Simplified Kung Po Chicken

Kung Po Chicken is a common dish found in most, if not all, chinese restaurants. This dish is basically diced chicken stir-fried with onions, dried chillies, cashew nuts and capsicum. Some even add water chestnuts to the dish. The aroma from the chicken which was marinated with chinese cooking wine blends well with the spiciness of the dried chillis. Meanwhile, the tender bits of chicken meat is contrasted with the crunchiness of the capsicum and onions. The cashew nuts lend a natural sweetness to the dish.

Dried Chillis

Anyway, I am not that good expressing how a dish tastes like, so I shall keep it short and simple. This dish is best eaten with plain white rice so that you can savour the full taste and aroma of the dish. Some have substituted the chicken with cuttlefish, which is quite a good alternative.

In my recipe, I have simplified the dish to my own liking. I have omitted the use of the capsicum and perhaps, the sauce is a bit different from the original recipes by professional cooks. However, I am still confident that you will like this dish if you try it out.

This is my recipe for Kung Po Chicken.

Ingredients

• 300 grammes chicken breast (cut into cubes / bite sizes)
• 2 medium sized onions (quartered)
• 10 to 15 pieces of dried chilli (washed and pre-soaked for 15 minutes prior to cooking)
• 20 to 30 pieces of cashew nuts
• 1 1/2 cups of cooking oil (preferably palm oil)
• 1/2 cup (70 to 100 ml) warm water

Marinade for chicken

• 2 tablespoons of chinese cooking wine
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of light soya sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1/2 teaspoon of white pepper powder
• 1 teaspoon of sesame oil
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of corn flour

Seasoning

• 1 1/2 tablespoons of dark soya sauce
• 1 1/2 teaspoons of sugar
• A pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon of chinese cooking wine

Method

Marinade chicken cubes for at least 1 hour.

Heat oil in wok on high. Fry chicken cubes till golden brown. Remove from oil and place aside.

Remove cooking oil from wok leaving about 1 tablespoon in the wok. Add onions and dried chillis and stir-fry for 30 seconds to bring out the aroma. (If you wish to add capsicums which are cut into cube sizes, add them at this stage) Add pre-fried chicken cubes and cashew nuts and stir well for a minute.

Add seasoning and 1/2 cup water and close lid. Stir occasionally till water / gravy reduced by half.

Serve hot with plain white rice.

Pea-Sprouts are also known as “Tou Miau” in Mandarin. Rich in vitamins and minerals, it is considered one of the easiest vegetable to stir-fry. Popular in many Chinese restaurants, the prices of these pea-sprouts have risen over the years due to its high demand.

Fresh Pea-Sprouts

When cooking this dish, it is important to have the wok heated at high as you need to cook the pea-sprouts in minimum time to preserve its nutrients and to ensure that the juices are retained in the sprouts. Else you will have a flooded dish!

This is my recipe for Stir-Fried Pea Sprouts with Garlic

Ingredients

• 300 grammes pea-sprouts (rinse with water to remove dirt prior to cooking)
• 5 to 8 cloves garlic (chopped finely)
• 2 tablespoons cooking oil (preferably palm oil)

Seasoning

• 1 1/2 teaspoons oyster sauce
• Salt to taste
• A dash of white pepper powder

Method

Heat wok till wok starts to smoke.

Add oil followed by garlic. Give the garlic a few quick stir and add the pea-sprouts.

Continue to stir-fry briskly whilst adding seasoning. Cook until pea-sprouts begin to wilt to your desired softness or reduced by 1/2 in bulk. Add one or two tablespoons of warm water if you prefer some gravy.

Stir-Fried Kai-Lan Stems with Pork and Mushrooms

“Oh no! Not another recipe with mushrooms!” Ha! Ha! Well, can’t help it when I have a lot of mushrooms at home. Chinese dried mushrooms to be precise. But anyway, the mushrooms here are the supporting act. The main actor is the Kai Lan stems.

According to the Wikipedia, Kai-lan, also known as Chinese broccoli or Chinese kale, is a slightly bitter leaf vegetable featuring thick, flat, glossy blue-green leaves with thick stems and a small number of tiny, almost vestigial flower heads similar to those of broccoli. As a group of Brassica oleracea kai-lan is of the same species of plant as broccoli and kale. Its flavor is very similar to that of broccoli, though not identical, being a bit sweeter.

