Stir-fried cucumbers with peanuts and black bean sauce

 Now that I don't always have other people to cater for, my daily cooking often consists of a quick and simple vegetable dish served with noodles. I had never even thought of cooking cucumbers until I had them in a Chinese restaurant with chicken but it struck me that the European aversion to doing so is quite irrational - a low-level taboo even.

Ingredients

1 cucumber
2 tbsps black bean and garlic sauce
1 tbsp minced ginger
2 tbsps vegetable oil
50 g peanuts
1 tbsp soy sauce
6 spring onions

Method

1. Cut the cucumber into thick matchsticks.
2. In a wok or large frying pan, combine the  black bean sauce and the ginger with the vegetable oil, and fry gently.
3. After a minute or so, add the peanuts, fry for another 30 seconds or so, then add the cucumber.
4. Turn up the heat and fry for another 3 minutes, add the soy sauce and chopped spring onions, cook for a further 30 seconds and serve.

Steamed spicy sour aubergine

 It's the sign of a good dish when it evolves in your kitchen over the years. I first started making a version of this as 'yu hung aubergine' about 15 years ago but since then I have simplified it and also pushed it in a spicy sour direction.

Ingredients

1 aubergine
2 tbsps vegetable oil
1 tbsp minced ginger
1 tsp chilli sauce
1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
2 tbsps light soy sauce
4 spring onions

Method

1. Cut the aubergine crosswise into 3 pieces, then cut each piece lengthwise into 6 or 8 wedges. Steam the aubergine for 8 minutes, until cooked but still firm.
2. Combine the oil, ginger and chilli sauce in a frying pan and cook gently for a couple of minutes. (I avoid adding minced ginger to hot oil as it will spit.)
3. Add the aubergine, mix well to coat in the sauce, and fry for another minute or so.
4. Add the vinegar and soy sauce, stir well and simmer for another couple of minutes.
5. Finely chop the spring onions, add to the aubergine mixture and cook for another 30 seconds or so.

I've probably eaten some version of this about once a week for the last five years, usually served with noodles for a quick lunch or supper, but sometimes as a side dish or pimped up with the addition of some firm tofu. The simplest way to vary this dish is by using a different chilli sauce. The aubergines above were made with a tablespoon of Laoganma's Crispy Chilli in Oil. It's not too hot, and includes crunchy soy beans and is flavoured with Szechuan pepper.

Szechuan fried chicken

When I go to the Wing Sing Inn in Edinburgh, I always order the spicy Szechuan chicken - little pieces of chicken, on the bone, fried with vast quantities of dried chillies and Szechuan pepper. The chillies are spicy and the Szechuan pepper provides a tingly, numbing sensation.

Tired of roast chicken, I finally decided to have a crack at making it at home. The following recipe is adapted from Fuchsia Dunlop's version of this dish. Although none of the stages is particularly difficult, it's quite involved as it requires you to dismember a chicken, chop it into small pieces (with the bone still in) then double-fry it, in batches, (You will need a cleaver to chop the chicken into small segments.) The quantity of chillies looks a bit scary, but the Chinese ones are not as spicy as their Indian cousins, and they are not meant to be eaten, just to impart flavour to the chicken pieces.


Ingredients

1 chicken (approx 1 to 1.5 kg)

marinade
30 ml Shaoxing wine
40g ginger, thickly sliced
1 tsp salt
2 spring onions, roughly chopped

frying
500 ml vegetable oil (preferably groundnut or rapeseed), plus 4 tbsps
1 tbsp Szechuan chilli bean paste
20g ginger, peeled and sliced
4 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
4 spring onion whites, sliced
100g Chinese dried chillies
25g Szechuan peppercorns
1 tbsp Shaoxing wine
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
4 spring onion greens, sliced
2 tsp sesame oil

Method

Part 1: chopping the chicken

1. Mix the marinade ingredients in a large bowl.
2. Separate the wings and legs from the body of the chicken.
3. Cut off and discard the wing tips and ends of the legs. (I use them to make stock.)
4. Separate the wings into two pieces by cutting through the middle joint, and separate the legs into thighs and drumsticks by cutting through the middle joint. With a cleaver, chop each wing piece and each leg piece crosswise into 2 cm segments.
5. Separate the breast from the back by cutting through the ribcage. Lay the breast section flat.skin side down, cut lengthwise through the breastbone to separate it into two, then chop the breast meat crosswise into 2 cm segments.
6. Lay the back flat, skin side down, and cut lengthwise through the ribs as close to the backbone as possible. Discard the backbone or set it aside to make stock. Chop the two meaty back sections into 2 cm segments.
7. Place the chicken pieces in the bowl with the marinade, mix well and leave for 15 minutes.

