Tag: sweet and sour pork

Sweet & sour chicken recipe.

I very rarely deep fry my food. Not because we don’t like fried food but cause I hate dealing with the leftover surplus of oil. I guess I could pour the surplus into an oil pot but you know what, I haven’t gotten around to buy one that looks nice and fits into the interior of the kitchen. Yes, this is one of my shortcomings as a human being.

We’re definitely going to get a electronic deep fryer but before that, we’d need to get a washing/dryer machine, a stand mixer, a new 4-6 slice toaster, a new kettle, a new rice cooker that’s not white in colour…all in that order :P

# – Sweet & sour chicken recipe.

Anyway, I made an exception for this sweet & sour chicken because (1) it’s time to redeem myself for sweet & sour chicken disaster circa 2006 and (2) it’s DELICIOUS!

For the marinade:

  • 2 pieces of chicken breasts, cut into desirable bite size
  • 1 tablespoon of bicarbonate soda
  • 4 tablespoons of corn flour
  • 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce
  • 2 tablespoon of chinese rice wine (optional)
  • A pinch of salt and pepper

For the sweet & sour sauce:

  • 300 ml of water
  • 2 tablespoons of tamarind paste
  • 3 tablespoons of tomato puree or tomato ketchup
  • 1 tablespoon of sugar
  • A pinch of salt

For the mix of vegetables:

  • 2 medium onions, quartered
  • 150 grams of pineapple, cut into cubes
  • 1 large cucumber, peeled, seeded and cut into cubes
  • 1 large red chilli, seeded and cut into large rectangles (you can use capsicum)
  • A sliver of ginger

# – First, marinate the chicken in the marinade ingredients for about 30 minutes.

# – Then, prepare the sweet & sour sauce by stirring the sauce ingredients together till combined. Set aside.

# – Heat up enough oil to cover the chickens in a wok and throw the chicken in one by one. Don’t crowd the wok and work in batches.

# – Remove when golden brown and place on a paper towel to drain.

# – After all the frying, pour away the oil to leave just about 2 tablespoons in the wok. Throw in the mix of vegetables.

# – Followed by the sweet & sour sauce prepared earlier. Allow it to simmer gently.

# – Taste and season with salt if needed.

# – When sauce has achieved the desired consistency, throw in the deep fried chicken nuggets. Stir to coat chicken with the sauce. Remove from heat to serve.

# – Sweet & sour chicken, DONE!

# – Serve with piping hot rice. Yums :)

The chicken was tender on the inside and crispy on the outside. The sauce had just the right balance of flavours while the vegetables were nice & crunchy. Absolutely divine with rice.

I believe you can substitute chicken with other meats like pork or fish as well. Have fun cooking!

Hate it or Love it Pork Supreme Recipe.

My apologies for the name of the dish. Honestly, I don’t know what to call it. It’s nothing like I’ve ever tasted before and it’s not even a real dish as far as I’m concerned.

I was having a bad case of monthlies (I still am, actually) but dinner needed to be cooked. I opened my fridge and the bottles of hot broad bean sauce and tamarind paste happened to be right in front of me. I couldn’t even muster up the strength to push the bottles away and check out what other ingredients were behind them.

Not to mention, I should have used chicken stock or something but my legs were so wobbly I wasn’t sure if I could stand long enough to dissolve some chicken stock cubes in water so I ended up using apple juice instead. Which, of course was conveniently located right next to the bottle of tamarind sauce.

The result was a dish of tender pork cubes submerged in a rich, flavoursome, sweet and sourish sauce with a bit of heat to boot. Surprisingly quite a lot of depth of flavours for something cooked under the influence of blood loss and pain killers.

For the marinade:

  • 300 grams of pork, cut into cubes
  • 1 tablespoon of corn flour
  • 1 tablespoon of chinese rice wine
  • 1 tablespoon of oyster sauce

For the sauce:

  • 1 tablespoon of hot broad bean paste (dao ban jiong)
  • 1/2 tablespoon of tamarind paste
  • 1 tablespoon of garlic, minced
  • 1 tablespoon of shallots, minced
  • 1 tablespoon of ginger, minced
  • 100 ml of pure apple juice

# – First, marinade the pork for at least 1 hour in the chinese rice wine, corn flour and oyster sauce. Keep chilled in the fridge till ready to be used.

# – In a pan, fry up the minced garlic, ginger and shallots.

# – Add a tablespoon of hot broad bean sauce.

# – Followed by half a tablespoon of tamarind paste.

# – Next, throw in the pork. Stir.

# – Add the apple juice. If you don’t like too much sauce, reduce liquid by half. Stir till pork’s cooked through.

# – Hate it or Love it Pork Supreme, DONE!

The sauce was appetising and wonderful with rice. As the title goes, you may either hate or love this dish. I say this because it’s a very interesting and unique flavour (no, not in a repulsive sort of way hahaha). My best suggestion is to try it out and then decide for yourself.

That said, the next time I make this dish (yes, I’ll make it again), I would make a few changes though. For one, I will cut the pork into thin square slices rather than cubes and brown them in a pan first before chucking them into the sauce…purely for texture & aesthetic reasons.

Have a good week peeps!