Chinese Braised Shiitake Mushrooms

Photo: Linda

Ingredients

marinade

1 tablespoon ginger juice

1 tablespoon spring (green) onion juice

1 tablespoon light soy sauce

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 pinch salt

100 grams (3 ½ oz) dried shiitake mushrooms

2 garlic cloves, crushed

1/2 teaspoon peanut oil

240 milliliters (1 cup) ready-made chicken/vegetable stock

3/4 tablespoon oyster sauce

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 pinch black pepper

1 1/4 centimeters (½ inch) rock sugar

1/2 teaspoon sesame oil

1 tablespoon shaoxing wine

3/4 tablespoon cornstarch OR unmodified potato starch in 80 ml (⅓ c) water

Preparation

Soak the mushrooms in boiling water for 30 minutes. Remove the stems (you can save them for stuffed tofu or something else).

Meanwhile make the marinade, by mixing everything together in a medium sized bowl. Marinate the mushrooms for at least 10 minutes.

Heat the oil in a large frying pan (skillet) with a lid. Sauté the garlic, then add the mushrooms and sauté until fragrant, about 2-3 minutes. Add the stock, oyster sauce, salt, black pepper and rock sugar. Bring to a boil and simmer with the lid on for 30 minutes. After that, uncover and allow the sauce to reduce, about 5-10 minutes.

Add the shaoxing wine and bring back to the boil, then add the starch slurry, stir and allow to thicken. Before serving sprinkle over the sesame oil and enjoy!

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About

This dish is definitely a delicious traditional Chinese dish. Make sure you choose the high quality dried Chinese mushrooms (shiitake or dun-goo in Cantonese), with the very thick, cracked caps. They will give you a robust flavor and a meaty texture.

These braised mushrooms are delicious with a steaming bowl of jasmine rice. When braised correctly, they taste meatier than meat, if that’s possible! The recipe is a definite keeper; however, I’d like to keep the dish for special occasions, due to the price of the ingredients.

As a note - To get the juice out of ginger root and spring onion, simply chop very fine, then squeeze through a tea-towel (kitchen towel).