Tempura

Serves 4

TEMPURA BATTER:

1 egg
1 cup ice water
1 cup all purpose flour, sifted

Preparing Egg Mixture:
Beat an egg in a bowl. Add ice water in the bowl. Be sure to use very cold water. Add sifted flour in the bowl and mix lightly. Be careful not to overmix the batter.

*Use ice water for the batter. This is really important to prevent the batter from absorbing too much oil. Do Not Overmix!*

Step-By-Step Procedure

Remove heads and shells from shrimps without removing tails. Devein the shrimps.
Make two or three incisions in the stomach sides of the shrimps.

Lightly press the back of shrimps by fingers.

Using a knife, remove the dirt from the tails of shrimps.

Dry shrimps on paper towels.

Mix eggs and ice water in a bowl.
(Add ice cubes in the bowl to minimize oil absorption)

Add flour in the egg mixture. Lightly mix the batter (Do Not OverMix.

Flour shrimps.Heat vegetable oil to 340F degree in a deep pan.

*To check the temperature of the oil, drop a little tempura batter into the oil. If the batter comes up right away instead of sinking to the bottom of the pan, it's about 360F (temp in cooking shrimp tempura). If the batter goes halfway to the bottom and comes up, it's about 340F (temp in cooking vegetable tempura. If you are frying both seafood and vegetables, fry vegetables first. Then, fry seafood.

Pick the tail of shrimp and dip shrimp in the tempura batter. Immediately fry the shrimp until crisp. Serve tempura shrimp right away with tempura dipping sauce.

TEMPURA SAUCE:

1 bouillon cubes
1 c hot water
3 tbsp soy sauce
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp grated fresh ginger
3 tbsp grated radish

Prepare stock, drop bouillon cubes in water in a small saucepan and boil. Add soy sauce, sugar, and ginger; stir in grated radish.

*I remember before, during our cooking class we used 1c of apple juice instead of bouillon stock. no sugar(since apple juice is already sweet) just kikkoman soy sauce and grated radish... I have no exact measurement for this but it did taste good.

Bulgogi

INGREDIENTS:
2 pounds sirloin, thinly sliced
2 onions, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon sesame oil
2 tablespoons soy sauce
3 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 teaspoon ginger, freshly grated
Freshly ground pepper
1 teaspoon toasted sesame seeds (optional)

PREPARATION:
In a large bowl, add onions to beef.
Combine sugar, sesame oil and soy sauce to form a sauce. Add in garlic and ginger. Mix well.
Marinate the beef in the sauce for about three hours (the longer the better).
Season with pepper.
Grill on a grill, pan-fry or broil for about 15 minutes, or until meat is done.
Sprinkle sesame seeds over dish, serve with rice and side dishes.
Makes 4 servings.

Spicy Spareribs

Ingredients:

Serves 4

1 k meaty pork spareribs

1 tsp szechuan peppercorns

2 tbsp coarse sea salt

1/2 tsp five-spice chinese powder

1 1/2 tbsp cornflour

oil, for frying

Marinade:

2 tbsp light soy sauce

1 tsp sugar

1 tbsp chinese rice wine

ground black pepper

Using a sharp, heavy cleaver, chop the spareribs into pieces about 5cm/2 in long, or ask your butcher to do this for you. Place them in a shallow dish and set aside.

Heat a wok to medium heat. Add the szechuan peppercornd and salt and dry-fry for about 3 minutes, stirring constantly, until the mixture colours slightly. Remove from the heat and stir in the five-spice powder. set aside to cool.

Grind the cooled spice mixture in a mortar with pestle to
a fine powder

Sprinkle 1 tsp of the spice powder ocer the spareribs and rub in well with your hands. Add all the marinade ingredients and toss the ribs to coat thoroughly. Cover and leave in the refrigerator to marinate for about 2 hours, turning occasionally.

Pour off any excess marinade from the spareribs. Sprinkle the ribs with the cornflour and mix to coat evenly.

Half-fill a wok with oil and heat to 180c. Deep-fry the spareribs in batches for 3 minutes until golden brown. Remove and set aside. When all the batches have been cooked, reheat the oil to 180c and deep fry the ribs for the second time for 1-2 minutes, until criso and thoroughly cooked. Drain on kitchen paper. Transfer the ribs to a warm serving platter and sprinkle over 1 - 1 1/2 tsp of remaining spice powder. Serve immediately.