, or wood ear fungus to give the dish a distinct crunch. These funguses sounds like an odd ingredient, but are themselves tasteless. Both are dark in color and come fresh or dried, and either whole or already cut into strips. Black and wood ear funguses are available at your local Asian supermarket. I’ve added that ingredient to the recipe even though I didn’t use it in this version.

Enjoy!

Slow Cooker Spiced Lamb Shanks

 

This recipe was updated on 21 July 2013. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

I usually don’t make this dish in the summer (even though it’s been a cool summer this year), as this is more of a Fall or Winter meal, but lamb shanks were on sale and they’re one of my favorite ingredients. I previously made this dish with red wine or port but decided instead to try a Chardonnay this time, and I was pleased with the results (you can just as easily use chicken stock). I also got the idea to add lemon to the dish from this recipe that was featured in the Wall Street Journal. However, what really makes this dish tasty are the spices – cumin, fennel, coriander, allspice, and pepper - which are toasted before being ground (and then adding turmeric). The spice mix would also work for pork (a future recipe).

The other piece of information came from America’s Test Kitchen. They use Minute Tapioca (made by Kraft) to thicken sauces in a slow cooker. They found that tapioca starch holds up well to the long cooking time in slow cooker, whereas other thickeners, such as corn starch, break down and don’t thicken. Minute Tapioca can be found in any grocery store, but it’s pretty expensive when you compare it to regular tapioca starch, which is available in Asian markets. They both thicken the liquid equally as well, so I use regular tapioca starch.

The Lamb Shanks can either be browned in a wok or Dutch oven, or in a barbeque (smoked with hickory and rosemary) before adding the shanks to the slow cooker. The lamb shanks can be browned the night before cooking.

Enjoy!

Stir Fried Beef with Long Beans (豆角炒牛肉, Dau6 Gok3 Caau2 Ngau4 Juk6)

 

This recipe was updated on 01 Jul 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

Long Beans is a favorite vegetable of mine. It goes well with pork spareribs and for this recipe, beef. Long beans differ from regular green beans in the most obvious way; they are really long in length. If you can’t find long beans at your favorite market, you can easily substitute regular green beans.

Enjoy!

Soy Sauce Chicken and Peach Pasta Salad

There was an article in the local newspaper’s food section on barbequed peaches. That gave me the idea to include peaches in a chicken salad that I was about to make using leftovers from the Grilled Soy Sauce Chicken (Siu¹ Haau¹ Si⁶ Jau⁴ Gai¹, 燒烤豉油雞) recipe. While I didn’t barbeque the peaches, they tasted great after briefly baking (after halving and pitting) in my toaster oven.

I used a balsamic yogurt dressing and it turned out to be an OK dressing, but it lacked the tang I expected. The next time I made this dressing, I used rice vinegar, instead of balsamic, and upped the amount of lemon/lime juice, and it tasted much better. The yogurt dressing is also healthier than a mayonnaise based dressing.

The first crop of cherry tomatoes from my garden was also available, along with some very small Sungold tomatoes (some no larger than ⅛ of an inch). I also included button mushrooms and some basil to complete the pasta salad. In addition to the pasta salad, I made Garlic Garlic Bread to complete the meal.

Enjoy!

Garlic Garlic Bread

If you like garlic, then this is the garlic bread for you. It’s really very simple; you crush cloves of garlic with olive oil on bread with garlic baked into it (like you get at Costco). Toast the bread, and it’s ready to eat. Have the bread with Soy Sauce Chicken and Peach Pasta salad (recipe can be found here), Seafood Pasta Salad (recipe can be found here), or Greek Yogurt Soy Sauce Chicken Pasta Salad (recipe can be found here).

Enjoy!

Grilled Soy Sauce Chicken (燒烤豉油雞, Siu1 Haau1 Si6 Jau4 Gai1)

This recipe was updated on 16 Aug 2015. Some instructions and equipment were changed.

I used a basic soy sauce marinade for a grilled whole chicken. I cut the chicken in half before grilling and removed the backbone (which I grilled with the rest of the chicken) to decrease the cooking time over a whole chicken. You don’t have to use a whole chicken as the technique used in this recipe will work equally as well with chicken parts (drumsticks, thighs, breast…). Adding a smoking wood to the grill, such as oak, hickory, mesquite, pecan, further enhances the flavor. Both direct and indirect cooking on the grill is used for this recipe. I used the cool side of a covered grill for indirect heat to cook the chicken for 15 minutes, and then move the chicken, skin side down, to the hot side of a covered grill to crisp the skin for 3-5 minutes before flipping the chicken over and repeating the process. Depending upon your grill, your previous experience, and the amount of grill heat remaining, the direct heat cooking time may have to be increased or decreased.

You can look at the Poached Chicken (白斬雞, Baak⁶ Zaam² Gai¹) with Ginger-Scallion Oil (薑蔥油, Goeng¹ Cung¹ Jau⁴) recipe for instructions on cutting and arranging a chicken on a platter. You can adapt the cutting method to account for the chicken already being halved without a backbone.

