Chicken and Green Bean Stir-Fry

[project]

Did a stir-fry with chicken and string beans with a sauce of garlic, ginger, crushed red pepper, soy sauce, vinegar, dry sherry, and sugar.

Flavor is not very interesting and seek critique of what I did and ideas for improvements.

For the chicken started with 6 pieces of skinless boneless chicken breast meat (from three chickens) and defrosted and marinated by placing in a Ziploc bag with a brine of 1/4 C table salt and 1 quart water.

For the beans, used a 16 ounce net weight package of Hanover Gold Line frozen green beans. Defrosted, cut longer beans in half, rinsed, and drained.

For spice, used 2 T of each of minced garlic, minced ginger, and crushed red pepper flakes.

For the sauce used 1/3 C Pearl River Bridge Dark Soy Sauce, 1/3 C Chinese Rice Vinegar, 1/3 C dry sherry, 1/3 C sugar, and water to make 2 C.

For corn starch for the sauce, took 1/3 C of the sauce mixture and combined it with 1/4 C corn starch to make a slurry.

For the chicken, when defrosted, after about 2 hours in the brine, drained, cubed, and drained.

For the cooking, in a Chinese steel wok over a high propane flame, with about 3/4 C Canola oil, at high temperature, in four batches, quickly stir fried chicken pieces, not enough to brown the pieces. Drained cooked pieces.

Leaving about 2 T of oil in the wok, added the garlic, ginger, and pepper, heated (aroma very strong), added sauce mixture, boiled, added green beans, boiled, added chicken pieces, boiled, added corn starch slurry, boiled, dumped into a 2 quart casserole dish. Got about 1 1/2 quarts of finished product.

Ate with steamed white rice.

The sugar and ginger together left a curious candy on the end of the cooking spoon used in the stir fry.

Sauce was quite dark. Flavor was not too salty, but such a dark sauce seems like overkill.

Sauce was quite thick, gave the solids a thick glossy coating, and left little liquid sauce.

With the 16 ounces of beans, could use more meat, maybe 8 pieces of chicken instead of 6.

Flavor edible but not interesting.

[JAZ]

Try using chicken thigh meat instead of breast. It has more fat, so it'll stay moist even without brining and will have much more flavor than the breast meat.

It also sounds like you used about three times the cornstarch I would have -- I use about a tablespoon in a quarter cup water, and thicken the sauce only at the very end. That way, I can control the consistency better.

[Jason Perlow]

add some oyster sauce to it or black bean paste. Five spice powder is also handy for zinging things up.

[hwilson41]

Try using chicken thigh meat instead of breast. It has more fat, so it'll stay moist even without brining and will have much more flavor than the breast meat.

I'll second that suggestion. Chicken breast (to me) is grossly over rated, and the dark meat has more moisture (from fat) and way more flavor. And just ignore the cries of outrage from the dry white meat lovers .

THW

[JAZ]

A couple more suggestions:

Add some sliced green onions or slivers of white onion at the start, along with the aromatics. Also add a couple pieces of ginger to start (remove later -- or you can grate it and leave it in the sauce).

[Singapore]

Project:

Try marinating the chicken in your sauce.

Drain very well, set the marinade aside.

Stir fry the chicken, remove and drain.

Pour in your oil, and add the ginger, garlic, and pepper. Might want to sub sliced shallots for garlic as well, or add them in.

Swirl the oil around the wok, letting flavored oil coat evenly

Add in your green beans, and stir fry until color turns bright green. Add in your chicken and toss with the green beans for around 20-30 seconds, until evenly mixed. Remove from wok and drain.

Pour your marinade back in. Work the cornstarch slurry in until it just starts to thicken. Season with white pepper and a bit of salt if needed.

Add your chicken and green beans back in the wok, and toss until evenly coated. Serve over a bed of white rice.

I've never really liked dry red peppers in wok cooking. Doesn't feel like you have enough time to get it wet enough to impart the heat and flavor. Try Vietnamese chili paste instead. It's available in almost every Asian market I've ever seen. It comes in a clear jar, usually with a green lid. Nice flavor, and good heat. Start with a 1/4 teaspoon and see if you like it. BTW you add the chili paste where you added the red pepper, straight into the hot oil.

Welcome to the world of the Chinese Chop Suey Cook!

PS

Lighten up on the sugar in the marinade. One teaspoon instead. And add 2 tsp salt.

