What's for dinner tonight? Chinese Sweet and Sour Pork over Fried Rice
Every year, on Christmas Eve, it's our family's tradition to have Chinese food. I don't know from where it came, but it's almost as exciting as our dinner on the next glorious day. In times of penny pinching (like this year), cooking at home is a must and to keep my family happy, the entrée's title must start with the word "Sweet". Grandma lets me take over this main course and I'm proud to say that she should.
Now the key to this meal is my sauce. I've worked on mastering my easy making, super simple sweet and sour sauce (Annie's Simple and Sweet 'n Sour Sauce) using pear preserves for quite some time. My family has agreed that I've finally figured it out and I'm so excited to share it with only you. Did I mention that no use of a boiling pot is involved for making this sauce?
Starting from the bottom of the plate to the top, here's how the was dish made:
Fried Rice
My fried rice might be a little simple, but it works for my family. You need:
1 cup of rice (= a little under 3 cups cooked)
2 eggs
½ cup frozen carrots
½ cup frozen peas
Soy sauce
3 pats butter
Spray Cooking Oil
Steam the rice.
Fry the eggs, scramble and finely chop them with the spatula until they're cooked through. Remove them from the pan and save for later.
In the same pan, spraying well with cooking oil and a little butter, add into the pan frozen carrots and peas. Keep stirring until they're cooked.
Next, scoot the vegetables aside, add another couple dabs of butter and gradually stir in the rice. When the rice begins to brown, mix in the vegetables and stir.
Following that, add the set aside, finely chopped scrambled eggs and top the flavor of the fried rice by stirring in soy sauce to taste.
Note that most people add a ½ of cup of mushrooms, onions, pork, chicken and/or other delicious treats to their fried rice, but I'm a simple girl and will let you experts "spice" it up for yourselves.
The next easy layer is the meat.
Fried Pork
Note that all of the ingredients are in 1's:
1 pound of boneless pork;
1 big teaspoon of oil;
1 bag of frozen stir fry vegetables (or cut up thinly 1 green bell pepper and 1 red sweet bell pepper).
Simmer the pork in the oil and carefully add the vegetables. Turn off the wok or pan, cover and let it steam to its doneness. Very simple, right?
Now, the piece de resistance!
[Annie's Simple and]Sweet 'n Sour Sauce
For the sauce you need 2 separate receptacles. I use a one cup measuring cup for the mixture, so it's easy to pour into the pear preserves bowl.
This mixture consists of ¼'s:
¼ cup of barbeque sauce;
¼ cup of apple cider vinegar;
¼ cup of water and
½ (two ¼'s) cup of pear preserves.
Mix everything -with the exception of the pear preserves- together. Slowly pour the mixture into the bowl of pear preserves stirring vigorously to create the texture or thickness you like for your sauce.
That's it! That's my secret that I will only share with you, my dear friends. The six of us eat this quickly and since they say you are hungry again an hour after eating Chinese food, I'll hurriedly plan my next issue of "What I'm having for dinner tonight?" for you immediately after I finish my last bite!
Feel free to check out our webstore JustPots-N-Pans http://www.justpotsnpans.com for stock pots, pans, skillets and woks to use to prepare your Chinese Sweet and Sour Pork!
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