89. Healthy recipe: stir fried celery and almond (V)

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Chinese stir fried celery and almond

After staying indoors the whole day, in the afternoon, around 4.15pm, I decided to pack my sport wear and go to gym. According to the weather forecast, sun set would be at around 4.06pm, so I thought I would be walking in the ‘dark’. However, when I stepped out, day light was not totally gone yet, then after passing the buildings in the yards, which blocked my view, suddenly I saw the beautiful sky, rose, purple, orange, red--- the sun was making its last splash in the sky, it was a beautiful picture in the west. I wished I had a camera with me.

I could not help but looking back every single step as I moved forward. When I turned into another street at the end of the road, suddenly I realized there were so many people already coming out from the shops, galleries, restaurants, and were all looking at the sky. --- It is not because something so rare, but because something we try not to miss in life.

This recipe is an easy and healthy one -- stir fried celery and almond. Ok, we have to talk about almonds a little bit. There is a difference between almonds grown in Southern China and those grown in Northern China; so, we usually distinguish between Northern and Southern almonds.

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76. Chinese stir fried baby squid and celery (spicy)

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Chinese stir fried squid

...I don't know how "authentic" this recipe really is. It is probably just 'my' recipe :)). I have always liked this way of cooking squid, never remembered where I learned it from.

Before writing this post, however, I quickly checked up online, and asked my dad --- no, I could not find the same recipe. So I think this is one of those recipes that I liked at some point and then ended up adapting it my own way.

It is really tasty though -- with a bit spiciness from the chili and a little influence from the cumin seeds. If you have to give credit to somebody, I think my dad and my auntie would definitely deserve it. I definitely ate something very similar that they used to cook long time ago.

Unlike southern recipes, in most seafood dishes in northern Chinese cuisine seafood is normally not combined with vegetables; also, most recipes don't combine different kinds of seafood. So, this dish an exception to the rule. I particularly like the celery ‘juice’ combined with the texture of the squid.

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56. Stir fried Lily bulbs, black fungus and celery (part II)

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Chinese stir fried lily bulbs

养生菜：清炒木耳、西芹、百合

Lily bulbs, black fungus and celery (Vegetarian)

Ok, the actual recipe from yesterday’s ‘healthy theory’. :))


As said in the previous post, stir fried Lily bulbs, black fungus (Mu’er) and celery is one of the popularly recommended ‘Yangsheng cai’ or ‘Shi liao’ (healthy-life food or ‘healing’ food) in Northern China nowadays.


Apart from the ‘healthy’ and ‘healing’ theory behind this dish, I also really like the fact that it is really simple to make, as the traditional concept of this kind of “healthy food’ normally will take ages to boil. So it is definitely my ‘healthy / heal’ food lazy solution, but in order to see the difference it helps for the body, it is good to have it on regular basis.


Here you go, the actual recipe.

Ingredients

Lily bulbs, black fungus (mu’er), (western) celery
Garlic, oil, salt, corn flour

Preparation

1）If you got dried Lily bulbs like I do, you need to soak them into the warm water for a few hours, until the ‘leaves’ are well extended and softened. If you can buy the fresh one, just get it ready into small pieces and washed, ready for cooking.

2）Soak a small handful dried black fungus (mu’er) in hot water for at least half hour, until it is soft and ‘stretched’ to full, then remove the ‘hard’ roots if there are any, and tear it into smaller pieces.

Soaking the black fungus

3）Wash and a little big “diagonal cross’ chop the celery into around 1.5cm long piece. Quickly ‘fry’ the celery pieces in the hot oil, or quickly boil them in the hot water. But make sure it is still crunchy not too soft. (I prefer to lightly fry, as it is easy to remove the 'rawness' yet keep the crunchiness).

4）Chop around 4 gloves of garlic into small pieces.

5) Mix well a teaspoon of corn flour with water.

Cooking

1) In a heated wok, pour in around 3 tablespoons of oil.

2) When the oil is very hot enough, put chopped garlic pieces in.


3) When the smell of the garlic raises up from the wok, add pre-prepared lily bulbs and celery in the wok, stir well.

4) Then add prepared black fungus (mu’er) into the wok, mix everything well together.


5) Add a bit less than 1 teaspoon salt into the wok, stir well.