Edited March 27, 2004 by Singapore (log)

[Jason Perlow]

A couple more suggestions:

Add some sliced green onions or slivers of white onion at the start, along with the aromatics. Also add a couple pieces of ginger to start (remove later -- or you can grate it and leave it in the sauce).

Yes, green onions go a LONG way. Chives are also a good oniony thing to throw in as well, as are leeks.

[chengb02]

I wanted to add my thoughts, but most of the other people have hit home my main points. First, that is a bit heavy on the corn starch. Also, if you want a lighter sauce, just use a different soy sauce. Finally, the savior of any Chinese dish is green onion and/or oyster sauce. If you are looking to add flavor, add one or the other or both!

[jo-mel]

You went to a lot of work and thoughtful planning for this dish , but the one thing that jumped out at me was the frozen green beans. I have nothing against frozen beans, but the texture of the fresh is just not there, aside from the fact that Chinese wouldn't use frozen.

I agree with the dark meat preference, but whenever I use the breast in a stir/fry, I use the 'velveting' process (oil poaching) where the chicken is placed in its own marinade: an egg white / 1T. cornstarch / 1T. sherry or Shaoxing wine / 1 T. oil / and some salt to a pound of chcken meat. Let it marinate a while, then scatter the piece of chicken into a couple of cups of oil heated to 275 - 300' (no higher) Stir them around to let the oil touch all surfaces, and when the chcken is white -- about 30 to 46 seconds, remove the chicken and drain. The chicken is not fully cooked, but will finish cooking when the sauce is added and heated. The result is tender moist 'velvety' chicken ----no need for any brine.

Your ratio of sugar to vinegar is fine, if you looking for a sweet/sour dish? Were you?

Too much dark soy, IMMHO. I would use light soy, and if you want a little darker color, make it 3 to 1, light to dark.

JAZ mentioned too much cornstarch, and you said there was too little liquid sauce. If you want more sauce, simply add some chicken broth to the sauce mix. It will thin it out, spread out the cornstarch, and there will be sauce for your rice.

Since it seems to be a sweet dish, you could probaby add a dimension with some hoisin sauce.

On the red pepper -- I have a fondness for Chili Paste with Garlic. Always adds the zing I want.

[Ben Hong]

This is not a critcism, but I find that your procedure is way too complicated by far.

Here's a method that restaurant cooks use when they're inundated with orders:

Slice meat and prep. veggies

Marinate your sliced meat in a bowl with whatever you choose as flavouring (please use a light hand with the flavours), eg; garlic, soy sauce, salt, sugar, etc. Plus a scant tsp. of cornstarch to bind. Shouldn't be any liquid standing.

Heat a large pot of water to a boil.

Heat wok to smoking. Add oil to wok and swirl, dump green beans into boiling water to blanch, dump meat into wok, chow a few strokes. When water comes back to a boil, spider scoop the beans into wok with the meat, chow, adjust flavour with maybe a shot of oyster sauce. At this point, there may be enough cornstarch in the marinade to thicken, if not make a slurry with 1 tsp. cornstarch and ad drop by drop, stirring the while until the proper sauce is attained. If the contents are too dry add a couple tbsps. of hot water from the pot or chicken broth if that's you preference. Add green onions to flavour, a few drops of sesame oil for "shine", serve.

Total cooking time 3-5 minutes, depending on wok heat.

I don't recommend blanching for tender leafy greens, only for firm vegs. like peppers, green beans, bamboo shoots, asparagus, etc.

[Ben Hong]

Supplementary post. Jo-Mel is right about frozen vegs. Please take the extra minute and prepare fresh veggies. Except in very, very rare cases "Chinese" cooking using frozen veggies is not Chinese cooking.

We would use or eat something else if we didn't have fesh stuff, show me the CRUNCH!

[Richard Kilgore]

I'll agree with most of the above, with emphasis on fresh green beans and other produce used. You also may be using too much oil, but I may not be picturing your procedure correctly. About 1T of oil in a very hot wok should be fine to start. One approach is to then add a clove of garlic and stir it, spreading the oil up the side of the work, remove clove and then proceed. Also you might try using peanut oil, which will add a little flavor since it is not as neutral as canola.

[Ben Hong]

Re-reading the original thread starter message, I am again puzzled as to why everyone thinks that just because a meal is cooked in a wok, you can call it a stir fry. For quantities mentioned ,ie; the breast meat of 3 chickens (est.32 oz.) and 16 ounces of beans plus liquids and flavourings, those quantities would be much better served stewed in a pot. It should not, in the strictest sense, be called stirfrying or "chowing", which is the Chinese term.

