A Chinese Dinner - Garlic Steamed Fish, Beans and Cabbage Soup

A Chinese Dinner - Garlic Steamed Fish, Beans and Cabbage Soup 

Raw ingredients for tonight's dinner

For tonight's dinner, we will be cooking some simple Chinese style dishes - Steamed fish with garlic oil, stir fry french beans with carrot and cabbage soup. 

Start Time: 8.22pm

As usual, we record our start time to see if we can prepare this meal for two in 60 minutes.

Preparing the ingredients

For tonight, I will be using leftover rice. So I won't be boiling any rice. But if you are, boil it before you prepare your ingredients.

Chop enough garlic for the fish and your vegetable dish into little pieces. 

For the soup, you can choose to either use garlic or ginger. Prepare whichever you pick. In my case, I went with garlic, as there was no ginger available.

Slice some carrot and french beans. Optionally, you can choose to add in some tiny prawns or chicken slices. 

Wash your fish slice and rub some salt into it. Also wash a small amount of anchovies (ikan bilis) for your soup. This is to add flavour to the soup.

Clean your sink / work area if it gets dirty from all the chopping.

Looks like I am done preparing the ingredients and cleaning up the sink. Guess what?? It only took me 15 minutes! 

The cooking

In a wok, fill enough water to steam for approximately15 minutes (this is roughly the time needed for the fish to cook). Set a timer if you are worried you won't be able to keep time. 

While we wait for the fish to be ready, in a separate pan, heat some oil (enough to drizzle over your fish later). Fry the garlic you've prepared for both the fish and vegetable dish. Cook till golden brown and pour the majority of your garlic and all it's oil into a bowl. Set aside to cool.

 1. The vegetable

With the fire still running and the remainder garlic in the pan, pour in the sliced meat/prawns if you are using them. Else just pour in the carrots and french beans into the pan. Add some water to help them cook. Simmer for a while and add in some salt and soy sauce for taste. You can also add some oyster sauce to add flavour to the gravy. Once the beans are cooked, turn off the gas pour the contents into your serving plate.

2. The soup

Using the same pan, heat the pan until it is dry, then add in some oil. Once the oil is hot, fry the anchovies (ikan bilis) until it is slightly crispy. Add the ginger/garlic for the soup. Fry it for a while more. While waiting, measure a bowl of water. Pour the water into the pan. Be careful when you do this, as things might start splashing out of the pan and hot steam will be coming out from the pan. Cover the pan and let boil.

Do some cleaning while you wait for the water to boil. Don't worry about over-boiling the water. It is alright to do so, so long as there's still water in the pan, as it will help your soup be more tasty.

If your timer goes off for the fish, just turn off the gas for it. You can leave the fish inside to keep warm until you are done cooking and ready to eat.

Once you are done cleaning, add the cabbage to the soup and cover to boil. 

Since I am using frozen rice, I heat my rice in the microwave, setting it for 3 minutes.

How long to boil the cabbage for, depends on how you like your cabbage to be. If you like them crunchy still, then boil them only until they look a little soft (about 2 -3 minutes).  Add in some salt and soy sauce for taste.

Once the soup is done, turn off the gas and pour out the soup into the serving bowl. Next, take the fish out of the wok. Be careful as the plate/bowl you steamed your fish in will now have some water in it. Pour some out if it is too much. Pour the garlic and oil you previously set aside and dribble some soy sauce on top.

Your fish will look something like this:

Scoop the rice out unto plates and wah lah... dinner is served!





I washed the frying pan and rinced the wok. The time now is 9.05pm.

That makes it only 45 minutes.

There we go, another healthy home-cooked meal for your family in less than an hour.

Enjoy!

Do leave your comments or questions, if you have any below.

Thanks for reading!