Cantonese style chow mein is characterized by a bed of crispy pan fried noodles topped with a delicious brown sauce with stirfried meat and veggies—it could be seafood, beef, chicken, etc. The brown sauce is usually a base of soy sauce and oyster sauce thickened by a cornstarch slurry.

Chow mein was often a dish we ordered when we went to a Cantonese restaurant or dim sum place and got as an "add on" dish (because for us, when we went for dim sum, we ate dim sum, and any other "entree" is really just in case you aren't full, or you want to bring it home as leftovers, haha). My dad would often order the chicken chow mein for us to eat and it is a memory I often associate with whenever I see it on the menu. I love the way the pan fried noodles would crackle and crunch when you cut into them, and how tender and moist the protein always was, regardless of whether it was chicken, beef, or pork.

The reason for this is due to the marinade used for the protein and then cooking it on high heat—this is a process called 'velveting' and it locks in all the juices, making even chicken breast tender and yummy.

Since we've been craving childhood favorites lately, and because there is truly a shortage of good, authentic Asian eats where I live, I found our local mini Asian market sold chow mein in their freezer, I decided to make this restaurant favorite at home! I air fried the noodles rather than frying the noodles pan or wok of oil so it is just mildly healthier than the restaurant version! It was so crispehhhhhh 😍

The package of chow mein noodles we got had 4 servings, so we just used half and saved the other half to make again later in the week. You can always make as much as you want, but we have a small airfryer so it wouldn't have fit all of it in one go anyway, haha. Be sure to get the thin chow mein noodles--thick noodles won't crisp up the same way.

AIR FRYER BEEF CHOW MEIN
Makes 2 servings

INGREDIENTS:
Air Fryer Chow Mein
- 1/2 package Chow mein noodles
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp sesame oil
- salt* optional

Marinade for Beef
- 6 oz beef, sliced into bite sized pieces
- 2 tbsp water
- 1 tbsp cornstarch
- 1/4 tsp black pepper
- 1/2 tbsp oyster sauce
- 1/2 tsp sugar

Other
-1/2 onion
- 3 stalks of scallions
- 1 tbsp oyster sauce
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce
- 2 tsp sugar
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 2 tbsp cornstarch
- 1 cup water or low sodium chicken broth

​DIRECTIONS:
1. Marinate your sliced beef in 1 tbsp cornstarch, a sprinkling of salt, black pepper, sugar, oyster sauce, and 2 tbsp water. Mix well and let marinate for 10 minutes.

2. Boil the chow mein noodles briefly, about 1-2 minutes. Then drain and run through cold water to remove any excess starch, and get rid of as much liquid as possible in the strainer. Use paper towels to dry if needed.

3. Add the olive oil and sesame oil to the chow mein in a large mixing bowl and mix well to ensure the noodles are coated. You can add a pinch of salt and mix in as well, but optional.

4. Lay the noodles flat in your air fryer rack with a piece of parchment paper underneath the noodles. Airfry at 380°F for 10 minutes. Then flip the noodles and move the noodles around so that all the crispy edges are under and the non crispy noodles are exposed. Airfry again at 380°F for 7 minutes. At this point, check to see if it is crispy throughout, and if not, mix the noodles and make sure the non crispy noodles are exposed and airfry again, 3 minutes at a time until it reaches desired crispness. The time may differ based on how dry you were able to get your noodles.

5. While the noodles are airfrying, add a little oil to your fry pan and cook your beef until seared brown on all sides. Remove from the pan and cook your onions in the remaining oil until onions are brown and translucent.

6. Make your sauce mixture with cornstarch, water (or low sodium chicken broth), oyster sauce, light soy sauce, sugar, and black pepper. Add your beef back in, add scallions, and add the sauce mixture and mix. Cook until the sauce thickens and taste—add salt if needed, but if you use chicken broth, most likely do not need extra salt. Once the sauce is thickened to your desired consistency, shut off the heat.

7. Once airfried chow mein noodles reach the desired crispness, put onto a large plate and spoon the beef and onions sauce on top. Garnish with more scallions if desired and enjoy!

Until next time,
Jenny

This is pan fried turnip cake, or 香煎蘿蔔糕, a delicious turnip cake that is first steamed with daikon radish, Chinese sausage, shiitake mushrooms, dried shrimp and scallions that is pan fried until crispy and golden brown.

Chinese turnip cake always makes me think of busy dim sum Sundays with family and friends and is such a nostalgic dish. Like my shrimp cheung fun recipe, this was born out of a craving during the COVID19A quarantine and wanting some luo bak go and not being able to go out for dim sum!

This is such an easy recipe—it's one of those one pot recipes where you throw everything togeher and let it cook. There's only a little prep work involved where you have to shred the daikon radish and stir fry the ingredients before mixing all of it in a bowl. To steam the turnip cake, I used a 12x3 metal circle pan that fit my wok, but you can honestly use whatever you have on hand and you can separate the batches depending on the size of your pan and steamer. Steam for an hour, let cool completely and it's ready to eat! Or, my favorite way is to cut it up and pan fry with some oil for a great crispy outside and soft turnip cake inside. I typically like to cover it and leave in the fridge overnight for it to settle and then crisp it up for breakfast or dim sum brunch the next day!