Just to soften the perception that I am a crotchety old curmudgeon, let me list a few guidelines for the neophyte cook, in a domestic setting with domestic sized utensils and appliances. Understand that I am speaking strictly of stir frying, not moist cooking, stewing, or large quantity cooking.

---when stir frying, any deep saute pan, pot or wok will do

---very high or extremely high sustained heat is a prerequisite ( for speed)

---the requirement for extremely high heat precludes the use of non stick pans,

over the long run

---flat bottomed woks or saute pans are better suited to an electric burner.

---unless it's a meat based dish, such as scallion beef and ginger, the ratio

of meat to veg. should be 1/4 by volume, such as chicken and green beans.

---no stirfried dish in a domestic sized wok or saute pan, should amount to more than dishful, about a pound total weight, a smaller portion is much better.

---all seasonings should be used sparingly and harmoniously.

---the hot wok is oiled only with enough oil to prevent food from sticking

---liquids should be kept to an absolute minimum

---above all, strive for that elusive, ephemeral essence called "WOK HEI".

[project]

Many thanks for the critique and ideas!

JAZ:

Thanks!

I agree that thigh meat should be better. For a small point, a 10 pound bag of frozen skinless boneless chicken breast meat is convenient. For a larger point for me, I don't know how to work with thigh meat: When I take apart a chicken, either raw or poached, for the thigh and drumstick meat, all I get are irregular torn scraps. When I get Chinese carry-out with chicken, I get chunks of meat that came from I don't know where on a real chicken! I get the impression that some of the meat has been pounded.

You are right about the corn starch ratio: For my 2 C of sauce, sounds like I should cut back to 1-2 T of corn starch. And, I should constrain my compulsion to have reproducible measurements for everything and, instead, at least for the corn starch, make a slurry and dribble in by teaspoons at the end only until I get an appropriate thickness.

Thanks for suggesting the onion family. Sounds like I should include maybe 4 T of minced onion along with the 2 T of each of minced garlic, minced ginger, and red pepper flakes (chili sauce, etc.). Scallions are one of my favorites, but I resist buying them because they do not keep well. I like fresh chives, too, but see them only occasionally. I do have some nice shallots and yellow globe onions, and they should be a start.

Jason:

Thanks!

The flavors I have are really uninteresting; with just my flavors, a Chinese carry-out would go out of business in a week! While I have included a sampling of the usual suspects, somewhere I'm missing a lot, in ingredients, technique, or both.

For bottled sauces to try, have

• Sambal Oelek Ground Fresh Chili Paste
  
• Lee Kum Kee Black Bean Garlic Sauce
  
• Koon Chun Bean Sauce
  
• Lee Kum Kee Hoisin Sauce
  
• Hop Sing Lung Oyster Flavored Sauce
  
• Lee Kum Kee Premium Oyster Flavored Sauce
  

Sounds like I need to try these -- one or two at a time.

And thanks for suggesting the onion family.

Singapore:

Thanks for the suggestions!

You also agree I should get some onion in there. Okay.

It would be plenty easy for me to marinate the chicken in the sauce. I'll do that for the next trial.

You are suggesting that I stir fry the green beans. I wondered about that.

With my technique, I cook the aromatics, add the sauce, boil, add the green beans, and boil. So, I am 'poaching' the green beans but in the sauce. So, maybe the green beans are giving up some liquids with flavors that are hurting the flavor of my dish, and maybe stir frying the green beans causes these liquids to evaporate and/or cook on the wok surface and, thus, get better flavors.

Also your sauce technique is different: You get the solids all stir-fried and hot together in the wok and then remove them all, make and thicken the sauce, and then add the solids back to the wok. I've seen this done by Chinese carry-out cooks.

My concern has been that at times I got a 'broken' sauce where manipulations after the corn starch had thickened caused the corn starch to 'break' and leave the sauce thin again. My only solution was to add the corn starch slurry as the very last step, add it to the combination of hot solids and liquids. I got this suggestion here on eG, and so far it's worked. Still, I don't understand when corn starch thickened sauces break and when they don't.

I have noticed that your technique can yield a more interesting final dish: Some of the solids remain uncoated and more distinct. E.g., in some dishes with chunks of meat heavily breaded and nicely fried to distinct nicely browned chunks with some nice vegetable chunks, say, broccoli florets, can put the sauce in the bottom of a casserole dish, put the chunks of meat in a mound in the center, and arrange the vegetables around the boundary. Then, the sauce is there but the chunks of meat and broccoli are not coated (hidden, masked, overwhelmed).

