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| The Basic Chinese Meat Marinade |
Growing up in a Chinese family, I learned from an early age that numbers all have an alternative meaning - almost a magical or alchemical one! Hence, 'two' was never just a '2', the second to one, but also equivalent to 'easy' and 'good'; and 'eight' was not only an '8' but a symbol of 'wealth' and 'overall abundance'. Evidence that the play with numbers and their meaning has remained strong among Chinese is self revealing time and time again, as thousands of dollars are spent on the 'right' license plate numbers both in Hong Kong and Canada, and only the 'right' number of dumplings and dishes appear at any dinner across Chinese families everywhere. You'll forever have 2, 3 or 5 dishes and dumplings and never '4' as the pronunciation of four in Chinese is equivalent to death and inauspiciousness.
Given my Chinese heritage, I'll continue this section of the blog trying to demystify the basics of Chinese cuisine in our home cooking 'rules of 3' (three being a good number, of course - equivalent to 'life', and nothing more appropriate than to link food with life, particularly for all of us who live to eat!)
Well - here goes the first Magic Three Rule of Chinese Cooking:
Magic Three Rule # 1: "For any beef marinade of any kind, just use: Soy Sauce, Sugar and Corn Starch - with slightly a higher proportion of soy sauce over sugar and cornstarch"
This is one of the first things in cooking my mom ever taught me and once this is done, whether you are doing a fusion fajitas dish, or a light beef stir fry the only thing you need to do is sautee greens or aromatics and voila! The dish is done in 15 minutes. A variation to this rule of 3 marinade is that when you cook chicken (in thin strips) instead of beef you would marinate it with a variation of the magic three by using: Soy Sauce, Egg White and Corn Starch - the egg white will give the chicken a very silky texture.
The Magic Three Rule # 1 works with any type of cuisine and I must say that even to cook a traditional steak over the skillet or the barbecue, this marinade will yield great results! Give it a try and discover for yourself other ways in which you can use this mix of ingredients! - C
