Apparently, we love to deep-fry stuff. Growing up, I don’t think I ever realized how many of the foods I ate were actually deep-fried first, before it was stir-fried with sauce. It definitely adds a crispy texture, which binds well to the thick sauce and leads to a flavorful and crunchy bite.

Ingredients

1 lb haddock filets
1/2 teaspoon salt
water
2 tsp cornstarch
chopped scallions
Sauce
- 1/2 tablespoon fish sauce
- 1 tablespoon soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon sugar
- 1 1/2 tablespoon vinegar

Steps

Cut the fish into small strips and mix well with 1/2 tsp of salt. The salt will help the fish absorb the water.

Then add 2 tsp cornstarch, a couple drips of water, and mix. This will form the base of the battered fish for deep-frying.

On the side, create a sauce of fish sauce, soy sauce, sugar, vinegar. Mix the sauce until the sugar is dissolved.

In a tub of more dry cornstarch, cover the each strip of fish in a healthy padding of cornstarch. When fried, this layer will become the crunchy part.

Now heat frying oil to ~375 deg F. Once at temperature, carefully add each fish filet to deep fry.

When the fish are done, move the cooked fish out onto a dish.

Now clear the wok to prepare the sauce. Turn the heat on high.

Heat a little cooking oil along with the scallions.

Add 1/2 cup of water and the previously prepared sauce.

Bring the mixture to a boil.

While mixing the sauce, add more cornstarch until it becomes a thick gravy.

In the final step, add the fish to the wok. At this point you don’t want to stir-fry like you traditionally would with a spatula (this may break the fragile fish filets apart). Instead while only holding the wok handle, toss the fish with the sauce until it is fully coated. If you find this too difficult, you can just scoop the sauce over the plated fish.

We were apparently too busy eating this dish to remember to take a picture of the final state 😋.

Fuzhou Food

Sweet and Sour Fish, 糖醋鱼片