Such nice things are some grade levels above my skills: I'm still in the grade trying to get the flavors up from the boring category.

Thanks for the suggestion of Vietnamese chili paste. The Sambal Oelek Ground Fresh Chili Paste is from California but may be similar, may be by Vietnamese in CA.

For "Lighten up on the sugar in the marinade. One teaspoon instead. And add 2 tsp salt." Thanks. Since I have brined the chicken and am using soy sauce, I'm reluctant to add more salt. But, for the sugar, having that in the marinade would tend to dry the meat. So, if I'm going to include sugar in the sauce, likely should delay that until the meat is out of the marinade. Thanks -- I would have missed that.

"Welcome to the world of the Chinese Chop Suey Cook!" Yes, I'm a long way from being able to get flavors as good as in any successful Chinese carry-out. In my area of New York State, 70 miles north of Wall Street, there are more Chinese carry-outs than McDonald's, Wendy's, and Burger King places combined, and with my stack of books on Chinese cooking and dozens of trials I have only a few times done as well as they do. My improvised dumpling dipping sauce is passable, and otherwise the only candidate for a competitive trial was when I did Moo Shi Pork 20 years ago from:

Joyce Chen, 'Joyce Chen Cook Book', J. B. Lippincott, Philadelphia, 1962.

No kidding: I don't understand how to get good flavors in Chinese dishes.

chengb02:

Yes, you are correct on the corn starch. For my next trial, with 8 pieces of chicken instead of 6, for the sauce I may add water to make 3 C instead of just 2 C and then add corn starch slurry just as needed and then estimate the amount to use with a measurement the next time.

Also, with so much water, maybe I should include some light chicken stock. I have some reduced and frozen I made in the French style with onions, carrots, celery, leeks, etc. I'm definitely a 'Western' person: I've frequently had decent successes with French cooking, and my Chinese efforts have rarely been better than poor.

Thanks for the soy sauce suggestion: Just as a soy sauce, I do like the flavor of the soy sauce I used. I guess my surprise was that 1/3 C of that soy sauce in 2 C of sauce with 1 1/2 quarts of the final dish was too much soy sauce. Including 1 C of extra water or stock should help the situation. Else maybe I should cut back to 1/4 C and then keep cutting back 1 T at a time. Maybe what experienced Chinese cooks do with soy sauce is just add it by color -- once the sauce has enough color, stop.

For "Finally, the savior of any Chinese dish is green onion and/or oyster sauce. If you are looking to add flavor, add one or the other or both!"

Wow! I have thousands of pages of books on Chinese cooking, and you gave a big secret in two sentences!

Sounds like I should get some green onions, even if they are quite perishable!

jo-mel:

Thanks for your praise! Careful planning? Yes. Good success? No!

Yes, the frozen green beans are just a big compromise for the terrible sin of convenience!

Thanks for the suggestion of velveting. I saw the discussions of velveting, in either oil or water, in:

Barbara Tropp, 'The Modern Art of Chinese Cooking: Techniques and Recipes', ISBN 0-688-14611-2, William Morrow, New York, 2001.

but I have never tried it, and the main reason is that I've been trying to get some decent flavors first and to minimize other labor on the way. Thanks for the confirmation that velveting works.

For "Your ratio of sugar to vinegar is fine, if you looking for a sweet/sour dish? Were you?"

Well, in part, yes. While I can like 100% 'savory' dishes with no sugar at all, here I was including some sugar, at least in the sense of the standard broad recommendation of having all of vinegar, sugar, salt, and pepper. Also I am beginning to suspect that ginger helps and works well with sugar. And I am suspecting that somehow some flavors that by themselves do not taste very good can, with sugar, be marvelous. While I wasn't looking for a sauce as sweet as candy, it is fair to say that I'm trying for sweet/sour in some sense.

For "Too much dark soy, IMMHO." Yes, I have finally reluctantly concluded that. Again, my surprise, shock, was that 1/3 C of dark soy did so much and went so far. But, gee, if dark soy is so strong and needed in such small quantities, then it is just that much more of a bargain!

But, one thing I have yet to understand is how a dumpling dipping sauce of 1/2 C Pearl River Bridge Light Soy Sauce, 5 T of Chinese Rice Vinegar, 1/4 C minced garlic, 2 t of dark sesame oil, and 2 t of Chinese style hot oil can taste so good with dumplings yet be way too strong and way too salty when used as the sauce for a stir-fry. More mysteries of the East!

