[00:00] In our ongoing ‘over rice’ series,&nbsp; we’ve done dishes from Hunan, Guizhou,&nbsp;&nbsp; and Sichuan that people devour with&nbsp; rice… but not yet us Cantonese.
[00:12] First, jeung bao ke zi bou, an great&nbsp; eggplant pot that goes awesome with rice,&nbsp; Second, the Cantonese with-rice&nbsp; mainstay of juk beng (meat cake),&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:26] which is probably considered to be THE&nbsp; xiafan dish in Cantonese home cooking,&nbsp; And third, as is tradition, we’ll have something&nbsp; that’s easy and quick, straight up from a jar.
[00:39] dish from a daipaidong classic Jyu wan ke&nbsp; zi bou - ‘fish soul with eggplant pot’.&nbsp; It’s kind of a ‘wilder’ Cantonese&nbsp; dish, it’s actually kind of spicy…&nbsp;
[00:54] something you can imagine maybe some gangsters&nbsp; gathered around it on a winter night, smoking,&nbsp;&nbsp; drinking… and maybe talking&nbsp; about… who did the job. &nbsp;
[01:06] That original dish itself can be quite&nbsp; intense, the portion is usually pretty big&nbsp;&nbsp; and deep fries both that massive fish head and the&nbsp; eggplant… and as for our homemade version today,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:19] we’ll be keeping the same flavor profile,&nbsp; but without the fish head or the deep-frying. So now, let’s prep the eggplant. Here we have two long eggplants,&nbsp;&nbsp; about 600-700g. Cut off the top and peel it,&nbsp; leaving some strips like this for a nicer color.&nbsp;
[01:38] Then cut it into 5cm-ish sections, then slice&nbsp; into third, and cut the slices into three again,&nbsp;&nbsp; giving us some 5cm stick that’s about 2cm wide. After cutting, toss the eggplant in a big bowl,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:57] soak it with water and touch of vinegar to&nbsp; draw out some of that eggplant bitterness. take it out and drain it until no water’s&nbsp; dripping, then we can start cooking.
[02:14] So first, long yau. Get your&nbsp; wok piping hot, heat off,&nbsp;&nbsp; add in half tbsp oil and give it a nice swirl. Then heat on high, add in our eggplant,&nbsp;&nbsp; spread it more of less evenly into one layer,&nbsp; and patiently let it fry to get some brownness.&nbsp;
[02:33] Turn the wok as you go, once all sides&nbsp; got some toast, flip, and spread again,&nbsp;&nbsp; and let it keep on frying until it starts to&nbsp; soften and wilt, then heat off, take it out.
[02:47] Then same wok, no need to wash. Heat on medium,&nbsp; add in 1.5 tbsp oil, again, give a nice swirl.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then in with four big cloves of garlic and 1/2&nbsp; inch ginger roughly minced, as our aromatics.&nbsp;
[03:03] Fry the two until fragrant, about 1&nbsp; minute, then it’s ready for our sauces. Now, these two sauces make up for&nbsp; the flavor profile here today. The&nbsp;&nbsp; “jeung” in the dish name jeung bao kezi bou&nbsp; refers to this, minsi, or ground bean sauce,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:22] this is a fermented soy bean paste, which&nbsp; gives the dish its deeper and rounder base.&nbsp; You can sub it with half akimiso and half soy,&nbsp;&nbsp; but of course the flavor would be a bit&nbsp; lighter compare to minsi itself. Nonetheless,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:38] we’ll be using a full tbsp’s&nbsp; worth of ground bean paste today. Then to knock things up a bit, we’ll be using&nbsp; one full tbsp of this Guilin chili sauce. This&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:50] is a garlic chili sauce that’s quite salty&nbsp; and not that spicy. It’s also quite available,&nbsp;&nbsp; what you’ll probably just get this&nbsp; same jar from Lee Kum Kee as we did.&nbsp; Or you can also use other savory&nbsp; garlic chili sauce you have on hand,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:05] but do remember to taste and check for salinity at&nbsp; the end because you might need a touch more salt. Now back to our wok, first add in the&nbsp; minsi ground bean paste and break it up&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:17] with your spatula. Once it’s broken up and&nbsp; smells nice, add in the Guilin chili sauce,&nbsp;&nbsp; fry them all together until well&nbsp; combine, then swirl in about 1/2&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:29] tbsp liaojiu aka Shaoxing wine.&nbsp; Then add the eggplant back right in. Quick fry, then add in one and half cup of&nbsp; stock or water, as it’s coming up to a boil,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:41] season with 1 tsp sugar, 1/8 tsp each salt&nbsp; and MSG. Once at a boil, transfer the eggplant&nbsp;&nbsp; over to a clay or some other smaller pot, cover&nbsp; and let it simmer on medium low for 15 minutes.
