Spicy and Sour Shredded Potato

Back a while ago, I went to a Chinese Restaurant with some American colleagues. The restaurant serves ‘spicy and sour shredded potato’. This is a very popular dish in China, but my American colleagues said they never heard this or had before. I hope this recipe can help anybody who likes spicy dishes.

Ingredients:

potatoes, green and red cayenne peppers, white vinegar, seasoning to taste.

Methods:

1. Clean potatoes and peppers, peel potatoes then shred. Rinse with water, drain well.

2. Chop peppers into the proper size to match potatoes.

Pepper seeds are much more spicy than pepper. So you can control the spicy level some by how many pepper seeds you keep in your cooking.

3. Heat up the skillet with medium high heat, add cooking oil, then add shredded potato into skillet, stir quickly for a few second to let oil evenly coated on shredded potatoes.

4. Add white vinegar into skillet, stir quickly for a few minutes.

5. Add chopped peppers into skillet, stir until pepper get tender.

6. Add seasoning to your taste. Stir quickly. You can add a little bit water to help seasoning melt and mix quicker.

For seasoning, I normally use salt, pepper, a pinch of sugar.

7. When potato is fully cooked, it’s ready to serve.

Stir Fried Luffa with Eggs

Luffa is one of my favorites, so I plant Luffa in the garden every year. Fresh vegetables always taste better.

Ingredients:

Luffa, eggs, black fungus, seasoning.

Method:

1. Soak black fungus in water, wait until it gets tender and spread out, rinse with water, drain well.

black fungus is not necessary, I just wanted to add some color to the dish. I wanted to add something red to begin with, but I didn’t have any at home, so I decided to use black fungus.

                    

2. Boil some water in a sauce pan, add a little bit salt, vinegar and cooking oil. Keep water boiling.

3. Peel Luffa, then chop into chunk, put luffa chunk into boiling water. Bring water to boiling again, then take Luffa out, put into a strainer, rinse with cold water. Drain well.

Some people say that you don’t have to get rid of all the green, but I prefer peel all of them off, just leave the white. If Luffa is some old, you can chop the seeds off.

3. Heat up a skillet on high heat, add some cooking oil. Beat eggs well, then pour into skillet. Stir constantly to cook eggs into chunk pieces, then get them out of skillet.

4. Adjust heat to medium high heat, add more cooking oil, cook black fungus for several minutes, then add Luffa into skillet, stir constantly.

5. Add eggs back into skillet, keep stirring, add seasoning, mix well.

                   

I’d like to keep its original color when cooking light color vegetables, so I normally don’t use soybean sauce.

I used white pepper, ginger powder, garlic powder, salt and sugar.

6. Mix a little bit corn starch with cold water, pour into skillet, stir quick until juice in skillet get thicker.

7. Add several drop of sesame oil, stir well. Serve when hot.

To view this recipe in Chinese, please click here.

Stir Fried Eggplant with Potato and Onion

This dish came from my hometown which located at northeast China. It was originally cooked with bell pepper. But I don’t like bell pepper, so I swapped it with some onion.

I did modified the way to fry the eggplant. Eggplant supposed to be fried naked, but I coated then fried.

Ingredients:

eggplant, potato, onion, egg, flour, garlic, corn startch, seasoning

Method:

1. Chop everything into chunks.

2. Heat up deep fryer with enough oil to fry potato and eggplant.

3. Rinse potato with tab water, then drain well.

4. Deep fry potato until lightly brown, set aside.

5. Crack eggs, beat well, then coat eggplant with it. Sprinkle eggplant with flour, make sure all the eggplant are coated with flour.

               

6. Deep fry eggplant until lightly brown, set aside.

7. Heat up skillet (wok), add some cooking oil. Cook onion for about 5 minutes on medium heat.

               

8. Add potato and eggplant into skillet, keep stirring until well mixed.

9. Chop garlic into small pieces, sprinkle on top, mix seasoning together with some corn startch and cold water, then pour over in skillet.

For seasoning, I used salt, sugar, soybean sauce, vinegar, sesame oil.

I love to use garlic and sesame oil when cooking eggplant.

10. Keep stirring until the seasoning mixture get thick, and all the pieces are coated.

11. Serve warm.

Stir Fry Bell Pepper with Onion and Spam

 

 

My mon has problem biting regular meat, so I tried to cook processed meat instead of regular meat for her. Spam is one of the kind I use often.

Ingredients:

bell pepper, onion, spam

seasoning: garlic, corn starch, vinegar, soybean sauce, sesame oil, salt, sugar.

Methods:

1. Chop bell pepper, onion and spam into sticks.

2. Chop garlic into small pieces.

3. Mix one teaspoon corn starch with little bit cold water, add vinegar and soybean sauce into mixture.

4. Heat up skillet on medium high heat, add oil. Add bell pepper, onion and spam into skillet, stir constantly.

5. When bell pepper and onion get little tender, add garlic into skillet.

6. When you can smell garlic is cooking, pour corn starch mixture into skillet, stir quickly.

7. Add several drops of sesame oil, stir well.

 

 

Stir Fried Eggs with Sausage

This has been one of favorites for years, probably for 25 years now. I learned from a co-worker when I was still in China. I tried different kind of sausage, and I think I love them all.