6) In around 2-3 minutes, after all the tastes ‘settling’ in the wok, pour in the corn flour and water mix, for getting the taste evenly on each piece of ingredient.


7) When the sauce in the wok get thickening (or almost disappeared), remove the dish to the place ---

---- Here you go, a healthy and hopefully helpful dish is ready.


Having it with boiled rice can make you have better taste of the dish, I think. Oh, also, lately I quite like brown rice though, we are talking about healthy eating anyway, no? :))))

56. Stir fred Lily bulbs, black fungus and celery (Part 1)

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These days in Spain, I totally fell in love with the food that my in-laws prepare. For lunch, my lovely mother-in-law would make different kinds of traditional rice dish (I eat until I couldn’t move :)) -- I have been meaning to learn, but I got lost in all the ingredients she puts in, so have to try them down in my little notebook; for dinner, I am so amazed by how simple and nice the food is which my father-in-law made -- I kept on asking him what ingredients/seasonings he puts in, so I can write down in my little notebook as well, he always says only “oil, garlic and salt -- ya está” ---

--- In Chinese, we normally refer to all Western food as “Xi Can", and think ‘Xi Can’ must be made with all different ‘western ingredients / seasonings”, that’s why the taste is so different to Chinese. But after traveling to Italy, having food in the local small bars, and seeing how my in-laws cooking Spanish food --- no, ‘Xi Can’ can be simply made and still tasty.

Sorry for boasting my in-laws’ food and how lucky I am, :)) what I want to say is I begin to believe in ‘simplicity’ in cooking (where I used to think it has got to put many seasonings or cooking for long time to get the flavor out, for example, for making those ‘healthy recipes’ / ‘Yangsheng Cai’ or ‘Shiliao’-- the popular food trend in China at the moment).

A simple and healthy Chinese recipe

This recipe, is really simple and healthy --- simply stir fry the root of ‘Lily’ with black fungus and celery.

It is just a quick stir fry with garlic, the real ‘healthy part’ is the three main ingredients.

The bulb of the Lily

The bulb of the ‘Lily’ in Chinese is called “Bai He”. “Bai He’ was been recorded in Chinese medicine centuries ago. It is the part of ‘Lily’ plant that is ‘under’ the ground. In medical terms, ‘Bai he’ is rich in proteins, calcium, iron and vitamins, etc.--sorry, some terms I don’t even know how to say.:)

The bulb of the Lily can go with Chinese herbal medicines , as well as with daily food. It can be boiled with rice congee, stir fried with different vegetables, or soup… Depending how you make it, it will have different effect. Nowadays, having ‘Bai he’ is very popular among girls -- it improves the skin's texture.

The bulb of Lily is normally sold in two forms -- fresh ones and dried ones, the latter need to be soaked into water first before cooking. In England, I could not find the fresh ones, so I normally buy dried ones from Chinese supermarket, it is not very, very cheap, but not bad price, and really worth it. :))

Black fungus and celery

As for black fungus (Mu’er), its properties could boost iron intake, blood circulation, and very helpful for detox as well. (see the post black fungus - health theory)

The third main ingredient is celery. Celery in the Chinese medicine ‘bible’ ‘Bencao Gaomu’ is recorded as ‘good for stopping bleeding, help with high blood pressure, loosing weight…’. There are different types of celery depending to where it grows, for example, in China, northern celery is slight different to southern celery, and in general, the stem of Chinese celery is slimmer and juicier than the celery we normally buy from the supermarkets over here in England. Western celery was introduced to northern China around 20 years ago, (or more? I don’t remember). But in this recipe, it is western celery used in cooking the dish.

The combination of these three ingredients is very popular in warm days, when you just get a bit restless in heat, or sudden weather change, and lost taste in food. :) It can help with detoxification, clearing up the skin textural, calming down the mind. So if you have swinging mood, uneven skin surface, regular insomnia, and headache, it is said that good to have this dish. But as I mentioned in the previous post, ‘yang sheng cai’ (healthy recipe) is not medicine, it doesn’t work immediately, but benefit in a long term, so it is good to have it regularly.

