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Monday 19 August 2013

韭菜餜 gucai guê

I have decided to make Dioziu gucai guê 潮洲韭菜餜 today.  So I went to the garden to harvest some gucai.  


Fresh gucai from the garden
Prepare the filling

Slice the gucai finely, season it with salt and ground white pepper and add a little oil.

Finely sliced gucai seasoned with salt and ground white pepper and a little oil - I use olive oil

Making the wrapper:

If you like the texture of bhi2ce5  then this recipe is for you.

For every 100 grams of zug8 bhi2 coi3 秫米粞, you use 80 ml of water and a little salt to taste.  Mix it to a dough and then you can either steam or microwave the dough until cook, kneading in between steaming or microwaving, until you get a stable dough which you can use to wrap the gucai guê.

You can mix different types of rice flours too.  If you want a firmer texture, you can use part glutinous flour and part rice flour.  If you want a bhi'ce texture - lovely and soft - one which you can stretch, then you use only glutinous rice flour.  

I am too lazy today and I microwave the dough on medium heat for 20 seconds each time and then knead.  I continue this process a number of times until I get a dough which I can manipulate and the dough does not break when I knead and handle.  I then make a long roll and cut into six equal size pieces.  For every 100 grams of flour, 80 ml of water, I can cut into six equal size pieces.




Put the equal size pieces of dough in a closed container or a plastic bag to stop the dough drying out.

Flatten each piece of dough with your hand until you get a round disc.  Place a tea spoon of filling and close the disc into a half moon.  Wrap the gucai guê and place the guê on pieces of small parchment paper and place these on a steaming basket and steam for 8 minutes and him5 for 4 minutes.

The wrapped gucai guê
Place the steaming basket on a pot of boiling water and steam for 8 minutes

Serve the gucai guê with diam zion or chilli sauce.  

Dioziu gucai guê 潮洲韭菜餜

I will make Suatao gucai guê 山頭韭菜餜 very soon. ^_~

Glossary


bhice  - cakes made from sticky rice dough an example is mochi 
diam zion 甜醬 - a sweet sauce made from mixing plum sauce and si iu
Dioziu 潮洲 - Teochew 
gucai 韭菜 - Chinese chives 
gucai guê 韭菜餜 - a steamed cake / dumpling stuffed with gucai 韭菜.
him5 [no character] - to rest the dumpling in the steamer with the heat turned off and do not open the steaming basket lid.  The residue heat / steam will the do the final cooking of the dumpling.
si iu 豉油 - light soya sauce 
Suatao 山頭 - Swatow 
zug bhi coi 秫米粞 - This is glutinous rice flour and in Mandarin is written as 糯米.



Sunday 18 August 2013

Zui2 zian1 giao2 水晶餃 Crystal Dumplings

In the family of zui2 zian1 giao2 水晶餃 - crystal dumplings - there are many examples of Chaoshan snacks [DioSua siao2 ziah8 潮汕小食], which falls under this family of dumplings.

I have already posted about DioSua Hung Guê 潮汕粉餜 - and this is an example of a zui2 zian1 giao2 水晶餃- crystal ball dumpling.

DioSua Hung Guê 潮汕粉餜
However, there are many others such as zui2 ziangiu5 水晶球 - crystal balls, which could be either savoury or sweet.  

Swatow gucai guê 山頭韭菜 is a very good example of savoury zui zian giu. In other places like Teochew 潮洲 or GigIon  揭陽  -Jieyang, they make their gucai guê with rice flour and in Swatow we do not - we use this crystal dumpling wrapper to wrap our Chinese chives - gucai.  In Teochew 潮洲 or GigIo 揭陽  they wrap their gucai guê in a half moon shape and in Swatow, we wrap it as a ball - hence a crystal ball - which is an example of zui2 ziangiu5 水晶球. Why?  This is because zui2 zian1 giao2's 水晶餃 birth place is Swatow - my home town. 