Part 2: frying the chicken

1. Heat the oil in a wok until it is very hot (about 190oC).  Add chicken pieces to the oil, one at a time, discarding the ginger and spring onion as you go. Don't overfill your wok - depending on the size of your wok, the size of your chicken and the size of your segments, you will probably need to fry the chicken in three batches, bringing the oil back up to its original heat before adding the next batch. Cook each batch of chicken for 3 to 4 minutes, until golden, remove from the wok and leave to drain in a wire strainer or on a wire rack.
2. When you have fried all of the chicken once, reheat the oil, fry each batch again until crispy, remove from the wok and leave to drain in a wire strainer or on a wire rack.
3. Transfer the used oil to a heatproof container, and brush the wok clean to remove any burnt pieces of chicken. Add 4 tbsps of fresh oil to the wok, and return to a medium heat. Add the chilli bean paste to the oil, stir and fry for 30 seconds, Add the ginger, garlic and spring onion whites, stir and fry for 1 minute. Add the dried chillies and the Szechuan peppercorns, stir and fry for another minute or so. Add the chicken pieces, Shaoxing wine, salt and sugar, and stir well to coat the chicken.
4. Remove from heat, drizzle the sesame oil over the chicken, sprinkle with spring onion greens, and serve.

Ma Po tofu

In my ongoing search for vegetarian dishes, I cooked this from Fuchsia Dunlop's brilliant book, Every Grain of Rice. Tofu itself is quite bland, so enjoying it is all about using it is a vehicle for other flavours, and appreciating the texture of the tofu itself.

Ingredients

500g plain tofu

4 tbsps of cooking oil

2 tbsps of chilli bean paste

1 tbsp of fermented black beans, rinsed and drained

1 tbsp of minced ginger

2 cloves of garlic, finely chopped

100 ml of vegetable stock

black pepper

2 tsps of potato flour, mixed with 2 tbsps of cold water

1/2 tsp of ground roasted Sichuan pepper

the green parts of 4 spring onions, thinly sliced on the diagonal

Method

1. Cut the tofu into 2 cm cubes, cover in very hot, slightly salted water, and leave to steep. Prepare the other ingredients. (When I'm cooking Chinese food, I tend to arrange all my dry ingredients on a plate, in their order of use.)  Remove the tofu from the water with a slotted spoon, and put it on a plate.
2. Heat your wok until it is nice and hot, add the oil, reduce heat to minimum, and add the chilli bean paste. Stir fry for about 30 seconds, add the black beans, and stir fry for a few seconds more. Add the ginger and garlic, stir for a few seconds more.
3. Add the tofu, stir gently to coat with the sauce, and add the stock and a few grinds of black pepper.
4. Bring to a boil, simmer for a few minutes, then add the flour and water mixture, and continue to simmer until the sauce thickens.
5. Transfer the tofu and sauce to a serving bowl, sprinkle the Sichuan pepper and spring onion greens over it, and serve.

Pock-marked old woman's tofu

Apparently this is what the Chinese name of this dish means. One can only admire the honesty - it makes a refreshing change from all the adjective-laden titles of restaurant dishes in the UK.

Potsticker wuntuns

I've been making wuntuns on and off for over 25 years but have only recently solved the dilemma of whether to fry, steam or boil. I like the crispiness of frying, but I also like the juiciness of steaming or boiling. Fortunately, there is a solution - potsticking!

Ingredients

500g minced pork

2 rashers of streaky bacon, finely chopped

1 tbsp dark soy sauce

1tbsp rice wine

4 spring onions, finely chopped

2 tsps minced ginger

1 tsp sesame oil

1 egg

1/2 tsp cornflour

1 packet of wuntun wrappers (32 skins)

Method

1. Mix all of the filling ingredients in a large bowl, mix well, cover, and leave to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes.
2. Take one wrapper, place a sausage-shaped portion of the mixture in the centre (about 1 teaspoon), and shape to form a mini springroll by tucking the edges in, rolling and sealing the final edge with a little water.
3. When you have shaped all the dumplings, heat a little oil in a large non-stick frying pan for which you have a lid, fill the pan with a layer of tightly packed dumplings, turm the heat to medium low, spray the dumplings generously with water, and cover.
4. After about five minutes, the dumplings should be cooked underneath and stuck together in a layer. Flip them over by inverting the pan over a plate, then slide the dumplings back into the pan, adding a little more oil if necessary, spray with a little more water, cover the pan, and continue to cook for another 2 to 3 minutes, until the dumplings are crisply underneath.
5. Transfer the cooked dumplings to a plate and serve.