And Differ to the ‘usual’ Chinese healthy recipe, this one is just simple like my father-in-law would say, ‘just oil, garlic and salt’. :)) Good for somebody like me -- lazy, but want to eat healthily. Je, je…

(Too long now, the recipe will be continuing tomorrow then. :)

7.3 Chinese dumplings: the fillings

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beef mince (or ‘meat free mince’) and celery

饺子馅－牛肉芹菜馅

Chinese dumplings

Sorry, got carried away with the good weather and beautiful sun. :))))
Keep on making dumplings. :))

Common Chinese dumpling fillings

Now is the fillings. The common  dumpling fillings in Northeast China are either beef, lamb, or prawns, seafood, which are normally combined with different vegetables. Of course there are also many vegetarian choices. Popular vegetables that go well with beef, lamb or prawns are the ‘big’ spring onions (here I just use leeks as alternative), celery, or JiuCai. The latter are called ‘garlic chives’ in English  (however, there are slight differences between the Jiu Cai and chives in mainland China. )

The dumpling filling I made last week was a mix of beef mince and celery, and this is the filling I am going to explain in more detail next (I will try to discuss some other vegetarian fillings as soon as possible. :))) Even in the recipe I am giving next, the beef mince can be replaced with ‘meat free mince’ as a vegetarian option. :))

Making chinese dumpling fillings

The basic method of making the filling is very simple: just mix the minced meat and vegetables together with the seasonings, and try to prevent the filling from getting  too much liquid from the seasonings and vegetables (otherwise it will be too difficult to fold up later).

Ingredients

Beef mince: I prefer to use lean - extra lean mince, however, it can be a bit ‘dry’ for the filling, (it is tastier when you have the first bite if the filling is ‘juicy’  from the fat of the meat and the vegetables), so I normally put more vegetables in, or when we have guests, I would mix in a bit of ‘normal’ mince, so that it contains  a bit more ‘fat’ and becomes more tasty:))). Last week, I used a pack of 454g of beef mince.

(Or meat free mince)

Celery: since at home we like to have lots of vegetables in the dumplings, I use 2/3 portion of the typical pack of celery that you can normally find in the supermarket. However, if you are a ‘meat lover’, you can put much less or even none:  simply put a bit of celery and spring onion to give the meat a slightly different flavor.

Spring onion (or leeks): actually the leeks can be used alone with beef mince, but here I just want to give the filling a bit more of flavor, so I used half of a leek. (Or you can use two spring onions.)

Ginger: I used only a few slices of ginger, it helps the flavor of beef mince. (needs to be very fine chopped though.)

Salt, cooking wine. light soy sauce, sesame oil, five (or thirteen) spices (or spiced water or flavored oil, see the end of this post)

Preparation

1) Chop the celery, leek and ginger into the smallest pieces possible - ‘mince’ everything. The best way of doing this is to slice, for instance, celery, as thin as possible diagonally, then chop again cross.

 2) Put the mince and chopped celery, leek and ginger all together into a mix bowl. 

3) Put salt (according to amount of the mince and vegetables you use), 1 table spoon of cooking wine, 1 table spoon of light soy sauce, 1 tea spoon of spicy powder (or 2 table spoon of spiced water), 1 table spoon of sesame oil, and 3-5 table spoons of oil or flavored oil.

---- Done! Ready to fold up the dumplings! :))

If you think the vegetables contain too much ‘liquid’ which can cause trouble for folding the dumplings, you can try this traditional way:  put salt into ‘minced’ vegetables, after a while, the ‘juice’ would come out from the vegetables, then use your hands to squeeze the extra liquid away. However, nowadays, it is said that the juice of the vegetables is very nutritious, so we try to keep them.:)))  If you make vegetable fillings, try to put some ‘fensi’(Chinese vermicelli) in, which can help absorb liquid.

If you are preparing the filling with ‘meat free mince’, put a bit more oil to avoid the ‘dryness’, since this type of ‘mince’ could absorb liquid.


Continue here to see how to fold the dumplings.

(Flavored oil - the oil can be made a very sophisticated way: pour the oil in the wok, when it is heated up, put anise star, cinnamon stick, sichuan pepper corn and fresh coriander into the oil. After 3 minutes or more, let the oil cool down. Remove the all seasonings, the flavored oil can be used for mixing the dumping fillings or stir frying… etc.)