In this recipe, I use the kai-lan stems. These are usually imported and sold in supermarkets. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of it prior to cooking. What you get is a stem roughly 15 to 20cm long and with very little or no leaf. It tastes much sweeter than the leaves in “normal” the normal kai-lan vegetable. I am told that this variety of kai-lan is grown specifically for its crunchy and sweet tasting stem.

The ideal way to cook this stem is to stir-fry it with medium or large sized prawns which have been deveined and cut “butterfly style”. If you are rich enough, you can consider adding scallops! As I don’t have any prawns at home when I decided to cook this dish and I am not rich enough to consider scallops, I used pork and mushrooms as the supporting cast.

This is my recipe for Stir-Fried Kai-Lan Stems with Pork and Mushrooms

Ingredients

• 3 to 5 kai-lan stems (lightly scrape the layer of skin from the stem and slice diagonally)
• 50 grammes of pork tenderloin (sliced thinly)
• 2 to 3 pre-soaked chinese mushrooms
• 4 cloves garlic (chopped finely)
• 1 tablespoon of palm oil
• 1/2 cup warm water
• 2 teaspoons cornflour mixed with 1/2 cup water to make corn starch

Marinade for pork tenderloin

• 2 teaspoon light soya sauce
• a pinch of white pepper powder
• 1 teaspoon corn flour

Seasoning

• 1 tablespoon oyster sauce
• Salt to taste
• 2 teaspoons chinese cooking wine (optional)
• A dash of white pepper powder

Method

Marinade pork tenderloin for 30 minutes.

Heat oil in wok and fry garlic till beginning to brown. Remove garlic from oil.

Add pork tenderloin and chinese mushrooms into remaining oil in wok and stir fry for 1 minute. Add kai-lan stems and pre-fried garlic and stir-fry briskly for 1 minute. Add one or two teaspoons of warm water to prevent burning.

Add seasoning (except chinese cooking wine) followed by remainder of water and cover lid. Allow to cook for 1 to 2 minutes whilst checking occasionally for drying out of gravy.

Once the stems have more or less turned to a darker colour, add chinese cooking wine and stir well. If the sauce is too thin to your liking, add a little bit of corn starch to thicken it.

Dish out and serve with white rice.

Stingrays are sometimes sold at the wet market and we buy it once in a blue moon. The most common method to cook stingrays are to grill them after marinating them in some spicy sauce. In fact, most hawkers selling grilled seafood will have stingrays amongst other seafood available.

We don’t grill our food at home because…we don’t have a grill in the first place. But what we do like is to cook the stingray with taucheo chilli and salted vegetable. The taucheo chilli gives the stingray a slight spicy taste whilst the salted vegetable lends an interesting salty twist to the dish. Taucheo is preserved soya beans which are bought from grocers in bottles. The salted vegetables mentioned are also known as kiam chye (in hokkien) or preserved mustard leaves.

Stingrays can have a rather “fishy” smell and that’s one of the reasons why it is cooked with chilli. By past experience, we find that the ones where the white-coloured flesh is riddled with black dots are tastier and have less “fishy” smell. If anyone can share the name of this specie or why it is riddled with black dots, that would be most appreciated.

This is my recipe for Stingray with Taucheo Chilli and Salted Vegetables.

Ingredients

• 400 grammes of stingray (wash thoroughly and cut to bite sizes)
• 3 to 4 red chillis (remove seeds and pound finely. Use more chilli if you like it spicier)
• 3 bulbs garlic (chopped finely)
• 4 slices of ginger
• 2 teaspoons taucheo (preserved soya beans)
• 3 to 4 leaves of salted vegetables julienned (kiam chye / preserved mustard leaves)
• 1 tablespoon cooking oil (preferably palm oil)
• 1/2 cup water

Seasoning

• Dash of white pepper
• Sugar to taste

Method

Heat oil in wok. Add chilli, garlic and ginger and stir till fragrant or slightly brown. Add taucheo and salted vegetables (preserved mustard leaves). Stir fry for 30 seconds.

Add stingray and stir till the meat is turns colour / cooked on the outside. Add water and close lid. Cook for 2 minutes on high heat (till stingray is thoroughly cooked).

Add a dash of white pepper and sugar to taste prior to serving.