a couple of idiot-simple chinese food recipies.
You know they're idiot-simple because I'm capable of producing them without much problem. None of these have quantities, because they're all in the grand old tradition of "just eyeball it, ok?"
Tea Eggs
You need:
Directions:
Soft-boil the eggs until they're safe to peel. Once that's done, take the eggs out of the water, and you have two options. The pretty way is to crack them gently before putting them back in, which I never do because it means you have to steep them longer. The fast way is just to peel them. Either way, get that done and resubmerge the eggs in new water, adding tea, spices, and soy sauce, and also at this point whatever other random shit you'd like to cook this way (lotus root, tofu, etc.). One of those spice holder thingies is helpful if you don't want to be picking tea leaves and bits of seeds and cinnamon shrapnel off your snacks, but not strictly required; I don't have one, anyway, and I do fine. Heat to a low simmer, stirring occasionally. Give it about, eh, twenty minutes, half an hour. When that's done, chuck the whole thing in your fridge. If you've peeled your eggs, letting it sit for about a day or two should be sufficient to let the flavor penetrate; if not, then you're on your own because I have no idea. These tend to be good as a snack or side dish, either on their own or dipped in soysauce.
I've actually posted this next recipe before, but I've since gotten better at making it so here's a revised version.
Fried Chicken
You need:
Directions:
Slice the chicken into small, bite-size pieces. Slice green onion and crush or slice the garlic, and if you're using other spices then do whatever you need to do make them small pieces. Submerge the chicken in a mixture of soy sauce and the spices, setting aside a little bit of the garlic and green onion for later. Let marinate for some amount of time--I usually just let it sit for like half an hour but you can do it overnight if you really want to plan that far ahead. Drain excess sauce and set aside. Add some flour to the chicken and stir it around so you get a nice tan paste covering it. You don't want to put too much flour because it'll produce the wrong kind of skin, but you also don't want too little because then it'll be runny and not skin at all.
Anyway, once that's done, heat up a pan on medium-high with some oil in the bottom--slightly more than one would use for stir fry but not so much that it's enough to submerge anything--and toss in your remaining garlic and green onion, letting them fry briefly until fragrant. Add the chicken at this point, making sure to spread out the pieces so that they cook evenly. Turn the pieces every now and then. When everything looks just about ready, dash the marinade you set aside earlier over everything and quickly stir it around a bit, and make sure you turn off the heat immediately after. Adding the sauce at the late stage gives the skin a nice gooey texture, although if you're going to use the chicken in stir fry later it's not strictly necessary. Tastes good on its own, or in stir-fry with broccoli or whatever fresh green vegetables you have handy.
This entry was originally posted at dreamwidth.
Tea Eggs
You need:
- Some eggs.
- Chinese five spice. You can probably find it in powder form in, hah, the oriental section of your average supermarket, but they often put weird shit in that. To compile from scratch:
- Cinnamon. Chinese for preference, but any kind works just as well.
- Star anise. I hear regular anise flavor comes from the same chemical compound, though, so that's probably fine too.
- Fennel seeds. I don't know a substitution for this one but it shouldn't be too hard to find.
- Cloves. Again, no substitution, but probably easy to find.
- Szechuan peppercorn. This one is the trickiest, for some reason they're regulated in the United States or something. They're actually closely related to citrus fruit, contrary to what the name seems to imply. Some citrus rinds or a dash of lemon juice is permissible if you can't get the peppercorns.
- Soy sauce.
- Really shitty fucking tea. Black is best, but I've made it from green when I didn't have any black handy and that tasted ok. Loose leaf for preference, but bags are ok if you can't get loose leaf. You want the cheap horrible horse-piss bitter tannin-heavy stuff, none of your nice expensive imported gourmet stuff because those don't even have enough bitter to even work for this so you'd just be wasting your money. Well, European gourmet teas are quite often bitter enough, but still--wasting money. So yeah. Cheap shit!
- Optionally: my family likes to put sliced lotus root and dense tofu, the kind with the brown leathery skin on it, in the brew as well, because they're also tasty cooked this way, but it's not essential.
Directions:
Soft-boil the eggs until they're safe to peel. Once that's done, take the eggs out of the water, and you have two options. The pretty way is to crack them gently before putting them back in, which I never do because it means you have to steep them longer. The fast way is just to peel them. Either way, get that done and resubmerge the eggs in new water, adding tea, spices, and soy sauce, and also at this point whatever other random shit you'd like to cook this way (lotus root, tofu, etc.). One of those spice holder thingies is helpful if you don't want to be picking tea leaves and bits of seeds and cinnamon shrapnel off your snacks, but not strictly required; I don't have one, anyway, and I do fine. Heat to a low simmer, stirring occasionally. Give it about, eh, twenty minutes, half an hour. When that's done, chuck the whole thing in your fridge. If you've peeled your eggs, letting it sit for about a day or two should be sufficient to let the flavor penetrate; if not, then you're on your own because I have no idea. These tend to be good as a snack or side dish, either on their own or dipped in soysauce.
I've actually posted this next recipe before, but I've since gotten better at making it so here's a revised version.
Fried Chicken
You need:
- Chicken.
- Flour.
- Soy sauce, or I've found it's good with teriyaki sauce too.
- Some kind of cooking oil. I just use whatever I have handy, anything from canola to olive to sesame or peanut or whatever works fine.
- Garlic.
- Preferably green onion, although I've done without when I don't have any handy and it tastes fine.
- Whatever other miscellaneous spices. A bit of ginger can be palatable. Sesame is also nice. You don't want anything too overpowering and you probably want to stick to asiany spices, but otherwise, just whatever you have sitting around is fine, this isn't the kind of dish to go out and buy things especially for. Sometimes instead of using soy sauce and spices I'll just use, like, Trader Joe's soyaki or similar, which has spices already floating around in it, and that kind of thing works fine, too.
Directions:
Slice the chicken into small, bite-size pieces. Slice green onion and crush or slice the garlic, and if you're using other spices then do whatever you need to do make them small pieces. Submerge the chicken in a mixture of soy sauce and the spices, setting aside a little bit of the garlic and green onion for later. Let marinate for some amount of time--I usually just let it sit for like half an hour but you can do it overnight if you really want to plan that far ahead. Drain excess sauce and set aside. Add some flour to the chicken and stir it around so you get a nice tan paste covering it. You don't want to put too much flour because it'll produce the wrong kind of skin, but you also don't want too little because then it'll be runny and not skin at all.
Anyway, once that's done, heat up a pan on medium-high with some oil in the bottom--slightly more than one would use for stir fry but not so much that it's enough to submerge anything--and toss in your remaining garlic and green onion, letting them fry briefly until fragrant. Add the chicken at this point, making sure to spread out the pieces so that they cook evenly. Turn the pieces every now and then. When everything looks just about ready, dash the marinade you set aside earlier over everything and quickly stir it around a bit, and make sure you turn off the heat immediately after. Adding the sauce at the late stage gives the skin a nice gooey texture, although if you're going to use the chicken in stir fry later it's not strictly necessary. Tastes good on its own, or in stir-fry with broccoli or whatever fresh green vegetables you have handy.
This entry was originally posted at dreamwidth.