A little taste of heaven: Stir-fried salted veg with pork

When I was young, my aunt and her family used to stay with us, right up til I was 15. She cooked lunch and dinner daily, and I loved to stand beside her and watch her slice, dice, steam and fry. My aunt is a good cook, and her specialties include Chinese soup, koloyok (deep fried bite-sized meat in tomato sauce), tau kuah (beancurd) in black sauce and stir fried brinjal. Thanks to the early exposure, I have a pretty good idea today of the basics for Chinese cooking and can probably recreate most stir-fried dishes.

I rarely get the chance to taste my aunt’s cooking nowadays as she has since moved away, so all those years spent next to her in the kitchen really comes in useful whenever I get nostalgic for a taste of my childhood. (It’s true, a person does get wistful for the food of their youth as they get older).

I don’t know why, but these few days, I’ve developed a craving for her salted vegetable with lean meat. So when the hunger pangs hit this afternoon, I decided to recreate the dish. There was salted vegetable in the fridge, but no lean meat, so I’ve substituted that with minced pork.  Regretfully, I did not take a picture of my masterpiece because I was too hungry, but here’s the recipe below if any of you would like to try your hand at this simple yet delightful dish:

Must-have ingredients:

1 small packet salted vegetable

1 palm-sized slab of lean pork or equivalent amount of minced pork

2 cloves garlic

3 slices ginger

1 teaspoon light soy sauce

2 teaspoons dark soy sauce

1 teaspoon sesame oil

2 tablespoons cooking oil

1 teaspoon mushroom or oyster sauce

1/2 teaspoon sugar

3 tablespoons water

A couple dashes of pepper

 

Optional ingredients:

1 medium tomato

1 stalk chilli

 

And here we go:

1) Marinate the pork with sesame oil, pepper, dark and light soy sauce and mushroom or oyster sauce. Let it sit for half an hour or less, if you’re really hungry. =)

1) Meanwhile, rinse and julienne the salted vegetable. Normally, ingredients should be washed before slicing and dicing, but because the salted vegetable is a preserved veg that lives up to its name, do rinse another couple more times after chopping it up.

2) Heat up your wok and add in two tablespoons of cooking oil. While waiting for the oil to get hot, cut a few thin slivers of ginger, then chop the garlic into tiny pieces.

3) Make sure the oil is hot but not too hot (medium heat is best; you know it’s too hot if smoke emanates from the centre of the wok), then throw in the ginger and fry for one minute before adding the garlic and fry both til they’re lightly browned.

4) Turn up the heat, then put in the salted vegetables and toss it around for a minute or so.

5) Add the pork and the julienned chilli (chilli padi if you like a little spice) and fry for two minutes. 

6) Add in three tablespoons of water and a little sugar, then toss the tomato in. It might sound a little strange to add sugar to a salty dish, but a sprinkle of it does enhance the flavour noticeably.  

7) Fry the mix for another minute or until the meat looks cooked.

Serve with plain rice. 

If you do try your hand at this dish or enjoyed reading about it, do give me your comments. If responses are positive, I might make ”A little taste of heaven” into a regular series to share with those who love to cook. Meanwhile, bon appetit! =)