62. Stir fried dried bean curd with green pepper

Chinese stir fried bean curd

青椒炒素鸡／豆腐干

After weeks of my mother-in-law’s most delicious Spanish food, we came back to Oxford, and back our normal life. ‘What should we eat?’ Having no need to cook for such a long time, I ran out of cooking ideas. "Tofu, then." - We almost said at the same time. If one thing we really miss when we haven't had Chinese food for a while is is tofu. So we rushed to the Chinese shop, and bought a few different kinds of Tofu.

Bean curd and Suji in Northern and Southern China

This dish is something I kind of improvised, as in North East China we don’t have the exactly same kind of dried bean curd as the one we bought in the Chinese supermarket in Oxford. The bean curd we use is called Su ji in Mandarin. Cantonese-style dried bean curd is around 0.8cm thick and in the shops over here they are come in square shape.


Su ji literally means vegetarian chicken. Northern ‘Suji’ is different to Southern Suji: northern Suji normally comes as a block and its taste is a bit savory taste, whereas southern ‘suji’ is more like ‘layers of dried bean curd sheet pressed together’.





But ‘Suji’ and dried bean curd share similarities in terms of textures and taste, they are normally ready-to-eat, so whenever I am making it, I really can not help ‘stealing’ a little bit. It is ideal for making salad / liangcai, and of course can be stir fried as well. In North East China, it is normally stir fried with vegetables (such as green pepper or Chinese leaves).


Cantonese-style dried bean curd usually comes in two different flavors, one is plain, another one is with seasonings like five spices. They both are good for this dish, I only found the latter one in my shopping trip.

Dried bean curd can be a bit heavy and filling. But it is healthy, and when cooking, it does not require much oil for frying, so it is a really good dish for boasting your daily protein intake.

Although dried bean curd can only be found in some far east shops here, you can also use tofu (or braised tofu ), which is sold in many supermarkets here. They are drier and way more firmer than the fresh ones. I always think that that those kinds of tofu are not suitable for the dishes I talked about before, but for this dish, it is good.

The recipe: Chinese stir fried dried bean curd with green pepper

Anyway, here you go, the recipe.

Ingredients

Dried bean curd (or tofu sold in normally supermarkets, they are normally sealed well, and have very long expiating days ), green pepper.

Garlic, oil, salt, light soy sauce (optional, especially if you use flavored dried bean curd, you don’t have to use soy sauce).

Preparation

1）Slice the tofu into thin pieces, then cut them in half again.

2）Chop a green pepper into strips.

3）Chop around 3 gloves garlic into small pieces.

Cooking

1） In a heated wok, pour in around 2 tablespoons of oil.

2） When oil is hot enough, add the garlic pieces in.

Stir frying the garlic

3） When you can smell the garlic, add in prepared green pepper and dried bean curd (or tofu), stir everything together.

Adding the green pepper and dried bean curd

4） Add 1/2 teaspoon of salt, and probably 1 teaspoon of light soy sauce, stir well ---

------- Done!

Chinese stir fried bean curd with green pepper

Every quick and easy, no? The green pepper doesn’t need to be soft, it is probably better to keep it fresh, crunchy and juicy, the taste of green pepper will match well with dried bean curd / ‘Suji’ / tofu. Rice dishes are good to go with it.

46. Chinese stir-fried shredded potato with green pepper

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I just like this time of the day in Spain - early afternoon, everywhere is quiet, not many people in the streets, all the shops are closed for lunch, followed by siesta. After a few streets, you can see some people eating in the small bars. The view in my sight is the leaves ‘dancing’ with the romantic wind, time to time they will let the sun shine through, I have to quickly shut my eye lids for a second; and the shadow of the trees lying on the street, made a big contrast with the light reflected on the building or the windows. ... I could not even hear my own steps, or even couldn't realize self-being, all by my ears are the echos of the mild wind and warm air. ...Yes, warm, but not restless, I can almost imagine people place themselves somewhere in the house, the best location where the wind blows in through the window to cool down the still and warm air in the room, then they just nap in whichever the position they can relax themselves, later they would wake up with a bit sweat to continue the rest of the day.



… I totally lost myself in the extreme familiar warm picture -- time and location became terms that I could not explain anymore.



And you? Enjoying the summer? Summer sun, summer rain, summer atmosphere...


