Tuesday, September 25, 2012

Ants Climbing Up A Tree

This is apparently a very popular Szechuan dish but I'd never eaten it before. In fact, I'd never heard of it before.

Sometime last week, while browsing on Instagram, I came across it. It caught my attention because of the name. Then, I started to search for information and found that it is cooked using very minimal ingredients - spicy fermented bean paste, sesame oil, cooking wine, soy sauce, sugar, and minced pork. Different cooks have different recipes for it, but the basic ingredients are essentially the same.

It sounded pretty easy and I had all the ingredients at hand, and so I decided to give it a try.

Ants Climbing Up A Tree 
Hmn ... I suppose you can't really see the minced pork. Perhaps I did not put in enough. 

I heated some oil and added some minced garlic and spring onions, followed by gojuchang. Then I added minced pork and water. In went a dash of soy sauce, shaoxing wine and sugar, and let the meat sauce simmer a while. On a spur, I decided to add in some malt vinegar. I wanted SOUR. It was only after that which I I dumped in the cellophane noodles and stirred till they cooked. 

Well, I found the whole dish to be rather oily. Must cut down the amount of oil next time! I liked the combination of flavours though - spicy, salty and sour. ;p I suppose what I'd cooked today would not be anything close to the authentic dish which, by the look of its ingredients, isn't sour at all. 

But anyway, I did enjoy the noodles for they definitely satisfied my craving for something sour. I'd definitely cook this dish again! 

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