Occasionally I embark on a quest to replicate with reasonable results at home the things we often order at restaurants or as takeaway. My excuse for doing this is the vague and somewhat unrealistic eventual aim of not having to resort to these methods to obtain food -- unrealistic because the usual reason for obtaining food in one of these ways is either (in the case of the former) to go out for its own sake, not just because of hunger, or (in the case of the latter) because we are hungry and can't be bothered to cook. In either of these cases, simply being capable of cooking the food we would otherwise order probably won't help. On the other hand, sometimes you just have a craving for a particular dish, regardless of where you obtain it and whether you have to (or can) make it yourself, and then knowing a copycat version comes in handy as well as saving money. My wallet is definitely fatter for the discovery that all I need to make a Japanese kare raisu indistinguishable from that available in your average restaurant is some carrots, onions, hot water and a block of instant curry roux; so too is my waistline.
One of Lee's favourite things-to-order-from-the-local-Chinese is sweet & sour pork, so this was an obvious one to attempt. I have actually made sweet & sour a couple of times in the past, but it involved quite a bit of dash-of-this splash-of-that taste-and-adjust, and was sufficiently long ago that I had no idea of what I eventually used. Since the goal is to produce replicable and reliable results that can be made quickly without having to spend too much time tasting and adding this and that, I decided a more scientific approach was in order, and started with measured quantities designed to approximate the sweetness and sourness as well as saltiness and appropriate red-but-not-fluorescently-so colouration. There was still a bit of adjusting required but this was more or less what I came up with after that -- some further testing may be needed but for now, this is a good draft version. Given the results produced even by this first attempt, I expect needing to make this again (FOR SCIENCE!) will not be a problem...
Sweet and sour sauce
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 tbs finely chopped fresh ginger
2 spring onions, finely sliced
1 small onion, sliced into wedges
1/2 red capsicum, chopped into bite-size chunks
1/2 yellow capsicum, chopped into bite-size chunks
1/2 tin pineapple slices, chopped into chunks (reserve juice for sauce)
1/2 cup pineapple juice
1/4 cup rice vinegar
3 tbs soy sauce
2 tbs shaoxing rice wine
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup tomato ketchup
1 tbs cornflour
Over medium-high heat, stir-fry garlic, ginger, spring onions and onion until fragrant and slightly softened; add capsicum and continue to stir-fry until capsicum is also slightly cooked. Meanwhile mix together all the other ingredients (apart from pineapple pieces) in a cup or bowl until sugar, ketchup and cornflour are dissolved. (This is where you start to understand why so many Chinese recipes have 'Set A' and 'Set B' ingredients...) When vegetables are just cooked, stir sauce mixture to homogenise (in case cornflour has settled) and then add pineapple pieces and sauce to wok and allow to boil for a few minutes, until sauce is glossy and translucent. Toss with your choice of deep-fried crispy thing (see below).
The sauce can be made in advance and reheated just before tossing the fried stuff in; the vegetables will go a bit soft, but if wok/burner space is limited this saves precious minutes during the critical time just before serving, when you're trying to get six different dishes all hot and on the table at the same time. Cooking the vegetables less before adding the sauce mix might help keep them crunchy and bright-coloured -- I will try this next time.
The advantage of covering things in crispy batter and deep-frying them is that it doesn't much matter what's inside, so I also decided this was a good opportunity to try sneaking in a cheeky faux-meat substitute instead of pork. Marinating about 450g of Quorn chicken pieces with some egg white, rice wine and dark soy sauce and then tossing it with potato starch before deep-frying gave a nice dark colour and a reasonably crisp coating, and then all that was needed was to toss it in the hot sauce. Result!
(And everyone thought it was pork. Ah, the power of suggestion and deep-frying.)
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