Cantonese beef and student misbehavings

The first time I made this recipe for anyone else was at college. It was one of the first nights of the first year, where a group of young people are just getting to know each other and are living away from home for the first time. I invited around 6 people to my room, where I fed them this Cantonese beef and also some beef noodles and chicken and cashew nuts, all taken from this book. We sat eating on the small wicker table or on the floor, from borrowed plates and cutlery. They were impressed and I felt like a million bucks, happily accepting their compliments and feeling a new sense of worth. 

The other things I remember about that evening are playing a drinking game to M*A*S*H, where you had to pick a name of one of the characters and drink every time you heard it spoken. I, not really being familiar with the programme, chose Hawkeye. The other vague, hazy memory is a boy named Woody struggling to put Hannah Evans in the recovery position on my sofa bed in case she got sick through too much alcohol....that's what he claimed, but he did seem to be grabbing her chest area a lot...

I recently read about a Chinese cooking technique called 'velveting'. This excited me as I've been practicing it myself for years since learning how to do it from a cookbook. Basically, it's a technique to help the meat become more tender, almost 'velvet' like by coating it in a mixture of egg white and corn flour before frying in very hot oil. There are several variations, such as adding Chinese cooking wine or a little all purpose flour but the idea is the same. As long as your oil is hot enough, the meat will be coated with a sort of silky batter that seems to add succulence to the actual flesh while also helping to thicken the sauce. It's a clever trick and if you've ever eaten in a Chinese restaurant or had a takeaway, no doubt your meat would have been silky smooth and tender: this is why (and the reason that some people think they're eating horse or cat - common Chinese restaurant urban legends in the UK).

There are a few ways this technique can fail, however and leave you with an almighty mess. If the oil is not hot enough, the meat will stick together in one sticky lump and the 'batter' will be limp and chewy. Generally stir frying is performed with very high heat, the highest you can turn your hob to and often the meat is fried in as much as one pint of oil.

This recipe uses the 'velveting' technique with a few added twists. After marinating in a mixture of egg white, pepper and cooking wine, the meat is dusted with cornflour rather than being 'battered'. The result is the cornflour creating a smooth crust on the meat which seals in the flavour and tenderness.

Recipe : Cantonese beef 

Adapted from the encyclopedia of regional Chinese Cooking by Kenneth Lo

2 slices of root ginger, peeled and chopped

3 spring onions, finely chopped

1 tbsp Chinese wine or dry sherry

7 tbsp water

a pinch of ground white pepper

2 tbsp soy sauce

450g (1lb) of beef tenderloin (fillet), sliced into very thin slices

1 pint vegetable oil (don't worry - this is for frying, most gets drained away).

1 tbsp plain (all purpose) flour

1.5 tbsp cornflour

3 carrots, scrubbed and cut into slices on an angle

1/2 tsp salt

1 tbsp tomato ketchup

1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

2 tbsp sugar

Mix together the ginger, half the spring onions, the wine, 4 tbsp of water, white pepper and 1 tbsp soy sauce. Add the beef and leave to marinate for about 30 minutes.

Heat the oil in a wok or frying pan to about 350oF or until a cube of bread browns in 30 seconds. Mix together the plain flour and half the cornflour. Remove the beef from the beef from the marinade, dust with the flour and deep fry for about 30 seconds. Remove and drain on paper towels.

Pour off mist of the oil, leaving about 1 tbsp, reheat and add the carrots and salt. Stir fry for about 1 and a half minutes and remove and drain.

Heat another 1/2 tbsp of oil in the wok and add the soy sauce, tomato ketchup, Worcestershire sauce and sugar. Blend the remaining cornflour with the remaining water and add to the wok to thicken the sauce.

Bring to the boil, add the beef and carrots and toss through the sauce until piping hot and well coated. Serve, sprinkled with the remaining onions.

Recipe : Vegetable fried soba noodles

Soba noodles have an incredible nutty, wholesome flavour. They are a little meaty to eat with a great texture and are made from buckwheat flour. They are probably most well known for yaki soba, the Japanese fried noodle dish, but are also popular as a health food.

1 bundle of soba noodles

1 tbsp peanut oil

1 clove garlic, finely diced

1/2 inch piece ginger, finely diced

1/2 small red onion, chopped

1 stalk celery, sliced

1/2 bell pepper, sliced

4 mushrooms, sliced

1/2 tin bamboo shoots

1/2 tbsp soy sauce

1/2 tbsp sweet chili sauce

1/2 tsp hot chili sauce

First, cook the soba noodles. They will need about 5 minutes in a pan of boiling water. Make sure they are soft, then drain and rinse under cold water.

Heat the peanut oil in a frying pan over high heat and add the celery, bell pepper, onion, mushrooms and bamboo shoots. Fry together quickly until they are just starting to soften.

Add the garlic, ginger and soba

Add the soy and chili sauces and stir well to combine everything and coat with the sauce. Serve with the Cantonese beef and some prawn crackers if you like.