​I'm so happy that we can now enjoy this dish at home and I hope you enjoy it too!

Recipe Serves 8

INGREDIENTS

• 2 daikon radish, about 10-12 inch long each, shredded
• 200 grams of rice flour
• 50 grams corn starch
• 2 cups water
• 4 Chinese sweet lap cheong (cured Chinese sausage), diced
• 4 scallions, diced
• 1/8 cup dried shrimp, finely minced
• 4 large shiitake mushrooms or 8 small shiitake mushrooms (use dried shrooms and rehydrate them before dicing)
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• 3 tsp oyster sauce
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp chicken powder (or salt)
• 1 tsp white pepper

DIRECTIONS:

1. Skin the daikon radish and shred it with a large toothed grater. If you don't have, you can use a fruit peeler to shave the radish down into strips, then roughly chop into shredded pieces.
2. Place all the shredded radish into a large pan and cook until no more excess liquid is produced and the radish is cooked through/translucent. You can taste it to make sure it is softened.
3. Heat a separate pan on medium heat and cook the diced Chinese sausage, releasing its oils. As it cooks, add the minced shrimp, shiitake mushrooms and scallions and mix thoroughly.
4. Once the meat mixture is cooked through, add it to the daikon radish. Add the oyster sauce, chicken powder, sesame oil and sugar and mix well.
5. In a large mixing bowl, add the rice flour, cornstarch and 2 cups of water. Mix well until lumps are gone. Then, add the daikon mixture into the mixing bowl and stir until well incorporated.
6. Use a large steam pan (I used a 12x3 circular pan) and pour the entire mixture into the pan. Steam on medium heat for 1 hour. After 1 hour, remove the turnip cake from the steamer and allow to cool completely.
7. Enjoy as is or slixe into desired thickness and pan fry with oil until both sides are crispy and golden.

​Enjoy!

Until next time,
Jenny

Crispy Cantonese Roast Pork "Siu Yuhk" 燒肉 (directly translated as "roast meat") is an essential part of Chinese Canto bbq cuisine. I grew up visiting Chinatown in New York every weekend with my family. For Chinese school, for groceries. We would walk past bakeries and restaurants, and many of the restaurants would feature Chinese bbq or tanks of live seafood at their storefronts. Seeing a plump soy sauce chicken, crispy roast duck, or fatty roast pork hanging in the window is always the best advertising a restaurant can have. You tell the butcher what you want by the pound, he chops it up and gives it to you with some cups of soy sauce or ginger scallion oil. Call us barbaric, but sometimes we can't even wait to get home and we start eating the meat straight out of the box with our hands!

​With the COVID19 quarantine in effect, we found ourselves craving all sorts of food that we normally get at restaurants, especially Cantonese style crispy roast pork.

I found a wonderful recipe on Pinterest from a blog called What to Cook Today and made some adjustments to the marinade to suit our tastes, but the method, time and temperature is the same. Definitely check out their food blog, there's lots of great recipes there! I can't wait to try other flavor profiles for this crispy pork recipe! You can enjoy this crispy pork with a bed of lettuce wraps, with bao buns, with rice, in sandwiches or tortillas, the list goes on!

The key to getting that crackly crispy AF skin is to make sure to pat the skin super dryyyyy before you oven it. You can honestly marinate the meat part with whatever flavor you want. We went with sweet hoisin and peppery flavors. The rest is in a salt crust that further draws out moisture to help achieve the crispy skin.

Don't worry about the salt crust making your pork too salty—once it is done baking, the loose salt forms a hard crust that comes off easily and you just have to brush off any excess before returning it to the oven to finish the roasting process.

Then it's a low broil for about 20 minutes and the pork skin begins to crackle, snap and pop!

Out comes a beautifully crackled crispy roast pork. It makes my mouth water just looking at the photos of it again. So. freaking. good. I know, I know, you've been scrolling for a while, recipe is down below!

INGREDIENTS:

• 2 lbs pork belly, skin on​
• 1 tbsp five spice powder
• 2 tbsp hoisin sauce
• 2 tbsp white pepper
• 2 tbsp black pepper
• 2 tsp cinnamon powder
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup shaoxing wine
• 2 tsp sesame oil
• 2 tsp salt
• 1 box coarse sea salt for baking

​DIRECTIONS:

1. Dry off the pork belly​ and ensure the skin portion is completely dried.
2. Mix the five spice, white pepper, black pepper, cinnamon, hoisin sauce, brown sugar, shaoxing wine, sesame oil and 2 tsp salt. Rub it on the meat portion of the pork belly, taking care not to get the skin wet. Pour the rest of the marinade into the container, rest the pork skin up and marinate overnight in the refrigerator, uncovered. The refrigerator will help draw moisture out from the skin.
3. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. In a oven safe pan, place a sheet of aluminum foil in it. Remove the pork belly from the marinade and place onto the foil, wrapping the foil up around the pork belly. Ensure about 1/2 inch of foil folds up above the pork belly skin. Make sure the foil is wrapped snugly around the sides to prevent the meat from drying out while baking in the oven.  Again, make sure the pork belly skin is dry.
4. Pour a 1/2 inch of coarse salt on top of the skin to form a salt crust.
5. Bake in the oven for 1.5 hours. After 1.5 hours, remove from the oven and carefully remove the salt crust from the top. Brush off any excess salt.
6. Put the pork back into the oven and broil on low for 15-20 minutes or until the skin is crackled to your liking.
7. Once crisp and crackled, remove from the oven and place meat onto a cutting board to cut and serve with lettuce as lettuce wraps, a side to go with rice or with noodles, whatever you like. 

Just look at that deliciousness. Don't you wish you could pull it right off the screen to sink your teeth into?! Be sure not to cover the meat because the steam and heat will make the skin soft and no longer crispy, which will result in sadness. 

I hope you enjoy this recipe! We had this with lettuce, an assortment of sauces like sweet thai chili, peanut sauce and hoisin sauce to dip, and a side of pickled cucumbers for a nice refreshing crunch. Until next time!

​- Jenny

I used dried shiitake mushrooms and re-hydrated them, saving the mushroom broth to use when cooking the japchae instead of water. I would much rather use dried shiitakes and re-hydrate them instead of using fresh shiitakes because there is a depth of flavor from the drying process that concentrates the mushroom flavor to a whole different level of umami. Like a dry-aged steak, the flavors of the aged beef are more pronounced and richer when dried than a fresh cut. Also, the mushroom broth that comes out of rehydrating is great for cooking and replacing vegetable stock in recipes. 

When I boil the noodles, I also cook the veggies at the same time, starting with the carrots. Then the garlic and mushrooms go in, and lastly the spinach. From there, the noodles are tossed in and the sauce joins the party! 

With a sprinkling of sesame seeds and fresh chopped scallions, the dish is complete and ready to eat. Enjoy as a meal by itself, or cook it as a side dish to eat with Korean bbq at home--grill up some meat, serve with fresh lettuce leaves, kimchi, potato salad..the list goes on. I am seriously missing Kbbq right now. 😞 

INGREDIENTS:

• 5 shiitake mushrooms
• 1/4 large carrot
• 1/2 medium onion
• 2 cups spinach leaves
• 1 bundle japchae sweet potato vermicelli noodles (daengmyeon)
• 1 cup shiitake mushroom broth
• 2 tsp olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 2 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 3 tbsp lite soy sauce
• 3 tbsp sugar
• 1/2 tbsp sesame oil
• sesame seeds (garnish, optional)

Protein (optional)

• 3 boneless, skinless chicken thigh or 1/4 lb flank steak, sliced

We hope you enjoy this Korean staple dish as much as we do!

After mixing the sauce, I place a dollop of it in the bottom of my serving bowl, add noodles and then add the toppings. Lastly, I garnish with sesame seeds and drizzle more chili oil and prickly ash oil on top! Honestly, it doesn't matter how you layer your ingredients, since you'll be mixing it all up to eat anyhow. To each their own!

INGREDIENTS:
​
Toppings

• 1/2 pound ground pork
• 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 1 tbsp lite soy sauce
• 1/2 tbsp oyster sauce
• 1 tbsp ground ginger
• 1 tbsp shaoxing wine or rice wine
• 2 tsp sugar
• 1 tsp white pepper
• 1 tbsp corn starch
• Chinese sweet preserved radish, minced (optional)

Other toppings

• Chinese broccoli or bok choy
• Kimchi (optional)

Dan dan noodle sauce

• 2 tbsp peanut butter or 2 tbsp sesame paste
• 1 tbsp dark soy sauce
• 1.5 tbsp lite soy sauce
• 1 tbsp shaoxing wine or rice wine
• 1 tbsp black vinegar, rice vinegar or white vinegar
• 1 tbsp sesame oil
• 1/4-1/2 cup water
• 1 tsp white pepper
• 1 tbsp spicy Chinese chili bean paste or just Chinese bean paste if you don't do spicy.
• 1 tbsp crushed red pepper
• 2 tbsp sugar
• 1 tbsp prickly ash oil
• 2 teaspoon sriracha sauce

Handmade noodles (2-3 servings)​ or store bought noodles of your preference

This is a great dish to assemble and enjoy, and I love that it can be prepared relatively quickly (unless you are making the handmade noodles, which takes a little more waiting time). For me, I always have soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine and assorted spices in stock since they are staples in our home, which makes this dish that much easier to make. Plus they are versatile and used in many other Asian dishes, so it's a win win for us! We hope you enjoy this noodle dish!