What? No picture

I was sure I had taken loads of pictures of this at every stage, but weirdly enough I can't find them anywhere. 

Chinese steamed and roasted duck

We all went to a Chinese/Japanese noodle place the other day, and Carmela was very disappointed when the duck she ordered didn't come shredded and served with pancakes, so I promised to remedy this at the earliest opportunity. Yesterday we went to the Edinburgh Farmer's Market and picked up a whole duck from Gartmorn Farm. Apparently making authentic Peking duck is a complicated process, involving scalding, pumping air between skin and flesh, and air-drying over several days, among other things, so I settled for a slightly simpler (and quicker) steam-and-roast routine.

Ingredients
1 large duck (2.5 to 3 kg)

dry marinade

1 tbsp five spice powder
2 tsps demerara sugar
2 tsps salt
stuffing
peel of 1 orange, sliced
6 thick slices of fresh ginger
6 spring onions, peeled and chopped into 2cm lengths
4 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
basting sauce
50 ml rice vinegar
100 ml clear honey
100 ml dark soy sauce

Method

1. Mix the dry marinade ingredients together. Dry the duck thoroughly with paper towel, and pat the marinade all over the outside and inside of the duck. (You can do this the day before if you are feeling leisurely.)
2. Mix the stuffing ingredients and insert into the cavity of the duck.
3. Place the duck on a V-rack in a roasting tin, pour a little boiling water into the bottom of the tin, and cover the whole assemblage with tinfoil (sealing to make sure it is reasonably steamproof), Place the tin on top of the stove, on a gentle heat, and steam for 45 minutes. Check the water level from time to time, and top up if required.
4. Set the oven to 200oC.
5. Meanwhile, mix the basting sauce ingredients in a small saucepan, bring to a boil, reduce heat to minimum and simmer gently for about 10 minutes until the sauce thickens.
6. Once the duck has finished steaming, remove the foil from the top, baste generously, and transfer to the preheated oven.
7. Bake for 1 hour, basting every 20 minutes.
8. When the duck is cooked, remove from oven and allow to rest for 5 minutes. Carve and serve with Chinese pancakes, spring onions, cucumber sticks, and plum sauce.

Ducks and dogs
We also took our labrador, Ronia, to the farmer's market, where she was petted by all and sundry, and ate out royally on fried onions (at the burger stand), some bits of pork crackling (from the hog roast), a stray sausage, and a pork bone. The next day we went to Cramond, where she promptly dived into the water in pursuit of some fresh duck. She came back empty-mouthed, but I decided to give her the neck and giblets from this one as compensation.

Taiwanese beef noodle soup

I was in the butcher's today and saw what was described as "runner beef". I'm not quite sure what cut it is (should have asked) but it was cheap and looked as if it would add plenty of flavour to a soup.

When I got home, I did a bit of googling, and came up with a recipe for Taiwanese spicy beef noodle soup or niu rou mian, which I adjusted a little bit both to reflect the contents of my cupboards and in an attempt to please the delicate palates of my children.

Ingredients
vegetable oil
1 kg runner beef (or another cheap cut)
1 large leek, roughly chopped
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
1 tsp minced ginger
1 tsp red chile bean sauce
4 tbsps rice wine
1/2 tsp five spice powder
1 tsp allspice berries
1 tbsp dark soy sauce
3 tbsps light soy sauce
2 litres of water
plus
500g of broccoli, cut into bite-size pieces
250g of thick egg noodles noodles

Method

1. Heat a few tablespoons of vegetable oil in a large pot and brown the beef thoroughly.
2. Add all the remaining ingredients (except for the broccoli and noodles), bring to boil, cover and turn to minimum, and simmer gently for 2-3 hours until the meat is completely tender.
3. Set lid ajar and allow to cool, then strain the broth into a large bowl. Take out the beef and set aside. Discard the other contents of the strainer (spices, leeks, garlic, ginger etc.).
4. Return broth to pan, bring to boil, add broccoli and noodles and cook until tender.
5. Meanwhile, remove beef from bone, trimming off the fat and any gristle, and cut into thinnish slices.
6. Ladle the broth with noodles and broccoli into soup bowls, add beef slices and serve.

Three cheers for Taiwan
Apparently this is the national dish of Taiwan. To do it justice, I decided to buy the most expensive noodles in my local Chinese supermarket - a Taiwanese brand which cost somewhere between two and three times as much as the alternatives. I was not disappointed, as they were also at least two to three times as good! If you can get hold of them, these are the ones to go for:

Chinese stewed aubergine with garlic, ginger and chilli

When I go to the Wing Sing in Edinburgh, I always order the yu hung aubergine - stewed, spicy aubergine with a bit of pork mince. Usually we order far too much and end up bringing home the aubergine in a container for the next day. The last time we did this, we reheated it on the barbecue and had it in mini pitta breads, and it was great, so I thought it was time I found out how to make it for myself.