Do also notice all our local Diosua dumplings are called guê  and not giao , even they are all technically a giao . However, those dumplings made outside our Diosua 潮汕 area are called giao - for example zuigiao 水餃 which is actually jiaozi 餃子 in Mandarin.  Another example of a giao  is he giao 蝦餃 - prawn dumpling - a Cantonese dumpling which we know perhaps by the Cantonese name of haa gaau 蝦餃. However, in our DioSua 潮汕 language it is said as he giao 蝦餃

We have many other types of guê in Diosua but in this posting, I am limiting myself to just to the family of zui2 zian1 giao2 水晶餃 and specifically the recipe for the wrapper.

There are two general recipes for making zui2 zian1 giao2 水晶餃 - does not matter if it is Swatow gucai guê or hung guê or the famous dessert zui2 ziangiu5 水晶球.

The first recipe:  If you want your wrapper texture to be chewy - which we say as kiu3 kiu3  in DioSua Ue and in Mandarin is rong2 rong2 茸茸. In Taiwan, they just write it as QQ. LOL

Then you make the wrapper as follows

1 cup of potato flour
1 cup of wheat starch 澄粉
a little salt to taste [for sweet dumplings - do not add salt]
2 cups of boiling water [450 ml - if you use US measuring cup]

Pour the boiling water into the wheat starch which has the salt, and stir vigorously until the steam has stop coming out of the glue like mixture, then add the potato flour and knead into a dough.  Roll out the dough into a roll and cut into equal pieces.  [Note you need to be able to handle the boiling hot dough - and I have done it for years and I have not burnt myself.  If this is impossible for you, then get your Kenwood Chef out and use a dough hook to knead the dough.]

Do notice the proportions - 2 cups of flour, 2 cups of water. One cup of potato flour, one cup of wheat starch - and hence your cup could be any size.  

Note:  For every US cup of flour or English tea cup, you can make 12 medium size dumplings - so in the above case, you will be able to make 24 medium size dumplings as there are two cups of flour. 

Second Recipe: If you were to make the more delicate Swatow gucia guê 山頭韭菜 or zui2 ziangiu5 水晶球 then you need a softer dough which is will not give you the kiu kiu texture then you follow the recipe below.

1/3 cup of potato flour
2/3 cup of wheat starch 
a little salt 
1 cup of boiling water [225 ml]

- method same as above

You cannot make the dough in the morning and then make the dumpling in the evening.  The wrapper will break and crack just like those of second rate restaurants.  The dough needs to be used immediately.

How about steaming duration?  8 minutes is a general guide for medium size dumplings.  Then you need to him5 for 4 minutes after switching off the heat. 

What does him5 mean?  You allow the dumplings to rest in the steaming basket on top of the pot without you lifting the lid - and in Diosua Ue we call this him5.  I cannot find the character for this him5.

Like kiu3 kiu3, I have not found the character either.  I think these are local dialect words which have no Chinese characters.  Perhaps people long ago knew these characters.  Remember, we have over 47 000 characters in our Kangxi dictionary.  Perhaps we have forgotten these characters through generations of illiteracy.  Even in my biggest Chinese dictionary, there are only 10 000 characters and an educated modern Chinese only knows about 3000 characters.  

So I am sure if we were to try hard enough, we could find these characters in the Kangxi dictionary.  哈哈 A joke! I am not an expert in Chinese and how do I know?  I just read Diosua Ue dictionaries, this is all I am able to do.  哈哈

How about adding oil or lard? - I have tried adding oil and not adding oil and I found no difference in the wrapper and I have stopped adding oil.

How about brushing the dumplings with oil after steaming to make them shine?  There is no need to do this.  The dumplings will naturally shine. For those dumplings which you cannot consume, just allow them to dry out on the pieces of paper which you use to steam the dumplings, on a plate, perhaps covered.  When they become cold, they will not stick together.   

Please remember I am writing this blog to help our people in the West who have no access to Chinese recipes because we are unable to read Chinese.  However, I cannot totally not use Chinese characters.  So, for those of you who want to ask questions, please do so.  I am doing this to preserve our culture through food.  It would be very sad if future generations do not know about our food and that would be very zaogao 糟糕

Saturday 17 August 2013

DioSua Hung Guê 潮汕粉餜

I have made so many batches of Hung Guê 粉餜 in last few days in order to regain some of my lost gongfu 功夫 and it was successful today.  Please take a look at the pictures below. Beautiful round Hung Guê 粉餜


Hung Guê 粉餜

Hung Guê 粉餜

Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 second posting

I could not sleep last night because the weather was too close.  So, I got up and prepared this Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜. This cake is also known as luobogao 蘿蔔糕.


Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜

I used my old recipe and found it be very successful and I have amended the recipe in the first post on this cake in July this year.

I used 300 grams of rice flour 粘米粉, 30 grams of glutinous rice flour 糯米, and 30 grams of potato flour 太白粉.

The other ingredients were the same as the first posting.  The cake was a wonderful success.

This cake is very good for those of you who are on a gluten free diet and do not eat meat.

Here is how it looks like after it has been fried.


Tuesday 6 August 2013

O luah 蠔烙 part 2

My friend, Brenda Lim’s aunt has just told her how she cooked the O luah. 

First mix sweet potato flour with water to get good consistency similar to that of single cream.   Sweet potato flour comes in two kinds – one smooth, really fine grade flour / starch and the other for cooking – rough, like small pallets. You want to use the rough kind for it tastes better.

Pour a ladle of the sweet potato mixture / liquid onto a frying pan which has been heated up with some oil.

Then add one portion of small uncooked prawns, suitable for a person's share on top of the sweet potato mix. While the batter is being fried, add a beaten duck egg onto the frying pan.  Fry the egg batter with prawns until one side is crispy. 

Then scrape the now crispy layer to one side of the pan.  Be ready to add your sweet potato mixture dipped oysters next into the frying pan and cook the oysters. 


Then gather the crispy now cooked egg crepe from the side of the pan and cover the oysters for the final touch for that mixed O luah finish. When you get that fragrance oozing from the now mixed egg oyster crepe, take it up from the pan and serve it on a plate.  Add few leaves and fine stalks of coriander for garnish. Use fish sauce as a dipping sauce. 

Learning Teochew

I hope you are enjoying reading this blog.  I am at the moment busy with translating my Teochew dictionaries and posting this in another Teochew blog.

If you have time, please visit the "learn Teochew blog" where I translate my Teochew dictionaries into English.

If you do not read Chinese, then just try to ignore the Chinese characters.  It is not possible for me to omit Chinese characters in my postings - but I then translate them into English.  

I am writing that blog to help people to learn our dialect, and there are not much material out there to help people learn the Teochew dialect.  I hope this tiny contribution will help some people.  

Thank you. 張如意

Friday 2 August 2013

O luah 蠔烙

O luah 蠔烙 is another Teochew gluten free dish and is made from oysters - and sometimes known as oyster omelette.  My friend, Brenda Lim, from Singapore,  had o luah 蠔烙 for dinner tonight.  Her Ngou Gou 五姑 [the fifth aunt - the fifth sister of her father] made this dish for her.  Just delicious!  I am going to share the pictures from Brenda with you.  When her 五姑 Ngou Gou shares her recipe, I will publish this too. 


O luah 蠔烙

o luah 蠔烙 close up - and one can add prawns to o luah, in case you are wanting to ask

Sunday 28 July 2013

Chaoshan culture 潮汕文化

I would like to share with you another blog of mine - which is all about Chaoshan culture 潮汕文化.  I started this blog in 2007 and have not added any new posts.  I have checked and amended the two posts in this blog today and I will be writing more posts about our Teochew culture in this blog.  Please visit my Chaoshan culture blog.

Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 Steamed Radish Cake 蘿蔔糕

Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 or also known as 蘿蔔糕 is known as a carrot cake in Singapore.  It is a gluten free and meat free cake but it has dried prawns.  You can eat this when you have yum cha 飲茶 in Chinese restaurants. 

Yum cha 飲茶 is a Cantonese word which means to have dianxin 點心 in a Cantonese restaurant, eating little snacks and drinking tea.  The actual direct translation of yin cha 飲茶 is to eat light refreshments while drinking tea.  In the old days, people would pay for the tea and have these dianxin 點心 free as tea is very expensive, even today.  Do you know good Chinese tea is as expensive as gold?  