[04:59] After that time, your eggplant should&nbsp; be completely softened. Add a touch&nbsp;&nbsp; more salt if needed, otherwise,&nbsp; top it with some chopped cilantro,&nbsp;&nbsp; and now you have your jeung bao&nbsp; kezi bou ready to go onto your rice.
[05:17] Okay – I love this pot but if you are Cantonese&nbsp; yourself, big flashing warning signs up here. So&nbsp;&nbsp; if you’re making this pot for someone who cannot&nbsp; eat spicy at all, I’d strongly recommend you&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:33] dial the Guilin chili sauce back to 1 teaspoon&nbsp; instead of 1 full tbsp, and up the minsi ground&nbsp;&nbsp; bean paste to 1.5 tbsp instead of just 1 tbsp. Because I can already Imagine some Cantonese&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:50] parents eating this and be like “this is&nbsp; so spicy, it’s totally inedible! What are&nbsp;&nbsp; these Chinese Cooking Demystified people, they&nbsp; know noting lah”. Or something like “哎，D鬼佬识咩啊！”&nbsp;
[06:06] Right, anyway. But for all of us that can enjoy&nbsp; some heat, this is a spicy level that I enjoyed. Next brings us to juk beng! Steamed meat cake.
[06:18] Now usually in this series&nbsp; we try to keep things simple,&nbsp;&nbsp; but juk beng done well isn’t&nbsp; necessary in that category. In Guangdong growing up if you wanted&nbsp; to be lazy you can actually just go&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:32] to the market and buy this read-made meat mixture,&nbsp;&nbsp; and go home and steam it straight – my mum&nbsp; bought it all the time just right after work.&nbsp; But I guess at your local Chinese supermarket,&nbsp; you probably don’t have that option.
[06:48] But we couldn’t do a Cantonese over&nbsp; rice video without this one, and the&nbsp;&nbsp; good news is that this meat mixture&nbsp; will keep well in the fridge for a day,&nbsp;&nbsp; and it freezes really well in the freezer, so you&nbsp; can at least make ahead and portion it in advance.
[07:04] We’ll be doing a shiitake juk beng today, so we’ll&nbsp; start off by soaking three shiitake mushrooms in&nbsp;&nbsp; cool water for at least four hours and overnight’s&nbsp; fine too. Then after that time, remove, squeeze,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:20] and snip off the stems… reserving the shiitake&nbsp; mushroom soaking liquid because that stuff tastes&nbsp;&nbsp; awesome and we’ll use it later in the recipe. Then just dice two of your shiitakes – these&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:33] will go in our mix – and cut the other&nbsp; into eight slices, which’ll go on top.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then marinate that with a ¼ tsp sugar, a ½ tsp&nbsp; soy sauce, and a sprinkle of white pepper powder.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:49] And for ease of use later, separate the slice&nbsp; from the dice in your bowl… and set that aside. Next, pork. So we’ll be using a mix&nbsp; of pork shoulder, a.k.a. boston butt,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:02] and some pork fat here. For meat pancake you’re going&nbsp;&nbsp; to need a mix of pork lean and fat. For the&nbsp; fat, you can also just cut off some fat part&nbsp;&nbsp; from pork belly, that’s totally fine. Just&nbsp; finely dice that fat and set it aside.
[08:20] But it’s the lean that we’ll need to&nbsp; be careful with, because which cut you&nbsp;&nbsp; use depends on the pork quality you have. In China, pigs tend to get more exercise&nbsp;&nbsp; than a lot of places around the world,&nbsp; so the meat’s firmer and it binds better.
[08:37] People here like to use the ham cut of&nbsp; the pig for this kind of meat mixture,&nbsp;&nbsp; but you will probably want to get some other&nbsp; muscle that gets worked more – so, the shoulder.
