Vegetable stir fry with prawns (芥蘭花炒蝦仁)

Posted on January 8, 2010 by Angeline
 

Well, this is a strange-looking vegetable and I only know the name of it in mandarin because I asked the vegetable stall uncle, and I’m not even sure if he’s right 😀

It looks like a cross between kai lan and broccoli because the flower bit on top resembles broccoli but the stem is that of a kai lan. The uncle told me it’s broccoli with a long stem (but the texture and taste of the stem is that of a kailan’s). Hmmm. Never mind what it is. What’s more important is that it tastes nice right?

You could replace this strange vegetable with asparagus/broccoli/ kailan and it’d still work fine. 🙂 Vegetables just taste so good with prawns! 🙂

Vegetable stir fry with prawns (芥蘭花炒蝦仁)

 Vegetable stir fry with prawns
 

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Vegetable stir fry with prawns (芥蘭花炒蝦仁)
Author: 
Cuisine: Chinese
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
 
Ingredients
  • a small bunch of broccoli-kailan (for a lack of better description of the veg) 芥蘭花 - you could technically replace this with any seasonal vegetable
  • 3-4 medium sized prawns
  • 2 teaspoons minced garlic
  • stock (or water)
  • oyster sauce to taste
  • cornflour slurry (if desired)
  • 1 teaspoon salt (for parboiling)
  • water (for parboiling)
  • 2 teaspoons oil
Seasoning for prawns:
  • ½ teaspoon hua diao jiu
  • 1 teaspoon light soy sauce
  • a dash of ground white pepper
Instructions
  1. Prepare the broccoli-kailan/ vegetable of your choice
  2. Rinse, shell and devein the prawns, leaving the tails intact. Marinate the prawns with the seasoning and set aside in the fridge for at least 15 minutes.
  3. Bring a pot of water to boil. Add a teaspoon of salt and parboil the vegetable. Check for done-ness by checking out the crispness of the stem. Sieve out the vegetable when done and discard the water. Set the vegetable aside.
  4. Heat 1 teaspoon oil and saute 1 teaspoon of minced garlic till fragrant.
  5. Add the prawns and fry till they are 80% cooked. Remove and set aside.
  6. Heat the other teaspoon of oil in the wok and add in the remaining garlic.
  7. Once garlic is fragrant, add in the vegetable and stir-fry quickly (the vegetable is already cooked), then return the prawns to the wok.
  8. Add oyster sauce to taste and a bit of stock (or water) and bring to a boil.
  9. Add cornflour water to thicken the gravy if desired.
Notes
Fresh mushrooms can be added for more variety.

 

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Posted in Chinese Food, Food for kids, Recipes, Vegetables, Vegetables (suitable for tots) | Leave a comment

Spinach soup recipe

Posted on January 8, 2010 by Angeline

spinach soup recipe

I’m a soup lover (though I’m not Cantonese) and my mum would always pamper me with my favourite soups when I go back for dinner at her place. This soup – spinach soup – is definitely one of my favourites (and my mum’s too!). I cooked this tonight for our dinner and had an extra bowl of it! 🙂

Spinach soup recipe

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Spinach soup recipe
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Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 4
 
Ingredients
  • 1 bunch spinach or baby spinach (heng cai in Cantonese or xian cai in Mandarin) - I prefer baby spinach coz it's easier to prepare and more tender
  • 10 fish balls
  • 2-3 chicken carcasses
  • 250g pork ribs
  • 10g dried scallops
  • a handful of dried shrimp
  • 40g ikan bilis
  • 3 cloves garlic (keep the skin on)
  • 3L water
Instructions
  1. Place chicken bones and pork ribs in a soup pot of water (with enough water to cover the ingredients) and bring the water to a boil. Discard the water (it should be full of scum and impurities) and place the chicken bones and pork ribs in a soup bag together with the washed ikan bilis, dried shrimp and garlic.
  2. Place all the ingredients (except the spinach and fish balls) into the soup pot of water.
  3. Bring to a boil then simmer on low heat for at least two hours.
  4. In a saucepan, bring some water to boil then blanch the spinach for about 30 seconds, just to 'clean' the spinach (spinach is in the dirty dozen list).
  5. Add the fish balls and spinach only when about to serve as they cook really fast.
  6. Add salt/fish sauce to taste (only after adding the fish balls as fish balls also add to the saltiness of the soup).
Notes
For toddler's consumption:

1. Skip the dried scallop and dried shrimp for tots below 18mths

2. Cut the spinach into toddler bite-size before serving to prevent choking.

3. Cut fishballs into small pieces - suitable for tots above 2 years.

Click the link for the full list of soup recipes (with thumbnails).

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Posted in Chinese Food, Food for kids, Soups, Soups (suitable for tots), Vegetables, Vegetables (suitable for tots) | 2 Comments