Chop Suey

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Tonight I made Chop Suey for dinner. The kids and Doug raved about it, even though I've made it before, so I thought I'd post the recipe.

According to Wikipedia, chop suey is a Chinese-American dish made with bits of meat and vegetables. My mom tells a funny story about when she was growing up and my grandma made chop suey. It was the one dish her children didn't have to eat if they didn't like it, because my grandma said it was "foreign food." It didn't matter that they were third generation Germans and ate quite a bit of German food, chop suey was "foreign."

I imagine you could use up quite a bit of leftovers with chop suey if you planned it right. I just bought some chicken breast and a bag of snow peas and started from scratch. You can eat it with rice or noodles, but we tend to go with the noodles here. Plain white spaghetti boiled, drained and tossed with a few teaspoons of sesame oil and a sprinkle of table salt. You could fry them before you mix them with the chop suey, but I don't bother. If you use noodles, I recommend doubling the sauce ingredients (see the ** below) and skipping the final cornstarch step -- the noodles really suck up the sauce.

Don't be put off by the list of ingredients, most are repeats on the list (used at different times) and if you make Chinese food at all, these are probably ingredients you already have.

Chop Suey

1 lb. lean boneless pork chops or boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 T. low salt soy sauce
2 t. rice wine
1 t. salt
½ t. freshly ground pepper
2 t. Asian sesame oil
1 egg white
1 T. cornstarch
4 T. to 1/2 c. peanut oil *
3 cloves garlic, peeled and crushed
1 T. finely shredded ginger
2 cups snow peas, trimmed
½ cup finely chopped scallions
¼ cup chicken broth **
1 T. light soy sauce **
2 t. rice wine **
2 t. chili bean paste or sauce **
1/2 t. salt (can be omitted if you're watching your salt)
1 t. sugar **
¼ t. freshly ground pepper (can be omitted if you want it less spicy)
1 t. cornstarch mixed with 2 t. water
2 t. sesame oil

cooked noodles or rice



Cut pork or chicken into shreds 2 inches long by 1/8 inch wide.
In medium-sized bowl, mix pork with soy sauce, rice wine, salt, pepper and sesame oil.
Mix in egg white and cornstarch and toss until pork is coated.
Refrigerate for 20 minutes.
Heat a wok until very hot and swirl in peanut oil.
When oil is very hot, immediately add the meat shreds, stirring vigorously.
As soon as meat begins to lose its raw look, drain in a colander.
Add 1 T. oil to wok and heat.
When hot, toss in garlic and ginger and stir-fry for 30 seconds.
Scatter in snow-peas and scallions and stir fry for one minute.
Pour in stock, soy sauce, and rice wine.
Spoon in chili paste, salt, sugar, and pepper.
Stir to mix well and return meat to pan, cooking for 2 to 4 minutes.
Slowly drizzle in cornstarch mixture.
Stir in sesame oil, transfer to a bowl over rice or noodles.

*In my opinion, you should use as little oil as necessary. The original recipe called for 2 cups. Whoa! I think you can probably get by with as little as 3 T. for the meat and 1 T. for the veggies. And I use corn oil because of our allergies.

** Double for extra saucy.
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