Vermicelli with BBQ Pork and Mushroom

Tonight’s dinner was one of those ‘use whatever you have’ dishes. Hubby wanted noodles for dinner and I had half a packet of dried brown rice vermicelli (‘mei fun’ in Cantonese) in the pantry. Rice vermicelli is usually fried with meat (pork), shrimps and greens. I had some BBQ pork in the freezer, dried mushroom and some baby bok choy so it’s perfect.

Fried rice vermicelli is a simple dish but involves several steps: soaking the dried vermicelli, frying an omelette and cutting it to shreds, and frying the vegetable and meat separately. It is not an easy dish to make as you can either undersoak or undercook the vermicelli resulting in hard, indigestible noodles, or oversoak or overcook the noodles resulting in a sloppy, gloppy dish! The first time I fried vermicelli, I had noodles everywhere, it was a mess! But you do get better at it over time.

(Forgive the rather poor pictures. I took these photos with a camera phone! I’m still waiting for my computer to arrive.)

Fried Rice Vermicelli with BBQ Pork and Mushroom

Ingredients
200g shredded BBQ pork (you can also use 100g shredded pork and 100g shrimps)
3 dried Chinese mushrooms
2 eggs
200g baby bok choy
250g rice vermicelli (I used brown rice vermicelli)
1 small shallot, sliced (or 1 stalk green onion)
1 tbsp dark soy sauce
1 tbsp light soy sauce
2 tbsp BBQ pork drippings/juice (ask from the BBQ pork butcher, the meat is usually in a pan with the juices).

1. Soak dried vermicelli in lukewarm water for 10 minutes or until softened. Pour into a colander and drain well. (If using pork, season with a little soy sauce, cornstarch and pepper.) Rinse mushrooms and soak in hot water till softened. Retain the water and slice mushrooms thinly, set aside. Beat eggs in a bowl and fry in a non-stick pan into an omelette. Cut into shreds and set aside. Combine the BBQ pork drippings and the light soy sauce to make one and a half cup of seasoning. (Or use 1-2 tbsps of oyster sauce if you do not have the drippings.)

2. Wash and cut bok choy into section. Fry with 1 tbsp of oil till softened. Remove from pan and set aside. Fry BBQ pork till fragrant and heated through, remove. If using raw pork and shrimps, fry till cooked and remove. Fry mushrooms and shallot till fragrant. Drizzle over the dark soy sauce, mix, then add in the seasoning. Bring to a boil. Bring heat to medium.

3. Add in the rice vermicelli and toss well. Add the bok choy and cover for 1 minute. Remove the cover and toss to combine all the ingredients and to make sure the noodles is evenly covered with the seasoning. Toss until the the vermicelli is fairly dry. Add in the pork and toss again to combine. Taste and add more light soy sauce if needed. Dish out and scatter the shredded omelette on top. Enjoy!

About these ads