Thursday, 25th May 2006

Wm & her troop came over for dinner. I made this really strange claypot thingy - it has 2 types of tofu in it (the fresh ones in blocks) as well as 2 blocks of 'silken' tofu which is packed into plastic tubs and sold in most supermarkets. It also has mushrooms, dried oysters, a lot of whole garlic cloves, enoki & another type of mushroom, minced pork and a topping of salted fish and garlic. It turned out to be quite delicious, a wonderful mishmash of flavours - bland tofu, saucy sauce, textury mushrooms, and salty bits topping.

Here it is - we ate it with copious amounts of chilli oil.......



Brief recipe (its very very similar to the roast pork claypot dish I made last month)

1. Cut tofu into blocks, panfry and put into claypot.

2. Stew mushrooms & dried oysters with lots lots of whole garlic cloves (lightly browned first), when mushrooms & oysters are soft, add enoki mushrooms and another type of clustery mushrooms which I do know the name of. Stew till yummy using the usual sauces (dark, light soy, oyster sauce, chinese wine, sesame oil, pepper).

3. Pour on top of the tofu.

4. Fry marinated mince pork with some chopped garlic till aromatic and dryish.

5. Put on top of mushrooms.

6. Finally fry salted fish (the best kind - Mui Heong from HK, remove bones & skin) and garlic till brown and crispy.

7. Put on top of stew.

8. Set claypot on fire and let it come to a simmer.

9. Serve straight from the claypot.

Quote " wow, winter food "

After dinner, watched the finals of American Idol - yeah - Taylor won. Anyone who can dance with such abandonment certainly deserves my vote!