It is fantastic that there is so much to celebrate! By having so many cultures mix together there is basically always a good reason to make a big meal and cheer! Tonight I cooked a meal to celebrate the Chinese new year complete with miso soup, chow mein, steamed buns and cabbage stir fry(I forgot to make the almond cookies). I am learning that doing all four dishes in one post is a bit much so this will focus on the chow mein with a bit about the buns leaving miso soup as a lesson for its own post later and vegetable stir fry as a theme I am sure will come up again.
Chow Mein
Long noodles bring long life and for chow mein it is easy to find hearty long rice noodles to serve as the base. I do this recipe as a combination of vegetable stir fry with a lot of noodles and a little sauce.
1/2 onion
2 tsp diced fresh ginger
3 cloves garlic diced
1/4 purple cabbage
2 carrots
1/2 C diced shiitake (aprox 5-10 shiitake mushrooms)
1/2 C broccoli
1/2 C snow peas
2 Tbs okonomi sauce
? soy sauce (just a splash for color and some salty goodness)
? canola oil (just a splash to cook the veggies and another splash to fry noodles)
Rice noodles cook pretty quick but you want to make sure you give them some time to drain so they dont hit the hot oil too wet. I boil them in water for 5 -7 minutes, dont over do it because they will get cooked more during the frying.
I ran across the street to barrow a wok, you dont need to use a wok but it helps because the thin metal makes it so you can get a lot of high heat over a large surface area. . .perfect for pan frying a big meal.
Before we start frying the noodles we want to get the vegetable cooked, I use a large cast iron leaving the wok for the noodles and final mixing. I start with sauteing the onion and ginger in 1 or 2 Tbs of oil, tossing in the garlic a few minutes later. The carrots purple cabbage and broccoli make a really good color medley for that visual appetite stimulant. Paying attention to texture I shred the cabbage (comes naturally to it),
slice the carrots into long disks with a diagonal cut and nearly minced the broccoli to give a subtle texture. In retrospect I could have done more cabbage. Starting with these three is because they have similar cook times. I keep the heat on medium high to get everything browning nicely, around 5 minutes, before I toss in the snow peas and the shiitakes which both just need 3-4 minutes of heat.
Now with a Tbs or two of oil get the wok nice and hot, you should notice that just after a minute or two the pan is hot enough to hit the smoke point of canola oil. Throw the cooked noodles right into that high heat and keep them stirring so they dont stick to the wok. ( i let my noodles sit too long after draining and they stuck together so in addition to making ti hard to stir i used a bit of extra oil to try and break them up without mashing them just continually tossing the big chunk of noodles with a bit of oil and heat until it falls apart naturally). I like ti when the noodles burn a bit so I didnt stir as much as I should have but after a few minutes I toss in the mass of vegetables and keep stirring.
I was about to make a teriyaki sauce from scratch when my cook partner handed me okonomi sauce to try. I loved the stuff and threw in a few Tbs with a splash of soy sauce (not too much, we want to keep the water level down). After another minute I took the dish off the heat and plated it .
If you are paying attention I mention a few times about keeping moisture and water out of the frying process. This is because the delicious part of frying is when the heat goes beyond steaming (getting rid of extra water) and starts browning. By keeping the moisture level of the noodles down the browning happens sooner. The okonomi and the soy sauce add a bit to color and flavor but only add them at the end after you are satisfied with the combination of vegetables and noodles.
Steamed Buns
we made both bbq tofu buns (savory) and red bean paste buns (sweet) and I was not entirely thrilled with the way the red bean buns came out but everyone else raved, I wanted a creamier texture.
bun dough (a regular bread mix with 9 C flour)
3 C dry azuki beans (also called red beans)
1 C sugar
3 blocks firm tofu (about 3 C diced)
1 Tbs sesame seeds
? Barbecue sauce ( i am guessing 1 C but I lost track)
My cook partner made the dough last night and started the beans soaking so when ti came time to cook it was pretty straight forward, but I am always amazed at how baffled people are by making stuffed buns.
boil the hell out of the red beans, just like making re-fried beans last week, except I didnt know the correct cook time so I boiled the beans in a pot where I could check on them every 10 minutes or so (too much steam to get a decent picture, my apologies). While that is going on I shifted to the tofu.
I went looking for a recipe for BBQ suace from scratch but they all started with a ketsup base so I jsut bought a BBQ sauce and used that as my base. I added extra garlic, vegan worcestershire sauce, black pepper, cayenne, and salt until i got a taste that i really liked.
Press the tofu no seriously, press the tofu. it can be as easy as stacking a few cutting boards on it and letting the blocks sit for 30 minuted but driving off the water makes it so the tofu is more likely to absorb flavor.
I simmered the diced tofu in the barbecue sauce with the sesame seeds for 5 or 10 min on low heat, just until the sauce thickened up a bit and the tofu picked up the flavor.
To finish off the azuki paste pour off all the water and use a hand masker and smash in a cup of sugar. For no good reason I mixed in a pinch of ginger (I didnt even notice a change in the taste but I wanted to try it, better practice is to take a portion aside and play with flavors in a small helping not just going crazy on the bulk of food, but hey i am still in a weird mood) . The flavor was awesome but the texture was not how it is when I get dim sum in SF so I will have to try again, maybe some oil, maybe heating the mixture with the sugar so it becomes more like a sauce . . .not sure but half the fun of cooking is playing! ok 3/4 of the fun ;)
Filling the buns is as simple as taking a piece of dough (about 2 Tbs sized) and hand pressing it like a little piece of flat bread. Put a small spoon full of either filling in the middle and then pull the edges up into a single point using a pinch and a twist to force the dough together. Tonight we used a straight bread recipe for the dough but often the buns are made with a sweet bread recipe, some people like sugar more than I do.
Ok truth time. . . we didnt steam the buns. Turns out our house is without steaming baskets (something I plan on fixing next time I go to the restaurant supply store) and our make-shift steamer set up let too much water condense on the buns. Again water gets in the way! wet buns are not happy fluffy buns, they get a bit soggy. We shifted to baking the buns which has a noticeable impact on the texture, compared to steaming, but was still amazing and delicious. The buns baked at 375 for about 12 minutes in a muffin pan and were served hot.
I'll do another exploration of steamed buns soon but for now eat well!
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