Wok Star Eleanor Hoh

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Gratitude: 5 Minute Wonder Soup

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Gratitude is a very loaded word for me!  The older I get, the more I realize I’ve inherited many traits from my parents.  Good and bad. The good?  Learning to cook from my parents, they had two totally different styles!  The bad, well, we won’t get into it.  My dad is all about using top notch, expensive ingredients.  My mom focuses on homestyle cooking (my kinda cooking).  What they share is not using recipes and it’s such a liberating technique! It’s made me enjoy the challenge of using what I have.  It’s made me tap into my intuition and creative side so I don’t rely on following recipes.  I am truly grateful to my parents for introducing me to this liberating journey to cooking. It’s made me want to tell the world (and I have been), this is how you want to cook if you were stuck on a desert island or not!
After a recent sister reunion, I decided I’d make more of an effort to be grateful for what I have and not take things for granted, be ready to let go when the time is right and be open to new things.  And the most important?  Be grateful everyday because I’ve only got one life, so I need to make everyday COUNT and be the best that I can!  In fact, ‘Gratitude’ is the theme of this month’s #LetsLunch challenge, please check below for more posts from other Lets Lunchers, and  check back for more or get the feed! 
So, with that said, who’s ready for 5 Minute Wonder Soup? I came up with this name because it really takes about 5 minutes from beginning to end.  A dish I learned from my mom.  She came up with this dish because after a hard day of teaching at a boy’s school, she needed to whip something up quickly for a family of 7! It is so easy, fast and tasty, you’ll want to try it immediately.

5 Minute Wonder Soup

Substitutions:
You can substitute other types of meat like pork, beef, lamb, chicken, endless. Use a cut that’s NOT tough and chewy. Slice into thinner bite size pieces so they cook faster. This is the same cutting technique you would use for stir frying.  Good seafood substitutions are baby scallops, fish (salmon, grouper, yellowtail, tilapia), mussels, clams. It’s entirely up to you with vegetables but I want to say Less is More applies here. Otherwise it becomes a 10 minute, not 5 minute wonder soup which is the goal of this dish!  Anything in the cabbage family works, kale (curly or not), napa cabbage, bok choy (white stem or Shanghainese).
Tips for cookware & utensils:
Using a wok of course makes this so much easier because of its wide surface area and depth to work with. Mine is a thin walled, lightweight, round bottom cast iron wok which I use on a portable butane gas stove set on top of my electric stove (click on link to find out why I have this setup!)   But if you don’t have a wok, use the widest pan you have, stainless steel is good.
Accompaniment:
We don’t eat starch like rice or noodles but if you want to, have some red rice or soba noodles, or glass noodles. Make this ahead so they’re ready.

Ingredients:
3/4 lb shrimp, shelled and deveined
1/2 packet tofu puffs, halved into diagonals 
couple of bok choy heads, separate stems and wash well
1 knob of ginger, washed in cold water, dried & shredded
2 cloves of garlic, smashed & diced
1 carton chicken broth (use beef if you’re using beef or lamb)
squirt of tamari
dash of sherry
dash of white pepper
pinch of sea salt 
1 scallion, sliced diagonally really thin or chopped in thin rounds
Few sprigs of cilantro, chopped for garnish (optional or sub with parsley)

3 easy steps for 5 minute wonder soup! 

  1. Fry veggies & tofu first w/half of garlic & ginger, remove from wok to plate. Then fry shrimp with rest of garlic & ginger (just till they turn pink so you don’t overcook them), add to dish of veggies.
  2. Add carton of stock into wok and let it come to a boil, add squirt of tamari, dash of sherry, dash of white pepper and pinch of sea salt. Adjust to your taste.
  3.  Add veggies and shrimp into soup, you’re done!  Serve in big bowls, garnish with scallions and cilantro and ENJOY!

Here are more Let’s Lunch posts, do check back for more…

Gratitude “Plumb” Cake from Lisa at Monday Morning Cooking Club
Gratitude Fried Rice from Linda at spicebox travels
Seafood Chowder from Lucy at A Cook and Her Books
Cracked Black Pepper and Blue Cheese Crackers (gluten free) from Charissaat Zest Bakery
A Thanksgiving tablecloth tradition from Lucy at In a Southern Kitchen
Gratitude Soup from Rashda at Hot Curries and Cold Beer
Pumpkin Muffins with Cinnamon Sugar (gluten free) from Linda at Free Range Cookies
Pumpkin Roll with Pecans from Annabelle at a Glass of Fancy
5-Minute Wonder Soup from Eleanor at Wok Star
Green Tomato Salad from Renee at My Kitchen and I
Asian-Style Pickled Oyster Mushrooms from Joe at Joe Yonan
Pain au levain from Rebecca at GrongarBlog
If you want to join #LetsLunch, just tweet with this hashtag and someone will answer you!  I’ll be sporadically posting on Let’s Lunch due to overload, stay tuned.
 