After a bit of hunting around on the web I found this recipe for eggplant in garlic sauce at about.com. The technique involves quickly boiling the aubergine before stir-frying and then stewing it. I've left the pork out (because I didn't have any in the fridge) but will post a meaty version shortly. There is a frightening amount of soy sauce in this, but be brave - it's right! The end result should be almost 'jammy'. (Thanks to Alan for pointing that out - the first time I made it, I forgot to put the cornflour in, so it was a bit too liquid.)

Ingredients
750g aubergine
2 teaspoons minced garlic
2 teaspoons minced ginger
2 teaspoons minced chilli (I use the prepared version, alternatively use very finely chopped fresh chilli)
4 spring onions, white and green parts, finely chopped
2 teaspoons of cornflour
2 tablespoons of water
1 tablespoon of vegetable oil

Sauce ingredients
50 ml dark soy sauce
50 ml light soy sauce
35 ml balsamic vinegar
35 ml Chinese rice wine or dry sherry or dry white wine
1 teaspoon sugar
150 ml chicken stock

Method

1. Boil a large saucepan of water. In the meantime, top and tail the aubergine, cut into three or four segments crosswise, then cut each segment vertically into nine wedges.
2. Put the aubergine in the saucepan of boiling water, bring back to the boil, and cook for 1 minute (timed from when the water returns to the boil). Drain the aubergine pieces, then spread out to dry a little on kitchen paper.
3. Mince the garlic and ginger and chop the spring onion. In a bowl, combine the sauce ingredients (the dark and light soy sauce, vinegar, rice wine or dry sherry, sugar and chicken stock).
4. Heat the wok with the vegetable oil until it is hot. Add the garlic, ginger, spring onion and chilli. Stir-fry for 10 seconds. Add the aubergine and the sauce ingredients, mix well, bring to a simmer, and continue cooking on a medium heat for about 10 minutes until the aubergine is tender.
5. Mix the cornflour and the water together thoroughly, and add to the wok, stirring well as you do so. Heat gently for another minute or so until the sauce thickens.

Sweet and sour sauce

My first experience of Chinese food was eating at the Loon Fung in Edinburgh in the mid-1970s. Actually, it's a fairly bog-standard British high street Chinese restaurant but at the time it seemed exciting and exotic (helped no doubt by the fact that I was only 8 years old). I like to think that my palate has become more sophisticated since then, but I have to admit that I still love sweet and sour sauce. This recipe is fairly close to a restaurant "sweet and sour" sauce. If you prefer it sweeter you can always add more sugar or reduce the vinegar a little.

Ingredients
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons ketchup
2 tablespoons dark soy sauce
1/4 teaspoon salt
125 ml pineapple juice
2 tablespoons vinegar
1 tablespoon cornflour
250 ml chicken stock

Method

1. Put all of the ingredients apart from the cornflour and the chicken stock in a small saucepan and heat gently.
2. Dissolve the cornflour thoroughly in half the chicken stock, and add to the saucepan.
3. Whisk thoroughly, and gradually add the rest of the chicken stock. Simmer gently for another 10 minutes until the cornflour is thoroughly cooked.

Image free
I didn't have a photo for this, and thought I would find something cute and fun on the internet by searching for "sauce monster". Let's just say that I was shocked and stunned and not a little amazed at what I found. So, no pics today.

Oriental pork and squid meatballs

This had its origins in a fairly disastrous attempt to follow a Rick Stein recipe for steamed, stuffed squid. I got everything ready, but then realised that I didn't have anything large enough to steam my squid in, so I decided to stew them instead. And then I discovered that I didn't have any toothpicks to sew the squid together with, but ploughed on anyway. Inevitably, the stuffing spilled out, and that gave me the idea of just cooking the stuffing as meatballs. The result was really good, and had me wondering why there aren't more mixed meat and fish dishes.



After my trial version, I started from scratch the next day, with a fresh squid. I got a bit of a surprise when I cleaned the squid, as the poor thing had obviously not even had time to digest its last meal before being hoiked out of the sea.




Ingredients
800g minced pork/beef
100g prepared squid
2 inch chunk of fresh ginger
3 cloves of garlic
4 spring onions
2 tablespoons oyster sauce
1 tablespoon dark soy sauce
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon chilli powder
4 tablespoons of breadcrumbs

1. Prepare the squid by cutting off the tentacles, removing the purple skin, and removing its insides (together with any undigested fish still inside!). Chop finely.
2. Place the squid and all the other ingredients EXCEPT the meat and breadcrumbs into a food processor and whizz until you have a paste.
3. Put the meat in a large bowl, add the paste and breadcrumbs and mix well.
4. Fry in plenty of oil until nicely browned.
5. Serve with sweet and sour sauce and coconut rice.