Enjoy!

Grilled Cumin Lamb Shoulder Steak (燒烤孜然羊肩肉, Siu1 Haau1 Zi1 Jin4 Joeng4 Gin1 Juk6)

 

This recipe was updated on 17 Dec 2014. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

The same marinade that was used for the Grilled Cumin Turkey Wings (孜然火雞翼, Zi¹ Jin⁴ Fo² Gai¹ Jik⁶) recipe also goes very well with lamb, in this case lamb shoulder steaks. You need to grill the lamb shoulder steaks using direct heat to cook them. The marinade uses cumin, star anise, and Sichuan peppercorn to give the lamb its spicy flavor.

Enjoy!

Grilled Cumin Turkey Wings (燒烤孜然火雞翼, Siu1 Haau1 Zi1 Jin4 Fo2 Gai1 Jik6)

This recipe was updated on 01 Nov 2015. The Chinese name, and some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

Turkey wings were on sale and I decided to get them instead of chicken for a change. Since turkey wings are larger than their chicken counterparts, the turkey wings parts are separated before grilling. You can choose to not grill the wing tips (and keep them for stock), or you can grill and eat them as I usually do. The marinade uses cumin, star anise, and Sichuan peppercorn to give the wings its spicy flavor.

Enjoy!

Chicken and Marinated Bean Curd with Fuzzy Melon (腐乳五香豆腐節瓜雞, Fu6 Jyu5 Ng5 Hoeng1 Dau6 Fu6 Zit3 Gwaa1 Gai1)

 

This recipe was updated on 29 Sep 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

This is an easy dish to prepare and fermented bean curd is the basis of the sauce. Each bean curd looks like a little soft rectangular pillow and is packed together in a bottle. I happen to use 7 of the fermented bean curds, but you’ll have to judge how much to use depending upon your taste. The sauce is light in color, so soy sauce is not used (but is used to marinate the chicken) since this would darken it. Marinated bean curd (or five spice bean curd) is the other ingredient used in this dish. Marinated bean curd is not fermented, but spiced and its texture is firm, so it doesn’t break up when stir fried. If you can’t find marinated bean curd at your local Asian market, use a firm pressed tofu as a substitute.

Enjoy!

Grilled Bourbon Chicken Wings (燒烤波本鷄翼, Siu1 Haau1 Bo1 Bun2 Gai1 Jik6)

 

This recipe was updated on 17 Aug 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and the Chinese name added.

Somehow, bourbon and chicken seem to go together. Adding your favorite bourbon (e.g. Jack Daniels, Jim Beam…) to chicken wing marinade before grilling gives the wings a unique and tasty flavor. Adding a smoking wood to the grill, such as hickory, mesquite, pecan, or whatever your favorite wood is, further enhances the flavor. You can choose to remove the wing tips before marinating, but I leave them on since I don’t mind eating them. I first smoked the wings covered over indirect heat before grilling over direct heat to get the grill marks. This is a simple recipe to make and I hope you will try it.

Enjoy!

Pepperoni, Mushroom, and Olive Pizza

Making your own fresh pizza and not eating frozen is one of the joys of life. To create the dough, I use Cheri’s Favorite Pizza Dough Recipe. You can read the background story here, but her secret is to add semolina flour to the dough.  I use the dough setting on my bread machine to create the dough rather than a food processor and I use all the dough to create one 14-inch pizza (rather than 2 medium pizzas as called for in the original recipe) since I like my crusts thicker than thin. The recipe says that you can make the dough in 5 minutes, but using my bread machine takes at least 45-60 minutes.

I use a Cuisinart 14-inch non-stick pizza pan to hold the pizza. Even though I have a convection oven, I use the oven mode (no convection) set at the highest temperature (in my case 555⁰F) and with the rack set at the lowest point so that the pizza is as close to the lower heating element as possible to get a crispy crust for 10-15 minutes. I found that if I use the convection setting, the toppings burn before the crust gets done. Depending upon your oven characteristics, your results might differ.

You can, of course, add any toppings that your heart desires. This pizza happens to use pepperoni, mushrooms, and Kalamata olives. For sauce I use a bottled tomato sauce from Trader Joe’s that I like – Trader Giotto’s Puttanesca Sauce – which contains anchovy and anchovy paste, among other ingredients. The cheese is a pre-packaged six cheese Italian blend (of course, your favorite cheeses can be used). Finally, I added the basil on top of the pizza at the last moment, since I forgot to place some down on the pizza after the sauce. This resulted in some rather sad looking dehydrated basil on top of the pizza (next time I won’t forget).

Enjoy!