Thanks for the Hoisin sauce suggestion. I like Hoisin and can't ever understand how something with such simple ingredients could taste so good, so special, and so different from anything else. The people that mix up vats of Hoisin sauce understand much more about balancing flavors than I do, even understand more than I would guess is possible. Yes, Hoisin sauce might fix up this dish nicely. But, I've been regarding leaning on Hoisin sauce as cheating and been trying to avoid it. My best guess about Hoisin is that there is a lot of sugar in it and that somehow the sugar totally changes the effects of all the other ingredients and makes the total come out as something quite new and where even the sugar is not so obvious.

For "On the red pepper -- I have a fondness for Chili Paste with Garlic. Always adds the zing I want." I thought I had a bottle but just checked and do not. I've seen it on the shelves but so far have neither bought nor used it. I guess one consideration is that in some goal of actually learning how to cook I've been trying to work by doing my own combinations of components that are 'elements', e.g., garlic alone, chili sauce alone, black beans alone, sugar alone, etc., and, thus, avoiding pre-mixed combinations.

Ben Hong:

Many thanks for the insight on what experienced Chinese cooks actually do!

Thanks for the confirmation that such a cook would blanch the green beans in water! The nutritionists might scream about all the vitamins and minerals lost to the discarded blanching water, but my experience is that the blanching water commonly does not taste very good so that for a nicely flavored dish the blanching is important.

You may notice that in my steps, I cooked the aromatics, added the sauce, boiled, added the green beans, boiled, etc. So, I did 'blanch' the green beans in 'water' but, also, did keep the 'blanching water' in the final dish! So, this blanching of the green beans in the sauce may have hurt the final flavor of the dish -- may have been the cause of much of the "uninteresting" flavor I'm concerned about.

Maybe the standard practice for nearly all the vegetables -- carrots, celery, cabbage, green beans, bell peppers, water chestnuts, bamboo shoots, wood ears, snow mushrooms, baby corn, broccoli -- is to blanch and otherwise the dish will taste like some combination of leaves, grass, a cow pasture, canned flavors, etc. -- all flavors I seem to have obtained in many of my trials! So, maybe the idea is mostly just to blanch away the flavors of these vegetables and let the other flavors, the aromatics, soy sauce, oyster sauce, black beans, etc. dominate the dish. I have not read this anywhere, but I've been guessing it, and you seem to be confirming it.

On marinating the meat with soy sauce, etc. and enough corn starch to soak up the loose liquid, I've tried that and can see some advantages, but my efforts tend to cause the pieces of meat to stick together during the stir-fry. Maybe I used too much corn starch.

One question I have about your procedure is that it sounds like the dish would be drier than is common in Chinese carry-outs in the US where it is accepted that the customers like a lot of sauce to help flavor the rice. E.g., for a dish of maybe 2 quarts, I'm thinking of 3 C of sauce. That's a lot of sauce, much more than the 1-2 T you mentioned.

Richard Kilgore:

Thanks for the reminder that I should use fresh vegetables! The advice here is unanimous and uncompromising -- I should be severely chastised and brutally flagellated with a limp wet soggy defrosted freezer burned green bean, all for sin of frozen convenience!

For "You also may be using too much oil, but I may not be picturing your procedure correctly. About 1T of oil in a very hot wok should be fine to start."

Well, just to cook the pieces of chicken, I went ahead and put a lot of oil in the wok, about 3/4 C. For the 6 chicken breasts, defrosted, brined, drained, cubed, and drained, I cooked them in four batches. For one batch, I got the oil hot, dumped in the chicken, stirred, and dumped the wok contents into a colander set in a bowl, and returned the oil in the bowl to the wok and then did the next batch.

I tried the drain the chicken thoroughly.

For the oil in the actual dish, I just put about 2 T of the oil in the wok, got the oil hot, and added the aromatics. When I quit coughing from the outrageously strong aroma of the aromatics, I dumped in the nearly 2 C of sauce and continued.

So, with all this oil, I'm nearly deep frying the chunks of chicken. I was thinking that this technique was common. But, sure, I can return to doing more of an ordinary 'stir-fry' of the chicken pieces with just 1-2 T of oil and still doing this in four batches and draining the chicken.

Thanks for the suggestion of peanut oil. Next time I buy cooking oil, I will likely spring for my first batch of peanut oil. I can believe that it could help the flavor.

Your garlic technique is much more civilized than my 2 T of minced garlic, 2 T of minced ginger, and 2 T of crushed red pepper flakes, dumped into 2 T of hot oil, that caused me to stagger back coughing!