Gefilte squid
I felt reassured to reflect that the genesis of this dish was exactly the same process as gefilte fish has gone through. This started out as stuffed, boned carp, but now people generally dispense with the whole fish and just serve the 'stuffing' as little poached patties. I thought that "gefilte squid" would probably be a unique term on google, but was pleasantly surprised to discover that gefilte squid is the national animal of the nation of Bnai Brith, and frolics freely in that nation's many lush forests. The things you learn.

Pak choi with oyster sauce

Until I had my neither cooked nor raw insight, I was never quite sure what to do with pak choi. This is really simple, but effective. The key to it is that the green parts of the leaves should be slightly singed, while the white stems should still be crunchy and fresh, creating a nice contrast of textures and flavours. If you don't like oyster sauce, or it's against your principles, then you could use some light soy sauce and a little sesame oil instead.




Ingredients
4 small heads of pak choi
4 tablespoons of oyster sauce
vegetable oil

Method

1. Remove any tired-looking outer leaves from the pak choi, and cut any larger leaves in half lengthwise.
2. In a wok or large frying pan, heat a little vegetable oil until it starts to smoke. (As for most stir-fries, the oil is not really a cooking medium as such, just a way of stopping the ingredients from sticking.)
3. Add the pak choi and cook over a high flame for a couple of minutes.
4. Drizzle the oyster sauce over the pak choi and serve.

Chicken with cucumber in a garlic and vinegar sauce

My love affair with cooked cucumber continues. This is a really simple dish, with just a few, clear flavours. The idea of using vinegar was inspired by pickled cucumbers.



Ingredients
500g of chicken breast
4 cloves of garlic
1-inch piece of ginger
6 spring onions
1 cucumber
4 tablespoons of white wine
2 tablespoons of rice vinegar
2 tablespoons of light soy sauce
vegetable oil

Method

1. Peel and chop the garlic and ginger. Top and tail the spring onions (removing only the very ends) and cut into 1cm sections. Cut the ends off the cucumber, and cut the cucumber into 3 or 4 segments crosswise. Cut each segment lengthwise into slices - neither wafer-thin nor too thick - discarding the outside slice on each side to reduce the amount of cucumber skin. Then cut the pile of slices in half, lengthwise to give you narrow rectangles. Trim any fat off the chicken breasts, then cut into thinnish slices.
2. Heat the wine in a small saucepan to boil off the alcohol, then remove from the heat and add the vinegar and soy sauce.
3. Heat a couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil in a wok until it is smoking hot, then add the chicken and stir-fry until it is just done. (It should be cooked but still juicy - not dry.) Remove the chicken to a bowl.
4. Pour away any oil left in the wok, wipe clean then add a little fresh vegetable oil (a couple of teaspoons), and heat until smoking hot. Add the garlic and ginger, fry for a few seconds, then add the sliced cucumber and spring onions and stir-fry until the cucumber pieces are hot. (Take care not to overcook them. The cucumber should still taste crunchy and fresh.)
5. Return the chicken to the wok, together with any juices which have collected in the bowl, add the sauce ingredients and cook over a high flame for a few seconds until the sauce has heated through. Serve with noodles or rice.

Stir-fried mangetout and peppers with noodles

This is now my second cooking session with my sister Annie. Last week we made a coffee cake, and this week Annie decided to do a vegetable stir fry, which fitted in quite well with my current obsession with perfecting some of my basic Chinese techniques. Annie wanted a stir-fry with a sauce, so I made the sauce separately to stop turning the vegetables soggy, and added it at the last moment.



Ingredients
2 peppers
100g mange tout
3 cloves of garlic
1-inch piece of ginger
vegetable oil
8 tablespoons (2 fl oz) white wine
8 tablespoons (2 fl oz) vegetable stock
2 tablespoons light soy sauce
2 teaspoons of cornflour mixed with 4 teaspoons of cold water
400g fresh noodles

Method

1. Cut the peppers into strips (not too thin) and remove any seeds and white flesh.
2. Peel and chop the garlic and ginger.
3. Mix the wine, stock and soy sauce in a small pan, bring to the boil and simmer for a few minutes until the alcohol has evaporated.
4. Add the diluted cornflour and stir well until the sauce has thickened.
5. Heat a couple of tablespoons of vegetable oil in a wok until it starts to smoke, add the garlic and ginger, fry for a few seconds, then add the peppers and mange tout.
6. Stir-fry for another couple of minutes, making sure that the vegetablese are still crunchy.
7. Add the fresh noodles to the wok and continue stir-frying until the noodles are hot.
8. Pour the sauce over the vegetable and noodle mixture, and serve.