Steamed Lemon Chicken and Shrimp with Black Bean Sauce (豆豉檸蒸蝦鷄, Dau6 Si6 Ning4 Zing1 Haa1 Gai1)

 

This recipe was updated on 30 Sep 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

 

When I first moved out of my parents’ house, many years ago, I was cooking novice. My Mom had always prepared the meals and now it was going to be up to me to do the cooking. Parents, being who they are, helped the newly independent kid by supplying some tools for me to succeed on my own. One thing my mom gave me was some 3x5 cards (remember those!) with recipes on them. The roots of this dish come from that original 3x5 card, which I still have.

 

The original dish my Mom used to make was Lemon Chicken with Black Bean Sauce. This was a healthier version of the fried lemon chicken dish with gloppy sauce that you get at Chinese restaurants. This dish is steamed and the lemon accompanies a black bean sauce (which is a great taste combination). I’ve modified the original ingredients slightly and added a flourish of shrimp to the dish, but the roots of the dish remain as written on that 3x5 card.

 

The chicken should be marinated at least 4 hours (overnight is preferable) and you’ll need to defrost the shrimp before steaming the dish. Other than those preparation steps, the dish is quick and easy to prepare (perfect for any cooking novice!).

 

Enjoy!

Grilled Magic Dust Beef Porterhouse and Pork Rib Steaks

Magic Dust is a spice mix created by champion BBQ pit master Mike Mills. The recipe can be found at the About.com web site.  You can use the mix on any meat. I happen to use it on beef and pork.

Enjoy!

Beef with Bitter Melon (苦瓜牛肉, Fu2 Gwaa1 Ngau4 Juk6)

 

This recipe was updated on 22 May 2014. Quantities and measurements for some ingredients were changed, as well as the addition of metric measurements.
 

Beef with bitter melon in a black bean sauce is another classic, easy to prepare Chinese dish. I make this dish when I want something quick to eat. Bitter melon, for those who are not familiar with this vegetable, tastes exactly as it’s named and could be considered an acquired taste. I happen to like bitter melon and you can easily moderate the bitterness of the melon to your taste. The beef needs some preparation time, so you’ll need a minimum of 1 hour for marinating, but also can be marinated overnight.

Enjoy!

Spicy Pork and Dried Shrimp with Chives (油辣椒蝦米豬肉, Jau4 Laat6 Ziu1 Haa1 Mai5 Zyu1 Juk6)

 

This recipe was updated on 02 Nov 2015. The Chinese name was added, some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed, and metric measurements added.

I bought chives at my local Asian supermarket because they looked good and I’ve never really cooked many dishes using them (plus they were cheap). If you’ve been reading my recipes, you’ll probably notice that many dishes are created from what’s available in my refrigerator. This is another dish that falls into this category. I’ve never made this dish before, but I had the ingredients and I needed to cook something for dinner. The leftovers (if any) make a good topping for noodles.

Enjoy!

Poached Chicken (白斬雞, Baak6 Zaam2 Gai1) with Ginger-Scallion Oil (薑蔥油, Goeng1 Cung1 Jau4)

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

When I was living with my sister and her husband while my house was being remodeled (over 15 years ago), I made this dish, took it out of the refrigerator, and put it out on the counter to warm up before cutting. While I was occupied preparing other things for dinner, their cat, Phoenix, also noticed that there was a chicken and jumped onto the counter to investigate. As I turned around and noticed that there’s more than just a chicken sitting on the counter, Phoenix starts licking the chicken! Needless to say, I shooed the cat away. Phoenix looked very unhappy, since it just lost possession of a tasty bird, and I wondered what to do with the chicken. I figured that if the cat thought the chicken was tasty, then the chicken is still tasty. So I washed the chicken under the faucet and proceeded to cut it up under the watchful gaze of Phoenix. We ate the chicken that night for dinner. My sister still laughs at this story and I can truthfully say that my chicken is kitty licking good!

Fried Rice (Caau2 Faan6, 炒飯)

Fried rice (caau² faan⁶, 炒飯) is one of my favorite dishes to make and one of the first dishes I ever learned to cook. It’s Chinese comfort food. Fried rice is the ultimate leftover dish because leftover rice and other leftover ingredients are used. For this version, I added homemade hickory smoked bacon and Chinese broccoli (gai³ lan⁴, 芥蘭) to this easy to prepare dish, but you can add any ingredient that’s available. Other fried rice ingredient variations are pictured at the end. Oyster sauce (hou⁴ jau⁴, 蠔油) completes the dish.

Enjoy!

Chinese Broccoli Beef with Oyster Sauce (芥蘭牛肉, Gaai3 Laan4 Ngau4 Juk6)

This recipe was updated on 27 May 2015. Some instructions and ingredient quantities were changed.

Chinese broccoli beef is a classic, easy to prepare Cantonese-American dish. I make this dish when I want something quick to eat. This version adds button mushrooms and uses Lee Kum Kee brand premium oyster sauce to complete the dish, but if you have some time, you can use rehydrated Shiitake mushrooms. The beef needs some preparation time, so you’ll need a minimum of one hour for marinating, but also can be marinated overnight.

Enjoy!