Chop Suey
Units
Temperature
Servings
Ingredients
Protein and velveting marinade
- 200 g chicken breast, sliced thinly across the grain; see the variations for other proteins rounded
- 8 g cornflour rounded
- 10 ml light soy sauce rounded
- 10 ml neutral oil rounded
- 2 g bicarbonate of soda, optional tenderiser for beef; see notes (optional) rounded
Sauce
- 185 ml chicken stock or water rounded
- 22 ml light soy sauce rounded
- 15 ml oyster sauce, see substitutions for a vegetarian route rounded
- 15 ml Shaoxing wine rounded
- 8 g cornflour rounded
- 3 ml toasted sesame oil rounded
- 1 g ground white pepper rounded
Vegetables and aromatics
- 25 ml neutral oil rounded
- 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped rounded
- 100 g onion, sliced rounded
- 120 g carrot, sliced on a steep angle into thin ovals rounded
- 150 g celery, sliced on an angle rounded
- 100 g mushrooms, sliced rounded
- 200 g choy sum or other Asian greens, stems and leaves separated rounded
- 150 g bean sprouts, added right at the end rounded
Method
Method
- Velvet the protein. Toss the sliced chicken with the cornflour, soy sauce and oil until every piece is slick and coated, and leave it 15 minutes while you cut everything else. This thin starch jacket is what keeps restaurant meat tender and silky in a screaming hot pan, and it takes no real effort.
- Mix the sauce in a jug so it is ready to pour in one go, whisking the cornflour in last so it does not sit in a lump at the bottom. Stir it again just before it goes in the pan; cornflour settles within minutes.
- Cut every vegetable to a similar thickness and keep them in separate piles by cooking time. Hard ones are carrot and celery, medium are onion, mushroom and green stems, soft are leaves and sprouts.
- Sear the protein first and take it out. Heat a wok or wide skillet until it genuinely smokes, add half the oil, spread the chicken in one layer, and leave it 60 seconds before tossing. Cook 2 minutes total, until just cooked through, then tip it onto a plate. Undercook it slightly; it goes back in later.
- Fry the aromatics and the hard vegetables. Add the rest of the oil, then the garlic for 15 seconds until fragrant, then the carrot and celery for 2 minutes, keeping everything moving.
- Work down the list. Onion, mushrooms and green stems for 2 minutes, then the leaves for 1 minute. Everything should still have life in it; this is the point where home cooks overcook and end up with grey stew.
- Return the protein, add the sauce. Pour in the stirred sauce, toss constantly, and let it come to a boil. It thickens in about 60 seconds and turns from cloudy to glossy as the cornstarch cooks out. That gloss is the signal.
- Bean sprouts last, off the heat. Fold them through in the residual heat so they stay crisp, and serve immediately with steamed rice.
Variations
The sauce and method stay the same. Swap the protein and adjust as noted.
- Vegetable chop suey. Leave the protein out and add 200 g more mixed vegetables, plus a handful of snow peas and baby corn. Use vegetarian oyster sauce and vegetable stock.
- Mushroom chop suey. Replace the protein with 400 g mixed mushrooms, browned hard in a dry pan first to drive off water before any oil goes in, otherwise they steam and the sauce goes thin.
- Tofu chop suey. 300 g firm tofu, pressed and torn into rough pieces, dusted with cornflour and browned separately until crisp, then folded in with the sauce at the very end so it stays crisp.
- Chicken, beef or pork chop suey. The recipe as written. For beef use flank or sirloin sliced very thinly across the grain and add the optional bicarbonate of soda to the marinade, rinsing it off after 20 minutes. For pork use shoulder or loin.
- Prawn chop suey. 250 g peeled prawns, velveted the same way but seared for only 60 to 90 seconds and returned right at the end with the sauce.
- House special chop suey. 100 g each of chicken, prawn and char siu. Sear the chicken and prawn separately, and add the char siu with the sauce since it is already cooked.
Notes
- Chop suey is an American restaurant dish, not a Chinese one, invented in Chinese-American kitchens in the late 1800s and named from a Cantonese phrase meaning odds and ends. It is worth knowing that so you can cook it with confidence instead of apologising for it.
- A dry, screaming hot pan is more important than any ingredient here. Crowd the pan and everything steams. If your burner is weak, cook the vegetables in two batches.
- The optional bicarbonate of soda is for beef only, and it needs rinsing off after 20 minutes or the meat tastes soapy. Chicken and prawns do not need it.
- Bean sprouts go in off the heat, always. Thirty seconds of cooking is the difference between crisp and limp, and they are there entirely for the crunch.
Ingredient substitutions
- Oyster sauce is the savoury backbone of most of this shelf. Vegetarian mushroom oyster-style sauce is stocked by Asian grocers in Germany and Canada and is an honest swap with slightly less depth. Failing that, use 15 ml hoisin plus a splash of extra soy, which is sweeter.
- Shaoxing wine substitutes as elsewhere here, dry sherry closest, mirin acceptable with less sugar, stock with a little rice vinegar for an alcohol-free bowl.
- Choy sum can be any Asian green or simply more celery and cabbage; the dish is defined by its sauce and cut, not by one leaf.