Stir-fried cucumber

Sometimes you eat something which makes you rethink really basic food categories. I've always known that the Chinese cooked cucumber, but it was only when I had some pork with cucumber and black mushrooms at the Wing Sing Inn that I realized that the description is not quite accurate. This, together with the potato salad I had, finally enabled me to understand every Chinese cookery writer's sneering comments about overcooked European vegetables. There is a whole way of cooking vegetables in Chinese cuisine which, in European terms, is really halfway between 'raw' and 'cooked'. I decided to apply my newfound insight to a cucumber, and was pretty pleased with the result.



Ingredients
1 large cucumber
6 small spring onions
3 cloves of garlic
1 tablespoon of light soy sauce
vegetable oil

Method

1. Cut the ends off the cucumber, and cut the cucumber into 3 or 4 segments crosswise.
2. Cut each segment lengthwise into slices - neither wafer-thin nor too thick - discarding the outside slice on each side to reduce the amount of cucumber skin. Then cut the pile of slices in half, lengthwise to give you narrow rectangles.
3. Peel the garlic cloves, squash with the side of a large knife,then chop.
4. Cut the spring onions into 1cm lengths, using all but the very leafiest end.
5. In a wok, heat a little vegetable oil until it is smoking, add the garlic and spring onion and fry for a few seconds before addding the cucumber slices.
6. Stir-fry until the cucumber pieces are all hot, but taking care not to overcook them. The cucumber should still taste crunchy and fresh.

Courgettes with noodles

As Joni Mitchell so rightly said, you don't know what you've got till it's gone. Fortunately, a big yellow taxi has not taken away my old (wo)man, but I am mourning my cookery books. After smugly preening myself on my independence, I realise that I want them, I need them and I may even love them. (Sorry Elvis.) Unfortunately my books are in a box somewhere in San Fernando, while I am in a kitchen in Edinburgh where my inspiration is running low. I have even got to the point of checking FedEx rates for sending 30kg boxes across Europe.



However, every cloud has a silver lining, and at least I have had time to perfect my vegetable stir-fries. I have worked out a couple of things over the summer (with the help of regular dining at the Wing Sing). Tonight and for one night only I share these gems with you my little darlings. (I did say the lack of cookery books was getting to me.) So here are my three rules of vegetable stir-fries:

1. Sometimes less is more.
2. The secret is in the chopping.
3. High flame for short time.
   

Stir-fries are often ruined by throwing together an ill-considered collection of vegetables which share just one thing in common: they were at the bottom of the fridge when you were deciding what to cook and will probably be thrown away if they don't get eaten tonight. The vegetables themselves are unlikely to achieve a harmonious combination. (Broccoli and beansprouts, anyone? Carrots and cauliflower?) And they will almost certainly take different lengths of time to cook, so unless you are careful you will have an unappetising mixture of randomly assorted overcooked and undercooked vegetables in your wok.

The other sure way of ruining a stir-fry is by not chopping the ingredients properly. There is a bit of a misconception that Chinese cooking involves chopping everything very finely. Actually, nothing could be further from the truth. Instead, the key when stir-frying is to cut the ingredients small enough that they will cook quickly over a high heat, while keeping them large enough that they still have some bite and texture left at the end. If you cut the ingredients too small they will give out too much liquid and will start to stew rather than fry.

And the third way of ruining a stir-fry is by cooking it for too long. (Unfortunately, if you've got the wrong mix of ingredients or cut them to the wrong size, then you will probably end up having to do just this to avoid having raw ingredients.) If you've got the right mix of ingredients and have cut them to the right size (and haven't overloaded your wok) then you should be able to stir-fry them in a couple of minutes.

With all this in mind, here is my recipe for a very simple stir-fry involving just one main ingredient.