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Food… Yes, food. Today, I want to write about stir frying shredded potato with green pepper . It is a so common homey dish, I would never thought we could get it in any restaurant in China.

But two years ago, when we were traveling in Dalian (the "northeast Hongkong"), which is known for serving the best seafood in China, we had bad stomach and we ended up in this "Hui" ethnic group restaurant having La mian (Pull noodles) all the time. La mian are plain and easy to digest.

There I also saw the dish I am posting about today, well, almost the same -- I immediately made the order, and reminded me to cook it again.

Potato and green pepper in Chinese cuisine

I say almost the same is because in their dish, they stir-fried shredded potato, green pepper and beef mince, where we normally cook it without the meat.

The shredded potato is not supposed to be very soft or mashy, rather, juicy and crunchy. So is the green pepper. Oh, and the potato and green pepper are supposed to be shredded into very slim strips, I mean as thin as possible. In fact, in Chinese, it is called "tu dou si" and "qing jiao si", "si" literally means "thread", like silk thread, so you can imagine. And they can be stir-fried quickly in the wok. (But in these photos, I was a bit ... lazy, the strips are a bit fat).

As I mentioned in the previous post, I used new potato for most Chinese potato dishes ; as for the green pepper, I just used the normal ones I could get in supermarket. But if you can get, the peppers with thin skin, for example, Italian (green) peppers are better.

HOWEVER, if you are buying in the markets in China, have to be very careful, the peppers shaped as "Italian (green) peppers" with a "pointing" end can be very very very spicy, so probably better to ask the sellers first.


There are around three basic types of green peppers in the markets in China. One is just like normal green peppers, but with thinner skin, juicy and crunchy without any chilli taste, it is called You jiao , as oily pepper . The second type has the same shape but it is very spicy, (dry spicy), comparable to those small chillis, for people who really love hot spicy food. There is also another type "half spicy" --- spiciness mainly stayed at the inside (white) stems and seeds, if you removed the stems and seeds with care, the rest of the skin is very tasty, without any chilli taste in the mouth, but a little bit spicy smell to the nose, they are actually the best ones for this dish.


Also, since the main ingredients here are a bit plain in taste, so I used garlic and ground sichuan peppercorn to enrich the flavour --- which is a very common way of home cooking in northeast, well, but somehow, I really like the ground sichuan peppercorn with potato in stir-frying.

The recipe: Chinese stir fried potato with green pepper

This is a typical stir-fry dish with strong fire, and can be quickly done. It is very light, so probably even very good for summer stir-fry dish.

Ingredients

Potato, green peppers.

Garlic, ground sichuan peppercorn, salt, oil, cooking wine, vinegar (optional).

Preparation

1) Peel the potato, and shredded the potato and green peppers to the thin strips.

2) Chop around 3-4 garlic gloves.

Cooking

1) In a heated wok, pour in around 4 tablespoons of oil.

2) When the oil is hot, add in chopped garlic and 1/2 teaspoon of ground sichuan peppercorn.

3) When the smell of garlic and sichuan peppercorn coming out, ( :) have you got bored of me saying the same thing all the time? I am bored of myself, see my English is limited, otherwise, I could use some more fancy words to explain. Je.. je… ), put the potato strips in, stir well, and add a few drops of cooking wine.

4) After couple of minutes put chopped green pepper in, stir well.
Then add in around just a bit more than half of teaspoon of salt, and couple of drops of vinegar. (The vinegar is not for adding the sour taste to the dish, rather just help enriching the flavor a little bit). Also if you do use vegetable/mushroom/chicken stock or MSG, you can add 1/2 teaspoon at the end as well. Then


----- Done!!

If you like the potato and green pepper more soft, then you can add some water in the wok, and keep it cooking a bit longer, otherwise, it is just crunchy, still juicy, but without "rawness".