Thanks to all for the critique and ideas!

[wesza]

Project:

The regular method of preparing this dish at most restaurants is quite different.

Generally the type of Beans utilized are "Runner Beans" for a standard serving about 8/10 ounces is satisfactory. Beans are often broken or cut into approximately 6 inch pieces.

The amount of Chicken used for this portion of Beans should be about 6/7 ounces sliced diagonally. This Chicken Doesn't require brining, but may be coated with egg white.

Ingredients follow:

Runner Beans

Chicken

Egg White only enough to coat the Chicken

8 ounces rich Chicken Broth [reserve 2 ounces and mix with corn starch]

Dark Soy 1 Tablespoon

Light Soy 1/2 Tablespoon

1/2 Tablespoon Sugar

Corn Starch 1 Tablespoon

Sliced Hot Chili, about 8/10 very thin slivers.

Shredded Ginger 1 Tablespoon

Chopped Garlic 1 1/2 Tablespoon

Fardue Wine or Dry Sherry 2 ounces

Peanut Oil to cover bottom of whatever size Wok being used under highest heat.

Vegetable or Canola Oil to Deep Fry the Runner Beans at about 350-375 degree's

Some Oyster Sauce may be added for personal preference

Cooking Method:

Preheat Vegetable or Canola Oil in suitable Wok or Pot so as to be able to submerge the Runner Beans into the Hot Oil long enough to Blanch and become sizzling bright green.

Preheat your Cooking Wok, add Peanut Oil till hot

Put into oil Stirring constantly the Ginger and Garlic

Place Chicken Pieces into the Oil and Stir until opaque, then drain, remove and set aside.

Place Beans into oil and stir quickly until covered with Hot Oil

Add the Soy Sauces and Chili Slices, keep stirring.

Add Wine, still stirring

Add Sugar, stir

Then add the 6 ounces of Chicken Broth

When everything comes to a Boil then add the Chicken Broth with Corn Starch Mixture being sure that it's stirred together first.

Add Oyster Sauce option if preferred.

Allow the mixture to Thicken and serve immediately.

Results: Green Beans with Chicken

Try it you'll like it, or order from your favorite Restaurant.

Pork, Lamb, Shrimp, Fish, Beef, or Pickled Vegetables may be substituted or combined together with the Chicken as you prefer.

Irwin

Edited March 28, 2004 by wesza (log)

[project]

Ben Hong:

Thanks again!

To a novice like me trying to get something at least up to the level of an inexpensive Chinese carry-out, your advice sounds good.

For

"all seasonings should be used sparingly and harmoniously", the "sparingly" is easy; understanding "harmoniously" is challenging! Why a sauce made of oysters and sugar should be 'harmonious' with chicken and green beans escapes me. I know how to get stuff that tastes awful; how to get stuff that tastes good, from harmonious seasonings or otherwise, I'm still missing, really in the dark. Why lily buds, wood ears, Shitake mushrooms, eggs, and shredded pork with Hoisin sauce, scallions, and simple flour and water pancakes are 'harmonious' is one of the mysteries of the universe!

For "the hot wok is oiled only with enough oil to prevent food from sticking", okay, that's easy enough. But at times I thought that I have seen Chinese cooks use a lot of oil, maybe 3/4 C, to cook chunks of meat and then drain the meat.

For "liquids should be kept to an absolute minimum", that has been one of my biggest questions. This does seem to be the approach of the more authentic books on Chinese cooking, yet nearly all the Chinese restaurants I have been to in the US include a lot of sauce. The only real exception was the Northern Chinese restaurant, the Peking, opened in 1947 on the west side of Connecticut Avenue in DC just south of the Maryland line, but nearly everything they did was an exception. I ate there a few times a month for several years and yet don't have hardly a clue about what they did and only some rough guesses in a few cases: For one of the easiest ones, they took whole skinless boneless chicken breast, breaded it with some flavorful breading, fried it, cubed the result (the breading still stuck), and combined it with a cool salad of vegetables, sauce of mostly chicken broth, and served the whole in a bowl lined with large leaves of head lettuce. It was a nice contrast to nearly anything else in Chinese cooking. For another of the easiest ones, they did shrimp with a hot red sauce at one end of the plate and a mild white sauce at the other end of the plate with everything surrounded with either bean sprouts or spinach. There is something similar as 'Love Bird's Shrimp' or some such in

Jason Lowe, Deh-Ta Hsiung, and Nina Simonds, 'The Food of China', ISBN 1-55285-227, Whitecap Books, Vancouver, 2001.

