How to make delicious congee shop side dishes of poached beef and offal
- Poached beef and bean sprouts with fried garlic and shallots is a subtly delectable addition to the rice soup
- As is poached pork kidney and liver, while both make a great accompaniment to boiled rice or noodles, too
Many congee specialist shops have a short menu of snacks, in case customers want something more substantial than rice soup. The snacks include fried wonton, fried fish balls with salted clam sauce, fried noodles with soy sauceand a variety of poached fish, meats and offal. The poached dishes sound dull compared with the fried ones, but they are subtly delicious.
Poached beef and bean sprouts with fried garlic and shallots
This dish takes only about half an hour to cook, and most of that time is spent preparing the shallots and garlic oil – the beef and bean sprouts take less than five minutes to poach. Not all congee shops top their poached beef with fried garlic and shallots, but those that do make batches for use within a day or two. At home, it is best to make it fresh.
Buy thinly sliced beef from the supermarket, usually labelled for sukiyaki or hotpot.
Aged soy sauce has a rich, not too salty flavour. I buy Yuan’s, which is called royal soy sauce. It is expensive but a bottle lasts a long time, because the soy sauce is used in small amounts.
As well as congee, this dish goes well with steamed rice, or boiled noodles.
For the garlic and shallot oil:
4 shallots (about 60 grams), peeled
3 garlic cloves, peeled
60ml cooking oil