There is a joke amongst us Chinese about bad tea.  We say we are punished when we are served bad tea to drink and we also say this bad tea is restaurant grade tea.  So, when I go and have yum cha 飲茶 I often bring my own tea leaves and ask them to brew tea from my tea leaves. 

Yum cha 飲茶 - Cantonese - In Mandarin it is yin cha - in Teochew we just say ziah dê 食茶 - and a Teochew in Swatow, China who says "yum cha飲茶 like the Cantonese

Dianxin 點心 - Mandarin - In Cantonese is dimsum - in Teochew we say diamsim.  We all use the same characters 點心.




Chinese people eat Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 during Chinese New Year because they believe it will bring them lots of money - as it sounds like cai dao 財到 in Mandarin, which means "prosperity has arrived".

When the cake goes cold, you could slice it and fry it until crispy and eat it with Teochew chilli oil 潮州辣椒油.  However, I prefer eating this cake steaming hot from the steamer with diam zion 甜醬 a sweet sauce. 

Ingredients

300 grams Rice flour - In Taiwan this rice flour is known as 在來米粉 and in HK is known as 粘米粉.

30 grams glutinous rice flour + 30 grams potato flour

2 Chinese rice bowls of stock [500 ml高湯 or 清雞湯 

700 grams of roughly grated bêh cai tao 白菜頭  This white turnip / carrot / raddish is called bêh cai tao 白菜頭 in Teochew and other Chinese calls this radish 白蘿蔔.  Japanese call this daikon, meaning big root, and its Latin name is Raphanus sativus longipinnatus.

80 grams echalion shallot 紅蔥頭 finely sliced and fried.  Some people scatter  iu cang 油蔥 fried shallots on top of the cai tao guê and some people also scatter roasted peanuts on the top of the cake too.  I keep my simple and I add none of these iu cang 油蔥 or peanuts as I am going to cut the cai tao guê and fry them on both sides eat them with Teochew chilli oil 潮州辣椒油.

1 continental spring onion  [60 grams] white part only, thinly sliced. 

30 grams of dried Chinese mushrooms 香菇  hio gou– about 5 pieces, soaked overnight in cold water until soft, stem removed, diced and sautéd until fragrant

50 grams of dried prawns 蝦米 he bhi, soaked overnight or for at least 20 minutes, sautéd until fragrant

80 grams of kêng cai bhuah 芹菜末 Chinese celery / Chinese parsley, finely sliced – use only the stems and not the leaves

2 tbsp cooking oil 菜油

Salt  to taste and not too much

1 tsp of Sarawak white ground pepper 沙撈越白胡椒粉

Prepare all your ingredients to make cooking easier


You can also add lah deung 臘腸 Chinese preserved sausage, if you are into high fat preserved meat with lots of added E numbers.  I am not into eating this kind of food and I have therefore omitted this ingredient. 

I steam this Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 in whatever I have in my Westernised kitchen.  I use a 18 cm spring form baking tin, line it with parchment paper, spray with olive oil on the tin and wrap the whole baking tin in tin foil to stop water entering the Cai Tao Guê 菜頭餜 and cover the top like as if I am steaming a Christmas pudding.  I just do not have a large Chinese steamer made from aluminum, which you see in Chinese shops.  The likely hood of me buying one is also zero.  I have an induction hob and I need iron based pots to work on my hob!


A lined 18 cm spring form baking tin
The cake is steamed in my stock pot which sits on a tripod like steaming Christmas pudding
I think you should just use whatever you have in your kitchen and not go out and buy more clutter which you will only use perhaps make this cake once or twice a year. 

Method

1.  Fry the shallots until lightly brown in about 2 tbsp of cooking oil and then add the diced mushrooms and after frying  for about a minute or two, add the soaked, drained dried prawns and fry until fragrant and then add the sliced spring onion. 

2.  After a few minutes of sautéing the above, add the grated radish, the Chinese celery / parsley and the two bowls of stock and simmer slowly, add salt and pepper to taste and taste for seasoning.