[08:51] We’re just mincing this by hand from scratch&nbsp; today but you can totally start with ground&nbsp;&nbsp; pork as well – BUT, just MAKE SURE that your&nbsp; ground pork is ground from the shoulder,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:04] But whether from ground or hand minced, once&nbsp; you’re at this point… continue to chop the&nbsp;&nbsp; lean for about 3-4 minutes, periodically folding&nbsp; the meat over itself and continuing to chop it&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:20] together – this pounding motion is going to help&nbsp; everything get into sort of sticky, uniform whole. Once you’re at this point, something&nbsp; pasty, toss it in a bowl and go in with&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:32] 1 tsp salt. Mix that in, go at it for about&nbsp; 30 seconds, then go in with 1 tbsp of the&nbsp;&nbsp; shiitake soaking liquid. Mix that in, then go&nbsp; at it for another 30 seconds, and then repeat.
[09:48] We’re going to be doing this for five tablespoons&nbsp; of this soaking liquid in all. Adding the liquid&nbsp;&nbsp; bit by bit is to ensure it’s mixed sufficiently.&nbsp; It’s the same idea as sausage making – you stir&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:03] to develop the myosin so that the pork can&nbsp; bind together and have a nice snap to it. Then take 1 final tbsp of&nbsp; the shiitake soaking liquid,&nbsp;&nbsp; mix it with 1/2 tbsp of starch, and&nbsp; then also mix that in the same way.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:20] Then season with 1/2 tsp sugar, 1/2 tsp chicken&nbsp; bouillon powder, 1/4 tsp white pepper powder,&nbsp;&nbsp; an 1/8 tsp MSG, 1/2 tbsp soy sauce, and 1/2&nbsp; tbsp Shaoxing wine… and mix that very well.
[10:37] Then, for the fun part –&nbsp; take that mix and ‘dat’ it.&nbsp; So just lift it up a touch, smack it&nbsp; against the bowl, and repeat 10-15 times,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:50] which will help remove any air bubbles&nbsp; so that the mixture binds even better.&nbsp; Then toss in the shiitake and&nbsp; fat dices… mix that in very well,&nbsp;&nbsp; ‘dat’ a couple more times, and coat it&nbsp; all with about a tbsp of peanut oil.
[11:07] Now just transfer it to a plate,&nbsp; evenly spread it out and leaving&nbsp;&nbsp; a thinner dimple in the center. Lay&nbsp; over your marinated shiitake slices,&nbsp;&nbsp; and then this is good to steam. Just toss it over a steaming rack,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:24] cover and steam for 10 minutes. Then heat&nbsp; off, optionally sprinkle over a touch more&nbsp;&nbsp; white pepper powder and some chopped cilantro&nbsp; to garnish… and now you’ve have your juk beng.
[11:37] So growing up this is my all-time favorite thing&nbsp; to eat with rice. And I would also love to mash&nbsp;&nbsp; the juk beng in with some rice, though my&nbsp; mom would always stop me from doing so.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:50] But even if you’re just eating the meat&nbsp; cake alongside with some rice… you also&nbsp;&nbsp; just drizzle some of the juice on your&nbsp; rice, it’ll also just be really good. Now I know that one was a little&nbsp; intense, so as an apology,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:05] we also have this – something that you can&nbsp; just pop open and down with rice: dousi lengju.&nbsp; So this is basically deep fried fish mixed&nbsp; with Chinese fermented black soybeans.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:18] It’s a Cantonese icon, we’ve done a whole&nbsp; video on all the stuff that you can do with&nbsp;&nbsp; it… but I don’t think we’ve shown just&nbsp; how to eat it, straight up, in a meal.
[12:31] So basically what you’ll do is, you’d have some&nbsp; veg on the side, then you have your bowl of rice,&nbsp;&nbsp; you open that can, take some fish and some of&nbsp; the beans out, I like to sprinkle some granulated&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:45] sugar on top for another layer of flavor. And this is undeniably a very quick,&nbsp;&nbsp; tasty meal that you can just&nbsp; have under ten minutes, I’ll say.&nbsp;
[12:58] It’s a bit savory, has a deep umami, especially&nbsp; the douchi goes so well with white rice. Anyway, I love these all,&nbsp; I’ll never get tired of it.
[13:15] So right, this is our Cantonese version&nbsp; for our xiafan over-rice series. As always,&nbsp;&nbsp; recipes’ in description box, a BIG THANK&nbsp; YOU for everyone that’s supporting us on&nbsp;&nbsp; Patreon. And of course, subscribe for&nbsp; more delicious Chinese cooking recipes.