With boiled rice or bing (flat bread) or beer, they are all good combination. :)

6. Chinese recipe: Hong Lu Deng (stir fry potato, green pepper, tomato)

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红绿灯

Chinese stir fried potato, green pepper and tomato

Chinese hong lu deng

Ha, ha… If I tell you the meaning of this dish in Chinese, you are going to laugh…. :)) Hong Lv Deng literally means ‘green and red light’ (Hong as red, Lu as green, and deng as light), it normally refers to ‘traffic light’ in Chinese. I have no idea how people first came up with this name, I would guess it must have been only after traffic lights were first used in China!  :))

I cannot think of any dishes that deserve the adjective ‘home made’ more than this one. I don’t think I have ever cooked it for my friends: it is not a ‘super fancy’ dish that I can proudly present to my guests, but it is perfect for a cozy home dining table. :))

It is a very easy-to-cook dish. In fact, it is the very first Chinese dish my lovely ‘him’ learned to cook, and now he became an expert in cooking it. :))

Ok, the dish is made up with (yellowish) potato, green pepper and red tomato.

The recipe: Hong lu deng

Ingredients

Vegetables:

Potato (I use 2-3 medium size Maris Piper potato, it is easy to get the potato soft just before it goes completely mashy.)

Green pepper, one
(As I mentioned before, if you can get the ‘Italian green pepper’ with much thinner skin, it would be great.)

Tomato, two medium size--- Honestly, I am not a big fun of the tomato in the market here, it is difficult to cook in stir-fry dishes at least. I love those that are less juicy, but firmer and more ‘mashy’ inside for cooking, probably it is only because I grew up with that kind, so when I found the same ones in Spain and Italy, you cannot imagine how many of them I ate ... to a point .. I ended up with a horrible stomachache. :)) So here, I use vine tomato, I think the taste is better.

Veg oil (/soy oil), 5 (or 13) spices powder or Spiced water, sichuan pepper powder, salt, white sugar, cooking wine, vegetable essence or MSG (both optional)

Preparation

Peel and chop the potato into thin slices.
Slice the green pepper and tomato.

Stir-frying

1) Place the wok on medium to strong fire, pour in 4-6 table spoons of veg oil.

2) Put quarter tea spoon of sichuan pepper powder and couple of tea spoons of cooking wine in the oil.

 3) Put sliced potato in, mix well with pepper powder. Stir constantly until the potato is softening down. (This can be checked by the change colour of the potato or just use the cooking utensils to give a touch, see if it is soft enough.) Often potato can get dry in the wok, in this case, put a bit water in, or just spiced water.

4) Before potato gets completely soft, put sliced green pepper and tomato in.

5) Let the green pepper and tomato sit for one minute, then put quarter tea spoon of 5 spice powder in (if only you did not put spiced water in in step 3, otherwise skip this,) a bit more than half tea spoon of salt, 1 - 2 tea spoons of light soy sauce, a small pinch of white sugar (to balance the ‘sourness’ from tomato). Mix everything well.

6) Put one-third tea spoon of vegetable essence (or MSG if you like, both optional).
Leave the things in the wok for a bit, until the potato is completely soft, even a bit ‘mashie’, the green pepper is a bit soft, but still crunchy, and tomato gets really soft, juice of tomato becomes nice sauce of the dish-- now, done!

The taste of the dish is --- a bit ‘sour’ from the tomato, a bit ‘mashed’ potato soaked in tomato juice with crunchy green pepper…. Very good to go with boiled rice…. o, You know, I really like the sauce mix the boiled rice.. :))

1. Chinese recipe: Di San Xian (Three fresh vegetables)

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地三鲜

Chinese Di San Xian

Ok, this is the first recipe on this blog: a very popular 'home' recipe. :))

It is a veggie dish, in Chinese it is called ‘ Di San Xian’ , literally translated as ‘three fresh vegetable on the ground’. It is a very popular homemade dish in the North East of China. In fact, if you walk into a super posh restaurant (even in ) North East China, you may not find it.

You may only find it in small family run restaurants, it is a popular daily dish, and it is very cheap and very easy to make at home. I would say within 15-18 mins? :)

Aubergine, potato and green pepper

Di San Xian is a mix of  stir-fried aubergine, potato and green pepper. It’s called ‘fresh’ in original Chinese name  because these three vegetables used to be very seasonal, especially given the very obvious four seasons in the North East of China.

However, these vegetables here (in UK) are slightly different from the ones in China.


Starting with potato , there are lots of varieties on the supermarket shelves, but not all of them are suitable for cooking Chinese food (had lessons before :)). So now I tend to buy “Maris Piper” which will never get you wrong, but whenever I can I would prefer to use ‘New potato’ (let’s talk about it in another post). 