3. Switch off the heat and then fold in the flour and make sure that there are no lumps of flour in the cake mixture. 


The cooked radish before the rice flour is added
4.  Pour this cake mixture into a lined tin, wrap up with aluminium foil and also cover with foil to stop water entering into the cake.  The general instruction is to steam for 50 – 60 minutes but I am steaming mine for one and a half hours.  It does not harm the cake if you over steam it.  However, it would be a disaster if I were to under cook the cake. 

The cake mixture in an 18 cm spring form tin
The cake tin is wrapped in tin foil to stop water getting into the cai tao guê

At the end of the steaming period and the cake is revealed for the first time

Tuesday 23 July 2013

Teochew fried rice vermicelli noodles 潮州炒米粉 Chaozhou Chao Mifen "Teochew ca bhi hung"

炒米粉 chao mifen or in Teochew is said as "ca bhihung" is a typical dish one finds in South-East Asia - in Malaysia, Singapore amongst the Teochew people.  I have no idea if Teochew people in Chaoshan 潮汕 actually cook this dish and I therefore did a search on Google on” 潮州炒米粉” and found lots of examples of this dish.  So Teochew people do make and eat “ca bhi hung” 炒米粉.  I therefore want to share this gluten free, meat free fried rice vermicelli with all those gluten free friends around the world. 


This pan of ca bhi hung was serve to guests for lunch today


This is not the same dish you get in London Cantonese restaurants which is written as 星洲炒米粉 – Singapore fried noodles and where you find the whole dish has been baptised with curry powder!  None of my Singaporean Chinese friends know of this very strange dish.  I think this must be an imagination of Cantonese chefs here in London thinking we are all stupid and ignorant.  

My Teochew friend from Singapore, Brenda Lim, first gave me this recipe years ago.  Brenda taught me to fry a vegetarian rice vermicelli dish and later on my first cousin, Margaret Goh, from Canada showed me how to improve the texture of this fried noodle by adding water to the wok as I fry the noodles.  

If one has acquired enough gongfu 功夫 [skill] in frying this rice vermicelli noodle, then the noodle should be very long. A Penang auntie, Li Langley, also gave me one of her secrets in making excellent “ca bhi hung” 炒米粉, and this is not to serve the rice noodles immediately after frying but allow it to rest for a short period.  And it is this resting which allows the noodles not to break when served.  I would rather die than to serve this noodle to some 鬼佬 or 鬼婆 who would take a knife and start cutting the noodles in front of me.  The Italians would love such long noodles as they can handle long pasta.  So, if you want to give your Chinese friend a great insult then just cut the blessed noodles with a knife and watch their faces!  LOL!  Apparently, cutting noodles for a Chinese is a symbol of cutting short one’s life and one should always be respectful towards other people’s culture.

One can add lots and lots of different types of vegetables and in this recipe I will be using qincai 芹菜 - a Chinese celery, carrots, Napa cabbage which is called dabaicai 大白菜 in Mandarin and others.  People like Chinese food because of the crunchy vegetables – and similarly, we have lots of vegetables in this “bhi hung” just to add crunch into the dish, according to my friend Brenda Lim.

Today's recipe will not be a vegetarian rice noodle because of one of the guests loves prawns, lots of prawns, but it will be gluten and meat free noodles.

I also found a lovely topping for this fried vermicelli – for those people who love chilli hot food – and this topping is dried Burmese balachaung, much better than fried shallots and garlic anytime! 

This recipe is written for Dr Marie Wilson, who has been like a mother to me, and who has often asked me for this recipe.

Teochew people like their food to be pale in colour and hence we do not make our noodles looking black or brown.  So if I cannot add soya sauce or oyster sauce or MSG or Maggie seasoning sauce into these noodles. So, what can one do to make the noodles tasty?  The answer lies in homemade stock.