How to Make Perfect Fried Rice!

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Forces have aligned to make this an auspicious year for accomplishing resolutions! Here’s greeting the Year of the Ox with Kung Hei Fat Choy, which means good luck, prosperity and longevity. The Year of the Ox, begins Monday, January 26, 2009 and signifies a time to sweep away old habits and start anew. What better way than to jumpstart the process with a healthy, easy and delicious Pineapple Fried Rice using my simple stir fry technique.
Some of my fondest childhood memories of growing up in Hong Kong include the rituals, ceremonies and foods during Chinese New Year’s two week celebrations. Many traditional dishes are served because they symbolize good luck like uncut noodles represent long life, dumplings represent good luck packaged inside, and fried rice signifies prosperity. In Asia, fried rice is either an elegant banquet dish or a homestyle staple which uses leftovers. Fried rice is an all-time favorite Chinese dish in America and the most requested dish I get asked in my Wok Star Cooking Class. Even picky eaters and kids love it because it’s a one-dish wok meal combining tasty flavors, different textures and rainbow colors.
I realize it takes more than willpower to fulfill resolutions so to help make it happen, I’ve also got a video for Pineapple Fried Rice (a joint video project with Del Monte Fresh).  In this video, you’ll discover the simple secrets to achieving perfect fried rice. The most common complaints I hear are, “sticky” rice and “soupy” veggies, so it’s important to use the right wok and technique to guarantee success. And that’s why I put together a Wok Star Kit to demystify the art of stir frying with all the essentials to help you succeed.
Here’s the recipe but remember…
Create your own variations by substituting ingredients. That’s what being a Wok Star is all about!
What you’ll need
3/4 lb ham, cubed
4 cups day old, white rice, break up lumps
1 cup pineapple, cubed, save juice for sauce
1 red bell pepper, cubed
3/4 cup frozen peas
2 scallions, thin rounds
3 eggs with dash of San-J tamari
2 cloves garlic, peeled and diced
2 slices fresh ginger, diced
2 1/2 tbsp. canola oil for frying
Sauce:
2-3 tbsp. San-J tamari
2 tsp. medium drinking sherry
dash of white pepper
Juice from pineapple
Directions:
Gather all prepped ingredients (including eggs and sauce) around wok. Here’s order for stir frying :
First, fry vegetables…Heat wok till you see a wisp of smoke (for cast iron woks only.) Add 1 tbsp. of oil, then add half of the diced garlic and ginger. Add vegetables and pineapple, stir fry quickly. Add scallions at the very end so they don’t overcook. Remove ingredients and put them on a serving platter.
Next, fry eggs…Heat wok till hot, add 1/2 tbsp. oil, add the eggs and scramble, keeping the eggs soft (use low heat so they don’t overcook). Set aside with veggies. If wok has eggs stuck to it, wash out and dry.
Then fry rice and ham…Heat wok till hot, add 1 tbsp. oil, add garlic and ginger, then add rice and ham. Warm thoroughly. Add vegetables, then sauce, and combine thoroughly by stir frying. Last, add eggs and break up as you mix but don’t overcook them. They should remain soft and fluffy.
Pineapple is what makes this Fried Rice so special and sweet. Enjoy!…
This new year, instead of being a spectator watching chefs cook on television or being a passive diner, my mantra is ANYONE can be a Wok Star and make healthy, tasty, sizzling, wok creations right in your own home! Wok Stars agree my Kit is the solution to achieving their resolutions for longevity, prosperity and good luck.
You can find out more about Year of the Ox, predictions and horoscopes, celebrities and compatibility.
For a lot more about Chinese New Year traditions on what to eat, wear and how to decorate your home.
You can also subscribe in right sidebar to my FREE newsletter focusing on meal ideas, resources, tips and techniques and where to eat good Asian food and beyond.
Kung Hei Fat Choy!