Continuing our adventure in recreating restaurant dishes at home, Stephen and I have been working on stir fried Shanghai Rice Cakes with little success. It’s one of our favourite dishes at Shanghai Dim Sum and one we order all the time. I was convinced the vegetable used was a kind of pickled Chinese cabbage. After trying two different brands and variations with seasoning, the flavour just wasn’t right. Stephen thought it was a fresh vegetable but we just couldn’t figure it out. Recently, we ate at Shanghai Dim Sum again with my family and was telling my mom about our unsuccessful cooking attempts. Right away, she named the mysterious greens! But in Mandarin. Luckily my cousin was there to translate and tada, the vegetable was Shepard’s Purse and is usually sold frozen in Asian grocery stores (similar to frozen spinach). With this puzzle piece in place, the rice cakes turned out bang on.

Shanghai Rice Cakes

2017-05-12 01:53:30

Stir fried chewy rice cakes with minced pork and frozen shepherd's purse

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Prep Time

5 min

Cook Time

10 min

Total Time

15 min

Prep Time

5 min

Cook Time

10 min

Total Time

15 min

Ingredients

1. 100g of ground pork
2. 100g of frozen shepherd's purse vegetable
3. 1 cup of frozen rice cakes
4. 1 tbsp Chinese cooking wine
5. 2 tsp salt
6. 1 tsp white pepper

Instructions

1. Fill a large mixing bowl with cold water and put the frozen shepherd's purse in the bowl to defrost. Once it's full defrosted, squeeze the water out of the shepherd's purse using a paper towel or clean towel.
2. In another bowl, soak the frozen rice cakes in water for about 5 minutes to soften
3. In a separate bowl season the ground pork with the rice wine, salt and white pepper, mix thoroughly.
4. In a large pot, boil water and cook the softened rice cakes as per their packaging. When cooked, remove the rice cakes from the water (do not pout out the hot water!) and rinse under cold water. This helps them from overcooking and sticking together.
5. With the burner on high, add oil to the wok and heat until it just begins to smoke. Add the seasoned ground pork and stir fry until the browned and rendered.
6. Add the drained shepherd's purse to the wok and stir fry for another 15 seconds.
7. Quickly dip the cooked rice cakes in the pot of hot water before adding them to the wok, this will separate any rice cakes that have stuck together. Stir fry everything together for about a minute.

Notes

1. Once the rice cakes are in the wok, make sure to keep them moving or they will stick to the wok.

xiaoEats | Toronto Food Blog http://xiaoeats.com/

Season the ground pork with the cooking wine, white pepper and salt

Drain the defrosted shepherd’s purse

Cook the rice cakes

Heat wok

Stir fry the pork and shepherd’s purse

Add the cooked rice cakes and serve

One of my favourite dishes at Kinka Izakaya is their Udon Carbonara, it’s creamy, rich and the perfect example of fusion done right. Unfortunately, it’s not available at all of their locations. When Stephen and I recently stopped by the Kinka North York outpost, we were disappointed that Udon Carbonara was not on the menu.

As we walked home (after a still delicious meal), we talked about making the dish at home ourselves. After all, we had taken a cooking class in Rome and learned how to make Spaghetti Carbonara. Our instructor had also sent us incredibly detailed instructions, so why not try it with udon? The first time we tried, the egg ended up a little scrambled, but with a few tweaks on timing (ie. letting the pan cool a bit more), delish. In the recipe, Stephen and I used frozen pucks of udon, which was perfect for two bowls. If you’re using the smaller instant kind, I would use 2 packs.

We also experimented with the cured meat substitute in place of of guanciale. The recipe below uses Chinese sausage, but I also really liked Chinese cured pork belly. Otherwise, thick cut bacon will always work.

Udon Carbonara

2017-04-25 02:39:03

Serves 2

Delicious combination of Eastern and Western cuisine.

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Prep Time

10 min

Cook Time

15 min

Total Time

25 min

Prep Time

10 min

Cook Time

15 min

Total Time

25 min

Ingredients

1. 1 Chinese sausage
2. 1 pack udon noodles
3. 1 large egg
4. 1/3 cup grated Parmesan Reggiano
5. salt and pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Dice Chinese sausage into 1cm chunks.
2. Finely grate the Parmesan cheese and set aside.
3. In a large pot, boil water and cook udon as per instructions on package.
4. While the udon cooks, heat a pan on medium heat and saute the Chinese sausage until crispy.
5. In a bowl, combine the grated parmesan, egg, salt and pepper. Whisk until the mixture is smooth.
6. Once the udon is cooked, strain and add to the pan with the Chinese sausage, saute together for 1-2 minutes. Remove pan from heat.
7. Pour the egg mixture into the pan, stirring the noodles continuously, making the sure the eggs doesn't turn into scrambled eggs. Once the noodles are coated, plate immediately.
8. Top with freshly cracked black pepper, more grated Parmesan cheese and serve.

xiaoEats | Toronto Food Blog http://xiaoeats.com/

Dice Chinese sausage

Grate Parmesan cheese

Mix grated cheese, egg, salt and pepper

Saute Chinese sausage until crispy

In a separate pot, cook udon then add to the cooked Chinese sausage and saute together

Add egg mixture to cooked udon, stirring continuously

Once the noodles are coated with the egg mixture, plate immediately

Top with freshly cracked black pepper and more grated cheese before serving