The aubergines we normally use in China are much more slender, sometimes I can get them from some Asia vegetable shops. If put side by side with the aubergines that are normally sold in the supermarket, a little distinctive taste can be found, not too much though. And if the aubergines are very fresh, I don’t normally peel them, just wash them properly. 

But the green pepper is way more different though, need to adapt when cooking it. I would prefer to use those green peppers with very thin skin, like those ‘Italian green peppers’ sold in the market in Spain. :) They can be cooked very quickly, almost just need to touch the heated oil, so that the original taste and the freshness of the pepper can be kept. Well ... we improvise. :)) In addition, I personally also like to put carrots in, for more varieties of nutritious and for the colourful presentation... which might make you tempted to eat, no? :))

Chinese Di San Xian Recipe

Enough talking, let’s start. :))

Ingredients

Vegetables: 2 or 3 medium size potatos , one good size aubergine , (or 3-4 slender ones), 2 small carrots , one green pepper.


oil (veg oil or soy oil) , salt, light soy sauce , rice vinegar , white sugar, cooking wine , corn flour , sichuan pepper powder and 5 (or 13) spices powder (if you don't have them, you can skip them)

Preparation

I say it is easy to cook, because it is mainly only three steps: 1) to prepare the vegetables (washing, peeling and chopping); 2) to fry the vegetables; 3) to mix the vegetables with the sauce. 
 
In details: 


1. Chop potato, aubergine, carrots in cubes (not necessary perfect cube at all :)), and green pepper in slices.
 
2. Put wok on medium fire, pour vegetable oil in, enough to cover at least 2cm of the bottom of the wok.
 
3. Put the potato cube in, fry it until the surface turns into a bit gold colour, and the middle is well cooked (not crunchy anymore). Take it out on a plate. 

4. Put the aubergine cube in, until the surface of the aubergine absorbs enough oil, and becomes soft because of the heat. Remove it to the plate with potato together.  Aubergine is known for absorbing lots of oil when cooking, otherwise it will get dry and burn. So this dish can be a bit ‘greasy’ because of the aubergine. If you want to shed some oil away , there are some tricks you can try: keep aubergines in the wok for a bit longer after it is done, but keep the fire very low, or put the aubergine in microwave for a few seconds, either way, some extra oil can come out, but not totally, as some oil kept in the aubergine can make it taste good) :). 


5. Put the carrots and green pepper in the remaining oil, light fry (but if you are using that thin skin type of green pepper, do not put it into the wok with carrots just yet). This can be very quick, so the crunchiness of the carrots and green pepper can be preserved. Then remove them to the plate with the rest of the vegetables. 

6. Clean the wok for the next step. 

-- You have done most of the ‘hard’ part, almost there now. :)))

6. In a small bowl, put a tea spoon corn flour in and mix it with water, using a spoon to stir it, until corn flour mixed well with water. Pour a small tea spoon of cooking wine, light soy sauce, one-third tea spoon of salt (maybe, depend your taste), a couple of drops of rice vinegar, and one-third tea spoon of white sugar. Stir well everything together (corn flour can quickly sink to the bottom)

Mixing the sauce

 
7. Put the wok back to the fire, this time the fire can be a bit stronger. Pour a little bit soy oil (or veg oil) in, say around 2 table spoon? :) Put a small pinch of sichuan pepper powder and 5 (or 13) spices powder into the oil (you skip the powders if you don't have it).


8. Then put all of pre-fried vegetables in, (you can put thin skin green peppers in now). Stir the vegetables well with the sichuan pepper and 5 (or 13) spices powder. Then pour the seasoning and corn flour mix in.
 

Adding in the vegetables

9. Stir everything together, when the liquid in the wok starts showing bubbles, it gets thicker, turn off the fire, remove the vegetables to a plate--- you done!!!


The surface of the vegetables is smooth, all the sauce has been soaked by the vegetables. If you think the aubergine is too soft, the carrots and green pepper just balance it out. It goes very well with plain boiled rice, but because of the ‘greasy’ from the aubergine, I normally prepare a plate of cool dish (Chinese salad?) to go it. 

It sounds like.. 9 steps, but really not that complicated, especially when you get used to cooking Chinese. :))

Let me know how it goes? :)