For "above all, strive for that elusive, ephemeral essence called 'WOK HEI'", I don't have a clue about what that is and less of a clue about how to achieve it although I'm eager to learn.

For "unless it's a meat based dish, such as scallion beef and ginger, the ratio of meat to veg. should be 1/4 by volume, such as chicken and green beans.", didn't know that and glad to learn.

For the dish I'm working with, mostly I'm just interested in the meat. The green beans are in there just for some contrast. So, right: If have 16 ounces of green beans and enough meat that the green beans are just contrast, then might have three pounds of meat, and that's a large dish. It has occurred to me before to cut the green beans back to 8 ounces.

The common US Chinese carry-out dish is one US quart, that is, about two pounds. When I did the dish here, I got about 1 1/2 quarts. Next trial, I intend to shoot for two quarts. I can do it in more than one pass through the wok, but if I am going to get out all the ingredients, do all the cutting and chopping, and clean up all the mess afterward, then I want to get a lot of food for the effort -- say, two quarts, four pounds. I can do four pounds in maybe only 10% more effort than two pounds. So, there are 'economies of scale'.

I can do the dish where all the cooking except for the final assembly is a 'stir-fry' -- just work in small batches. For the meat for the last trial, I used four batches.

Still, when I turn off the fire (outdoors) under the wok, I want to walk back into the house with a two quart glass casserole dish essentially full.

My wok is not huge, has diameter only 14", but it is all steel, Chinese, with a round bottom.

The wok is large enough to permit final assembly and adding corn starch for four pounds.

Last, for "very high or extremely high sustained heat is a prerequisite (for speed)", uh, I, uh, did omit details of my heat source: It's claimed by the manufacturer to put out 170,000 BTUs per hour, and that may be more power than most of the restaurants. So far my eyebrows are still intact, but there is a risk!

[project]

wesza:

Thanks for the contribution!

Gee, I didn't expect that Green Beans with Chicken is a recognized dish!

Instead, I was just trying to combine some ingredients readily available to me, ingredients similar to what might be used in China, and to get good and interesting flavors similar to what a moderately good cook in a not very good US Chinese restaurant might get.

For beans, I understand that some a yard long or longer are common in China but that except for length string beans in the US are similar. I cut the length to about two inches to make the food more convenient to eat. Or, it's a bit of a challenge to eat a bean four to six inches long gracefully, and when I try and a juicy bean goes "squirt" I can end up wearing some food!

Let's see: For flavors, you are including egg white, some different soy sauce, a different source of hot pepper, some rich chicken broth, some different preparation steps, and, optionally, some Oyster Sauce. You are altering the proportions and are omitting the vinegar.

Frying the beans: Wow! Wouldn't have thought of that!

Although I am in a hurry to get a decent dish, another principle in trials is to make only fairly small changes at each step. So, I need to do another trial with some of the ideas here.

Thanks for the details!

[Singapore]

Whoops! I missed the bit about the frozen green beans! I was assuming fresh! Sorry about that.

[jo-mel]

Project "

For "the hot wok is oiled only with enough oil to prevent food from sticking", okay, that's easy enough. But at times I thought that I have seen Chinese cooks use a lot of oil, maybe 3/4 C, to cook chunks of meat and then drain the meat."

You are looking at two different cooking methods there. The minimal oil in the hot wok is for basic stir/frying. When you see the take-out cooks using larger amount of oil, and then draining the meat, you are looking at a form of 'velveting'. As you mentioned -- Tropp's book has the best description of this than any other I've seen.

One thing to keep in mind. When you 'velvet', you can put a whole pound of meat into the 'poaching' oil, briefly cook, and then drain. HOWEVER -- when stir/frying, only put 1/3 to 1/2 a pound in the wok at one time. I'm not sure how your BTUs compare to a restaurant's BTUs, but on a normal range, a whole pound of meat in the wok at once, will cool the wok and you will not achieve the searing you wish. The wok cools waaay down, and the meat will stew in its own juice, rather than sear. Portioning may take more physical effort, but it really takes very little time, and the result is better.

When you add the meat to the wok to sear/stir/fry, spread the meat out so that the meat surfaces are in contact with the hot wok. When they have seared, turn them over like a pancake and sear the other side. You want heat contact. Then stir them around to separate and mix with the oil. Stir/frying, in the sense that the meat is tossed and turned ---half in the air and half in the heat --- will not give you the piece of meat you are looking for.

Trial and error. That is the way you learn.