Ingredients
4 medium-sized courgettes
6 spring onions
3 cloves of garlic
1 large piece of ginger
sunflower oil for frying
4 tablespoons of oyster sauce
1 tablespoon of sesame oil
300g of 'straight to wok' noodles

Method

1. Wash the courgettes and cut the ends off. Top and tail the spring onions and cut into 1/2 cm sections. Peel and finely chop the garlic and onion. Take the noodles out of their packet and separate them out a little so that they don't form a block.
2. Cut the courgettes into 3 sections (about 2 inches in length), then cut each section lengthwise into slices about the width of a pencil, and cut each slice into batons (again, the width of a pencil).
3. Heat a little vegetable oil (sunflower, peanut whatever) in the wok, and when it is hot chuck in the garlic and ginger, stir for a few seconds, and add the courgettes and the spring onion. Cook over a high flame for about two minutes, stirring and tossing the contents from the wok from time to time. (The courgettes should still be a bit crunchy. If you're worried and think they need more cooking then they probably don't!)
4. Add the noodles to the wok and continue to cook for another 20-30 seconds until the noodles have heated through.
5. Drizzle the oyster sauce and sesame oil over the contents of the wok and serve.

As they say in China: "Do not despise the snake for having no horns, for who is to say it will not become a dragon."

Barbecued Chinese trout in tinfoil parcels

Barbecued fish is great, but is not quite as robust as meat or vegetables. If you are doing whole fish like sardines or small mackerel, then a little grill holder is good, as you can cook them in this on top of the barbecue. Another good technique for fish is to marinate it and cook it in a parcel of tinfoil.



Ingredients
1 trout, gutted and cleaned
1 large chunk of fresh ginger
2 spring onions
2 teaspoons of light soy sauce
2 teaspoons of sesame oil

Method

1. Cut off the trout's head and tail, and cut it into 3 equal-sized sections. Put the trout in a bowl.
2. Mix the marinade ingredients together, then pour over the trout, cover with clingfilm and leave to marinade in the fridge for a couple of hours.
3. Wrap each piece of trout in a piece of foil and cook over the barbecue until done, turning once (at least 8 minutes and maybe more, depending on the heat of your barbecue).

Hands off my camera
One of the curses of digital cameras is that they break down the barriers between what is a toy and what is not. This means that kids feel free to grab them and take hundreds of awful, out of focus shots with them which their parents then have to spend hours deleting (usually after midnight). However, I really liked the one below and spared it from the usual cull. Well done Sammy.

Beef with artichokes, ginger and black beans

I'm really lucky to have a brilliant butcher in my market in Cadiz. His name is Antonio Grimaldi, and he sells locally reared retinto beef which is a match for anything I can buy in Scotland. The other day I bought some thinly cut steaks, and this is what I came up with. I've never seen artichokes used in this way, but I think the result is a real success - one of those dishes where all the ingredients complement each other.



Ingredients
12 oz of beef steak, cut into thin strips

for the marinade
2 teaspoons of light soy sauce
2 teaspoons of cider vinegar (or balsamic vinegar)
1 teaspoon of sesame oil
2 teaspoons of cornflour

1 tin of artichoke hearts, drained and cut into halves
2 tablespoons of cashew nuts
1/2 an onion, thinly sliced
2 teaspoons of minced ginger
2 teaspoons of minced garlic
2 teaspoons of rinsed, finely chopped black beans
vegetable oil
6 fl oz chicken stock
2 teaspoons of cornflour, dissolved in two teaspoons of water

Method

1. Place the steak in a large bowl. Combine the light soy sauce, cider vinegar, sesame oil and 2 teaspoons of cornflour, pour over the steak, mix and leave for 15 minutes or so.
2. Cook the beef strips on a hot griddle pan, then set aside on a plate. Fry the cashew nuts for 30 seconds or so on the hot griddle pan, and add to the beef. (As I explain in my beef and oyster sauce recipe, this is a great way of ensuring that you dry-cook the meat, rather than 'sweating' it in the wok. The alternative is a very large wok, or batch cooking.)
   
3. Heat some oil in a wok or large frying pan, fry the onion for a couple of minutes, add the garlic, ginger and black beans and fry for another 30 seconds or so, then add the chicken stock, bring to a simmer, add the dissolved cornflour and stir and heat until the sauce has thickened a little. Add the artichokes, stir gently to mix, and heat for another 30 seconds or so, add the beef, the cashew nuts and any juices from the plate, stir gently and heat for a few more seconds.
4. Serve with plenty of boiled rice, and a fresh green salad.
   

Black bean sauce
A lot of Chinese bottled sauces are good - oyster, hoisin etc. - although they obviously vary from brand to brand. However, I think that the black bean sauce sold in jars is almost always pretty unpleasant. They tend to be way too salty, with nasty chemical overtones and a gloopy texture. I much prefer to use whole salted black beans, which you then rinse and chop, and add to your dish much as you would ginger or garlic.

Chinese chicken and aubergine

I'm trying to expand my aubergine repertoire beyond just deep-frying them and putting them in ratatouille (which is great) or making aubergine puree. There's a brilliant Chinese restaurant in Edinburgh called the Wing Sing Inn and they do a great aubergine dish (spicy, saucy and with a bit of minced pork - although they obligingly left out the pork last time we went with a vegetarian friend, Nacho). This is nothing like the Wing Sing dish, but it's simple and very tasty.