Ingredients:

eggs ( I actually used 4 instead of 3 eggs since they are small), green onion, sausage, seasoning.

Methods:

1. Slice sausage into slices.

2. chop green onion into pieces.

3. Crack eggs, add whatever seasoning you like, then add green onion, beat well.

For seasoning, I used a little bit cooking wine, ginger powder and salt.

4. Heat up skillet on medium heat, add a little bit oil, cook sausage until it gets darker.

5. Pour sausage into egg mixture.

6. Adjust heat to high, add more cooking oil, wait until the temperature get high, pour egg mixture into skillet, stir a little bit at beginning. When egg mixture get firm at bottom, flip over.

7. It’s done when both sides are firm.

You can use any kind of sausage to cook this dish, I like the smoked sausage best.

 

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and Woodear

 

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and Woodear

Stir fried napa is one of my favorite dish, it’s quick and easy, and it tastes good. The change on this dish is other ingredients cooking with napa.

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and WoodearIngredients:

napa, woodear, onion, meatball, seasoning

Methods:

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and Woodear1. Soak woodears in cold water, then clean them up, tear big pieces into small pieces (about same size as napa and onion).

2. Chop napa and onion into pieces, chop meatball into half.

I prefer chop napa leaves and napa white separately. You can click the link to see details on chopping napa cabbage: How to Chop Napa Cabbage.

3. Heat up skillet, add cooking oil, saute onion on medium heat until tender.

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and Woodear4. Add meatball into skillet, saute for several minutes, then add white parts of napa and woodear.

5. Saute napa white until tender, then add napa leaves, saute until leaves get tender.

6. Add seasoning, stir well, then serve.

I normally would use more vinegar when stir fry napa.

 

Stir Fried Napa with Meatball and Woodear

 

Stir Fried Eggs with Shrimp

 

stirfryeggs002

Stir fried eggs is my most favorite among all the stir fry dishes. I can pretty much stir fry everything with eggs.

Stir Fried Eggs with ShrimpIngredients:

4 eggs, shrimps, garlic leaves, seasoning.

Methods:

Stir Fried Eggs with Shrimp1. Chop garlic leaves into small pieces.

2. Clean shrimp, drain, pat dry with paper towel.

3. Crack eggs, beat well, pour garlic leaves into it, mix with seasoning, such as salt and white pepper powder.

Stir Fried Eggs with Shrimp4. Heat up skillet, add cooking oil, saute shrimp until color change on medium high heat.

5. Pour shrimp into egg mixture, mix well.

6. Heat up skillet on high heat, add more than normal cooking oil.

Stir Fried Eggs with ShrimpStir Fried Eggs with Shrimp7. Pour egg mixture into skillet, flip until egg get firm on bottom.

8. Keep cooking until new bottom get firm. Flip more if needed until eggs are fully cooked.

9. Transfer to plate and serve.

 

Stir Fried Eggs with Shrimp

 

 

Stir Fried Luffa with Garlic

 

Stir Fried Luffa with Garlic

 

Luffa is one of my favorite kind vegetable. It’s easy and quick to cook it.

Stir Fried Luffa with GarlicIngredients:

luffa, garlic, seasoning to taste

Method:

1. Peel and chop luffa into chunk shape.

Stir Fried Luffa with Garlic2. Mince garlic.

If you don’t want to mince garlic, you can mash it first then chop it really fine.

3. Heat up skillet, add cooking oil, add garlic into skillet, cook on medium heat until you can smell cooked garlic.

4. Add luffa into skillet, cook until luffa get tender, add seasoning, stir and mix well.

5. Serve when hot.

 

Stir Fried Luffa with Garlic

 

 

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and Onion

 

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and Onion

 

I love asparagus, especially stir fried asparagus.

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and OnionIngredients:

asparagus, shrimp, onion, seasoning.

Method:

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and Onion1. Clean shrimp, make sure the black vein is removed.

2. Chop onion into chunk, and chop asparagus into short strip.

3. Heat up skillet, add cooking oil, cook onion until tender on medium high heat.

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and Onion4. Add shrimp and onion into skillet, stir until shrimp change color.

5. Add seasoning to your taste.

I don’t like heavy seasoning, so I just used salt and a pinch sugar.

6. Transfer to plate, serve when hot.

 

Stir Fried Asparagus with Shrimp and Onion

 

Stir Fried Milk with Egg White

This is a flexible dish. It can be salty, can be sweet, just up to you.

Stir Fried Milk with Egg WhiteIngredients:

1 cup milk, 4 egg white, 1 tbsp corn starch, sugar/salt to taste.

Method:

1. Beat egg white well.

Stir Fried Milk with Egg White2. Mix corn starch and milk, then mix with egg white.

3. Heat up skillet, add cooking oil.

4. Adjust heat to medium, pour milk mixture into skillet, use spatula to push slowly from bottom of skillet until milk starting get firm.

Stir Fried Milk with Egg WhiteDo not stir fry.

5. Add sugar or salt to your taste.

I like it sweet, so I used sugar.