OH -- about cornstarch. Once it reaches its thickness, it will thin out if heated for a long time after thickening. Heating to the boiling point and stirring vigorously will bring on thickening. Letting the sauce cool and then reheating will break down the thickening also. That is why the thickening process comes just before serving. Harold McGees' "On Food and Cooking -The Science and Lore of the Kitchen" explains this process in depth, going into the amylopectins and starch molecules and heat and such.

[Ben Hong]

Ah Jo-mel, you come through again. All I posted above was for homestyle stirfrying, assuming that the usage of an average gas burner of 12,000 BTUs or a typical electric burner on a home range.

Blanching can be done both ways, by oil or water. Water is more amenable to homecooking, for a variety of reasons. Water blanching is rarely if ever, used for meats. Very little nutrients are lost due to water blanching, if done properly, ie; not "cooking" the veggies through. Omit the blanching done in a separate pot of water and do it in the covered wok with a bit of water or broth, of course the meat has to be out of the pan at this stage.

Any restaurant serving 2 pound portions will go out of business soon, for one reason or another. I do believe that you meant one "pint", ie; two cups. Anyway, when I used to work in a restaurant, I could hardly wait to get home and cook "homestyle", which is markedly different than restaurant style. Contrary to a widely held belief, Chinese restaurant food is NOT better or worse for you than any other restaurant food. However, traditional home cooking is definitely good for you.

Marinades are supposed to enhance the flavour of the meat, not mask it. There is a basic list of marinading ingredients: soy sauce, ginger, sugar, wine, vinegar, garlic, pepper. You can add cornstarch if you are "velveting". Marinades should be "targetted" as to the types of meat getting the treatment. 3-4 marinading ingredients are more than sufficient for any type of protein, any more and you get a cloudy taste. Eg; beef may only need soy sauce, garlic, tiny bit of sugar. You may want to add a little bit of ginger, wine, etc. Not absolutely necessary, but it may be to your preference and taste. Bind your marinading meats with cornstarch, tapioca flour, etc. and if the meat clumps up, mix in a few drops of oil

to keep it separated. Above all, use marinade ingredients sparingly.

Knowledge of harmony in Chinese cooking is that elusive quality that comes after much eating and cooking experience. Learn how to "read" a dish, then after eating many versions of a particular dish, learn or analyze why one is better than another. Describing harmony of ingredients in Chinese cooking is akin to ask an Afro-American to describe "soul". It incorporates at its base, the Yin and Yang of materials, various "humours" of ingredients and in some cases even feng shui, as in seasonal appropriateness of a dish, or where and when it is to be eaten.

"Wok Hei" is the Chinese expression for describing that particular aroma that accompanys a superbly done dish. Literally it is "the breath of the wok". It comes at the juncture where all the ingredients, preparation, heat, cooking technique, and timing of the first mouthful come together in perfect HARMONY. Some professional cooks have the ablity to achieve this quality, most run of the mill takeout cooks do not. To attain this level of culinary achievement is almost reaching Nirvana.

I am encouraged and extremely happy by the fact that there is so much genuine interest on this board for learning Chinese cuisine. Project, you must keep on experimenting and eating

[Big Bunny]

I see this as two simple dishes:

1) Braise dark-meat chicken with all of the savory stuff.

2) Stir-fry the green beans with just a bit of garlic, salt and wine.

Then make some good rice and open a cold beer.

BB

[chengb02]

Sounds like I should get some green onions, even if they are quite perishable!

to deal with this factor, the best thing to do is right after buying your green onions, cut them all up, put in the refrigerator what you might use in the next two days or so and freeze the rest for later use. You won't lose much of the green onions flavor by freezing them and it will be convenient for future use.

[Ben Hong]

Big Bunny, you have cut to the chase and stated what is important and obvious. A tip of my humble toque to ya.

[Big Bunny]

Thank you, Ben!

BB

[Samhill]

My humble 2c.

The thing that glared at me from your sauce recipe is the lack of oyster sauce, lee kum kee premium is my fav, and the excess of oil, as mentioned. You definately should not be making the sauce first, it's a "deglaze the pan" type of thing.

Also, I've never had much luck with the thin woks on my (gas/home) stoves, I find they cannot keep the high heat needed.

This type of wok was a revelation to me.

https://secure.lodgemfg.com/storefront/prod...?idProduct=2770

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewI...&category=46273

I have the lodge, but if you plug - cast iron wok - into ebay's search, many like this come up, hopefully you should be able to find a seller that minimises your shipping costs, if you choose to get one.

Best luck.