Ingredients
1 lb of chicken breast
1 large aubergine
6 Chinese mushrooms (soaked for 30 minutes in hot water)
vegetable oil
1 teaspoon of minced garlic
1 teaspoon of minced ginger
2 tablespoons of oyster sauce
2 tablespoons of hoisin sauce
1 glass of white wine
1 teaspoon of sesame oil

Method

1. Cut the chicken breast into bite-sized chunks, cut the aubergine in half lengthwise and then cut into slices, and cut the mushrooms into 4 or 5 slices.
2. Stir-fry the chicken chunks until they are cooked. (Unless you have a very large wok, you will need to do them in two batches to ensure they fry rather than stew. I use two medium-sized non-stick frying pans.) Remove the chicken to a bowl.
3. Fry the garlic and ginger for 30 seconds or so, then add the aubergine. (Again, you may need to do it in two batches at the beginning.) You will need to use plenty of oil, as the aubergines tend to soak it up.
4. Once the aubergines are soft (but not mushy - probably about 5 minutes), add the oyster and hoisin sauces and the white wine, bring to a boil and simmer for a little, then return the chicken with its juices to the pan, cover, and simmer for a few more minutes until the flavours have blended. Drizzle with a little sesame oil just before serving.

You Tube
I'm not sure if "You Tube" is an insult anywhere else in the English-speaking world, but in Scotland a 'tube' is an idiot, not a telly. Anyway, this recipe here is based on one I found there, although I've adjusted the proportions, ingredients and cooking times quite a bit so I feel I'm more than justified in including it here.

Vegetable spring rolls

"Never work with children or animals" is an old showbiz adage, but I think it applies to cooking, too. I've never had a dog helping me cook, but sometimes when my kids get in on the act my stress levels go through the roof. I still don't know why child labour needs to be outlawed - I would have thought that any sweatshop owner with an ounce of sense would keep kids out of the workplace anyway.



The other day Gemma showed up with a packet of Thai rice paper spring roll wrappers. After a bit of searching on the internet a lot of trial and error, and a few frayed tempers, we came up with these. The quantities here make enough to produce plenty of spring rolls, and also to have leftover noodles and vegetables to serve with the rolls.

Ingredients
1 red pepper
1 large courgette
2 large carrots
3 tablespoons of oyster sauce
2 teaspoons of light soy sauce
1 teaspoon of grated ginger
1 teaspoon of finely chopped garlic
instant rice noodles, soaked in water

Method

1. Julienne the pepper and courgette, and grate the carrots.
2. In a frying pan, heat a little vegetable oil, fry the ginger and garlic for a few seconds, add the vegetables and fry until they begin to soften a little. Add the oyster and soy sauce, stir to mix and remove from the heat.
3. Remove the rice noodles from their soaking water, cut with scissors into 2-inch lengths, and mix in with the vegetables.
4. If you are using riceflour wrappers, then soak them in a bowl of warm water for about 10 seconds to soften them up. IMPORTANT: soak them one by one, and don't allow them to go to soft. They should have the texture of thin paper. If they are too stiff, they will break, but if they are too soft they will go mushy and not hold together when frying.
5. Place one wrapper on a board or plate, put some filling in the middle, and shape to form a log. Fold the wrapper over the filling, Tuck the edges of the wrapper in towards the middle, and roll tightly. If you are using wheatflour wrappers, you will need to brush the edges with a little beaten egg before rolling, in order to seal the roll. If you are using rice paper wrappers, then they will stick themselves, but you should use two wrappers for each roll. (Use one wrapper to enclose the filling, then wrap the roll in a second wrapper.)
6. Deep fry in plenty of vegetable oil.

Oyster sauce salad dressing

Every now and then, I resolve to make large quantities of salad dressing so that I won't have to produce it from scratch each time. Apart from saving a bit of time, I'm more likely to be adventurous when making a batch, so it gets me out of the bad habit of just splashing on a bit of oil and vinegar when the lettuce is already in the bowl.



The following recipe produces about 400 ml of dressing - enough to fit neatly into an empty chick pea jar. Give the jar a good shake before you use the dressing.

Ingredients
200 ml olive oil
100 ml sunflower oil
50 ml oyster sauce
2 tablespoons light soy sauce
1 tablespoon wholegrain mustard
1 tablespoon of wine vnegar
1 tablespoon of toasted sesame oil

Method
Measure all of the ingredients into a food processor, whiz until it emulsifies, then transfer to a large jar with a lid.