Ingredients - 8 servings 

  1. vegetable oil for frying 菜油
  2. 400 grams of peeled prawns 蝦仁 marinated in 2 tsp potato flour, a little salt, a little soya sauce, a dash of sesame oil, a shake of Sarawak white ground pepper, one egg white in the fridge.  Prawns are added to give the “bhi hung” taste and flavour, according to my friend Brenda Lim.  If you have some spare soaked dried prawns, then do throw these in too – but remember to fry them first in a little oil to enhance its flavour.
  3. 40 grams of dried prawns, which has been soaked in hot water 
  4. 375 g dried rice vermicelli noodles soaked in cold water until soft, drained – this can be done hours ahead of time and the drained “bhi hung” stored in the fridge until required in a sealed plastic bag
  5. 1 Echalion shallot – finely sliced
  6. 1 large onion - julienne 洋蔥絲
  7. 2 medium size carrots [240 g] – julienne 紅蘿蔔絲
  8. 2 stalks European celery - julienne - this will give the dish a crunchy texture
  9. 100 grams of white part of a leek - julenne
  10. 100 grams French beans - sliced  
  11. 1 branch Chinese celery julienne qincai 芹菜絲 washed, cleaned and julienne
  12. 5 leaves of Napa cabbage julienne [200 grams] dabaicai 大白菜絲
  13. 250 grams fresh bean sprouts washed and tailed 豆芽
  14. Salt to taste to be added into the stock  – my friend Brenda Lim said do remember not to add salt into the “bhi hung” directly as it will cause some parts of the “bhi hung” to be salty whislst the rest bland and so it is better to add fish sauce or soya sauce to the stock directly.  If you do not have these, then add salt to the stock.
  15. Sarawak ground white pepper to taste to be added into the stock 沙撈越白胡椒粉
  16. 350 ml Freshly home prepared stock 上湯 – add according to need to make the rice vermicelli noodles soft 

For those who are able to eat gluten – you can add a little light soya sauce into the home made stock, if you wish – and this is optional.  For those gluten free people, you can add a tablespoon of fish sauce to the stock to give it flavour and taste.  If you do this, then please do not add any salt as the fish sauce is very salty. For those who do not eat meat, you can make your stock from dried anchovies which could be purchased from Tesco in the African section or any Chinese supermarket. As for me, I am neither adding soya sauce or fish sauce to the dish - I am just using salt and pepper - and very little pepper.  One should not even think about adding oyster sauce or else it would spoil the dish.  

Pictures of the vegetables and other ingredients


I am sure the above meets the 5 vegetables and fruits target for today!


It is a good idea to get ready all the ingredients to allow the cooking process to proceed without much problems, even for an experienced cook. 


Garnish / topping

Sesame oil – a good dash
2 large eggs – beaten and fried like an omelette and then julienne for garnishing When I am whisking the eggs prior to pan frying the omelette, a add about a tablespoon of home prepared stock, a little salt and ground white pepper to the eggs to give it some taste. 
Burmese balachaung – if you do not have this, than freshly fried shallots and garlic
1 continental spring onion [green part only sliced finely] 
Chinese celery leaves - finely sliced - you can coriander leaves if you want

Method

1.  Marinate the prawns in egg white, a little light soya sauce, potato flour, a little salt and ground white pepper and sesame oil for twenty minutes or better still over night in the fridge

2.  Soak the rice vermicelli until soft in cold water, drain and set aside.  I have soaked the "bhi hung" last night in cold tap water, drained the noodles and put in a bag and place this in the fridge overnight.

3.  Wash and peel the carrots and julienne

4.  Soak, wash and julienne the rest of the vegetables

5.  Lightly sauté the prawns in a little vegetable oil and set aside and similarly sauté the dried prawns and set aside 

6.  Then fry the sliced shallots and white part of the spring onion until fragrant and add in the julienne of carrots and onion and sauté until the carrots are soft

7.  Add the Chinese celery, Napa cabbage and bean sprouts, give a good stir and then the soften, drained rice vermicelli

8.  Slowly pour the home made stock into the wok while tossing the rice vermicelli with the rest of the vegetables.  When the rice vermicelli is cooked, add in the cooked prawns and season well

9.  Cover the wok with a cover and let the rice vermicelli rest for 10 minutes before placing it on a large serving dish and garnish with the toppings listed above.

10. Serve with Teochew chilli oil 潮州辣椒油