Joyee Cooks: Dan Dan Noodle (擔擔麵)

Recipe inspired by my favourite Shanghai Restaurant - Top Shanghai:

中文食譜: 按此

Serves 2

Ingredients:

A.) Marinade Pork

• 1/2 cup minced pork

• 1/4 tsp salt

• 1/2 tsp oyster Sauce

• 1/2 tsp sugar

• 1/2 tsp dark soy sauce

• 1/2 tsp soy sauce

• 1/4 tsp white pepper

B.) Sauce

• 2 shallot (diced)

• 3 cloves of garlic (minced)

• 1 chili pepper (sliced) - optional

• 2 tbs Chinese/ white wine

• 4 tbsp peanut butter

• 4 tbsp sesame paste

• 1 Tbs soy sauce

• 2 tbs black vinegar

• 5 tbs sugar

• a few tbs hot water (to thin out the sauce)

• 1 tbs sesame oil

C.) 2 packages noodles - cooked and drained.

D.) Garnishing (optional)

• 1/4 cup cucumbers (sliced)

• A dash of sesame

Procedure:

1. Mix all of Ingredient A together and set aside

2. Heat roughly 1 tbs of oil in a skillet pan under medium heat. Add diced shallot and minced garlic. Cook until shallot is translucent.

3. Add minced pork and stir until all the lumps and chunks are loosened up.

4. When all the moistures have evaporated and the pork bits look slightly golden brown, add wine and cook until wine is completely evaporated.

5. Reduce heat to low-medium heat. Add soy sauce, sugar, peanut butter, black vinegar, sesame paste and mix well.

6. Add hot water to thin out the sauce if it's too thick to your liking. (See consistency in the image below)

7. Add red chili (if you want a good kick. You may remove the seed to reduce the spiciness if you want something milder, or omit this step.)

8. Keep stirring and add cooked noodles. With quick hands, mix well.

9. Drizzle with sesame oil and mix well.

10. Garnish with shredded cucumbers and sesame

11. Serve.

Tips:

• It's okay to undercook your noodles initially because you will toss the noodles back into the pan with the sauce. You can finish cooking the noodles at that stage

• You do not want to overcook your noodles while you are incorporating the noodles with the sauce. I like my noodles to be chewier so I always work with quick hands. Remember that the noodles will continue to cook after you remove from the heat!

擔擔麵 (Dan Dan Noodle)

食譜靈感來自我最喜歡的上海餐廳 - 上海一只鼎：

English Recipe: Click Here

配料：

A.）豬肉醃料

• 1/2 杯免治豬肉

• 1/4 茶匙鹽

• 1/2 茶匙蠔油

• 1/2 茶匙糖

• 1/2 茶匙老抽

• 1/2 茶匙醬油

• 1/4 茶匙 白胡椒

B.）醬汁

• 2 顆 乾蔥（切碎）

• 3 瓣 大蒜（切碎）

• 1 隻 辣椒（切碎）

• 2 湯匙 米酒

• 4 湯匙 花生醬

• 4 湯匙 芝麻醬

• 1 湯匙 醬油

• 2 湯匙 鎮江醋

• 5 湯匙 糖（根據您的喜好進行調整）

• 數湯匙 熱水

• 1 湯匙 麻油

C.）麵條 - 煮熟並瀝乾。

D.）裝飾

• 1/4杯 青瓜 (黃瓜)（切絲）

• 少許 芝麻

程序:

1. 將材料A混合攪勻

2. 把鍋燒熱，注入小許油。

3. 加乾蔥，蒜頭。爆香

4. 加免治豬肉。把肉壓碎，炒至碎乾粒。

5. 水份收乾後， 盞酒。

6. 把火轉到小火，加醬油， 糖， 芝麻醬， 醋， 花生醬。 攪拌均勻。

7. 加熱水把醬汁稀釋。

8. 加辣椒 （如果不喜歡辣的朋友們， 可以省略這一步。 喜歡微辣的，可以除掉辣椒裡面的種子）

9. 加麵條, 芝麻油攪拌均勻。

10. 把切好的青瓜 (黃瓜) 絲伴碟。最後灑上芝麻。

11. 上菜。
    

小提示

* 煮乾麵條時，不用完全的煮熟。醬汁做好後，你會放麵條到汁里再煮。

* 我喜歡我的麵條比較有嚼勁，所以麵條回鍋跟醬汁攪拌時， 動作要快。不要把麵條煮太熟哦。記住鍋離開火後，麵條還會繼續煮熟的。

604: Remi Patisserie

It's interesting to see that with COVID in place, several things are on the rise:

(a.) marriages

(b.) pregnancy

(c.) divorces (ironically)

(d.) housing market (A - C all lead to point D I suppose)

(e.) Car rentals (road trips are popular these days)

(f.) and small food businesses

Lately, I've been seeing a lot more pop up events and new online stores that offer food delivery. I love seeing that and love supporting small local businesses. Remi Patisserie is a small local business that sells innovative baked goods. Remi started his online business in 2019 and now has an actual store in Vancouver. I couldn't help but notice the hype all over Instagram and the pictures on IG are all so appealing. I even had to preorder twice to submit my order through because they just couldn't keep up with the demand! As you can see from the video, their shelf was pretty much empty by the time I got there. So please remember to pre-order your goods!

The most uploaded pastries I saw on IG were the Matcha Mochi Eclair, Thai Tea roll cake, Mango Sego roll cake, and Matcha Black sesame Roll cake.

I ordered the trio which is basically a sampler of three different flavour of Swiss roll cake that comes with the matcha and Thai milk tea flavor, and the last piece is randomly selected by Remi. Unfortunately Mango Sego isn't on the menu currently, but Early Grey is one of my favourite tea flavour so it works out just perfectly!

Swiss Roll Cake:

All of the Swiss roll cakes are filled with a light flavoured tea cream with a themed panna cotta in the middle. I find it interesting as the panna cotta generally are silky smooth, but this one is creamier and is on the firmer side. It sort of reminds me of a cross over of a fudge, flan and stiffed whip cream all together. It's just an interesting fact, I'm definitely not complaining. I think I would prefer this as it incorporates better with the whipping cream and sponge cake. While the sponge layer could be a bit softer to my liking, I think the majority of you will appreciate the sponge cake more than I do. Again, I am a Nazi when it comes to sponge cakes, burgers and noodles. These three things are my specialities just because I'm so fussy about it...

Of all three flavours of the Swiss roll cakes, my favourite was the Thai Milk tea. The Thai Tea was strong but not too powerful. I like how aromatic and flavourful it was!

The earl grey flavour is on the lighter side. From the first bite, you will notice a hint of the earl tea aroma but it quickly vanishes with the following bites. The idea of the matcha black sesame flavour is definitely an attention grabber, but in my opinion I don't think it goes well with one another. The black sesame was strong so it overpowered the matcha flavour. To begin with the matcha flavour was not strong enough anyway, but if it was, it would have been a very conflicting taste with the black sesame. The whole time as I was trying to process the flavour, I felt like I was the sad child trying to pick sides over fighting parents lol. It lacks depth in the flavour. I think I would have preferred just one singular flavour - either roll cake filled with black sesame or just a potent matcha cream filling (I am a matcha addict btw) with nothing at all or possibly mochi or red bean (or both?).

All in all, these are some fantastic and innovative roll cakes. What I prefer is slightly biased because it really drills down to your own personal preferences. If you appreciate tea as much as I do, I think you would prefer the tea flavour in these rolls to be more potent like the Thai milk tea. So if you are a tea drinker, I highly recommend that you choose the Thai Milk Tea flavour. If you don't normally fancy tea, then I think you would prefer the matcha and earl grey flavour.

Matcha Mochi Eclair:

Out of everything, I am most impressed by the matcha mochi eclair because it's very challenging to keep up with the texture when the pastry cools down. The shell can easily turn soggy and soft while the mochi hardens over time. From my experience, I've never had a batch of puff pastry that does not turn soft after it's cooled down. Even Beard Papa cream puffs turn soft when it's cooled down (and that's why they always pump in the cream filling as per submitted order so the cream doesn't soften the shell quickly). Remi is smart to place the mochi in between the eclair and the matcha cream so that the cream does not soften the shell.

I also noticed that the eclair has a Craquelin topping, which is a thin cookie layer that crackles in the baking process and gives the puff/eclair shell an extra crunch. Again, Remi you are very smart to use this French technique as it helped preserve the crispiness.

The mochi was also surprisingly soft with the perfect chew even after placing the pastry in the fridge for an hour.

Overall, I am very impressed with this that I think it's worth to copycat. So stay tuned :)

Price:

$3 - $7 per piece || $23 - $23.5 per roll cake || $44 - $76 per large cakes (depending on size)

Taste: 4.2 / 5

atmosphere: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

seating: NA

Price Performance ratio: 3.9 / 5

Location: Vancouver