I have to admit that this is the only Mongolian dish that I make and other than Mongolian grill, I don’t know much about the cuisine. Eventually, I’ll cook my way through more Mongolian food, I’m sure. I like the sauce of this beef dish because it has a subtle sweetness to it that differs from other Chinese beef dishes.
Steamed spareribs is a dim sum dish, but it also makes a great meal when served with rice. It is very easy to make at home. Dim sum refers to various types of small dishes that are served with tea during the meal, yum cha (“drinking tea time”), which starts early in the morning and ends between noon and 3 pm, depending on the restaurant. (Check out the other dim sum recipes that I have posted in the Asian – Dim Sum category.)
This recipe uses Chinese fermented black beans (douchi) which have a sharp smell and a unique salty flavour that is also slightly bitter. They are used to make black bean sauce (which can be purchased in stores) that is used in some Chinese noodle dishes, chicken stir fries, bitter melon dishes, and steamed pork spareribs, to name a few.
I love eating eggs for dinner and Chinese people have several simple egg dishes that are served with rice alongside other dishes for dinner.
Picture below from top moving clockwise: tomato eggs, shrimp and garlic shoots stir fry, hot and sour soup, mongolian beef. See the Asian category for the rest of the recipes.
Udon noodles: This was my first time making any sort of pasta from scratch and it was surprisingly easy. Since Japanese udon noodles are supposed to be thick (4 – 8 mm) and chewy, no machinery was required to make this. I plan to eventually buy the pasta making attachments for my stand mixer, so one day I’ll make italian pasta from scratch too.
Udon broth: My favourite way to eat udon noodles is in Japanese broth. However, I am often disappointed with the unauthentic broth variations served at most restaurants and I don’t like using powdered soup mixes because of the MSG, excess sodium and preservatives. So I was Very excited to see an authentic dashi recipe on the Rasa Malaysia food blog provided by a Japanese guest writer. Dashi is a type of Japanese stock that is usually seafood based, using ingredients such as shaved bonito (a type of fish) flakes and kombu (kelp). Unlike chicken or beef stocks, dashi takes only minutes to make. It is a basic soup recipe to which you can add whatever ingredients you like (see variation suggestions in the recipe below).
Hoisin sauce is a very popular Chinese sauce that goes really well with chicken, pork, or beef. It is also the dipping sauce for peking duck and deep fried dough sticks wrapped in rice noodle. I use it on baked pork ribs more than anything else. Although marinating the ribs makes the meat more flavourful, the hoisin sauce has enough flavour that you really don’t have to. So this is the perfect quick and ridiculously easy meal that doesn’t require any pre-planning and only requires 2 ingredients. I make this often for guests too, because I’ve yet to meet someone who didn’t like them. If you don’t like/eat pork, hoisin baked chicken is really good too. When asked what he wanted me to make for Valentine’s Day dinner, 2011, Ed requested these hoisin ribs. 🙂
Cooking with Alison 