Suan Cai Yu: Boiled Fish With Pickled Cabbage And Chili

Firstly, we should prepare ingredients for this recipe. Finely chop 3 slices of ginger. Then save them for later. Finely mince 4 cloves of garlic. Then save them for later. Cut 1 bunch of green onion, separate green onion segment, and green onion leaves. Then save them for later.

Second, we should prepare green onion and ginger water. The green onion and ginger water can help us to get rid of the fishy smell from the fish later. Add green onion segment, ginger, 50ml warm water into the bowl. Grasp and rub them evenly. Then save them for later. Then separate one egg and save it for later.

Then cut 300g sour mustard into pieces and save them for later. If you don’t like the salt  taste of sour mustard, you can immerse it few hours to remove the salt taste. Of  course, if you like it, you can add more.

Then immerse 5g dried red peppers for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, drain and cut them into pieces.

Then immerse 1 bunch of mung bean threads noodles for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, drain and save them for later. If you want to cook it for more people, you can add more mung bean threads noodles to immerse.

Next, we should prepare 10g white sesame seeds for this recipe. Add white sesame seeds, 2 tablespoons of water into the pan. Use middle fire to heat them. Stir fry them evenly. After the sesame seeds started to be broken, drain and save them for later. With the help of water, it is not easy to burn the white sesame seeds.

Next, we should prepare a 400g snakehead for this recipe. Cut the head of the snakehead. Then drain water from fish skin and cutting board. We can use some kitchen paper to do it. It can prevent slipping. Then remove the flesh from both sides of the snakehead. Then cut the fishbone into pieces. Then cut the flesh into thin slices. If you don’t want to the flesh with fish skin, you can remove them. Then save them for later.  We can choose bigger fish for this recipe if we should serve it to more people.

Next, we should marinate snakehead slices. Firstly, put snakehead slices into the bowl. Then add 1 tablespoon salt into the bowl. Grasp and rub them evenly. Then use water to wash them three times.

After that, these snakehead slices will be white and clean with no fishy taste. Then drain and put them on the plate. Then add 1 teaspoon salt, 1/2 teaspoon chicken powder, 1/2 teaspoon pepper, green onion, and ginger water to the plate. Grasp and rub them evenly. Then add egg white, 1/2 tablespoon corn starch to the plate. Grasp and rub them evenly. Then save them for later.

Now we can start to cook Suan Cai Yu. Add 2 tablespoons lard into the pan. Use middle fire to heat it. Then add the fish head and the fish bones into the pan. Fry them until golden brown on both sides. This will get rid of the fishy smell and make the soup thicker, whiter, and more fragrant.

After that, add sour mustard into the pan. Use big fire to stir fry until fragrant. Then add enough water into the pan. Use big fire to cook the soup to be thick. Then taste it and use some salt and vinegar to tweak the taste according to our flavor.

Then add mung bean threads noodles into the pan. After the noodles are cooked, drain them into the bowl. After that, boil the water and then add snakehead slices into the pan. Don’t touch them when they are first in the pan.

Wait until they are completely cooked and set, push them. Then pour them into the bowl. Sprinkle with the white sesame seeds and green onions.

Then add 3 tablespoons of sunflower oil into the pan. Use a small fire to heat it. Then add minced garlic, dried red peppers, 3g Sichuan peppercorns into the pan. Stir fry until fragrant. The dried red peppers are easy to become black that we need to fry them quickly.

Then pour them into the Suan Cai Yu. Then we got the delicious Suan Cai Yu. If you taste it, you will find that fish slices are smooth and tender. Hope you can try it at home.