Chapter 1000: Chapter 416: The Ordinary Yet Perfect-Level Dry-Fried Beef Rice Noodles! "Passing the Torch" at the Fishing Platform!

Huo Yifan carefully contemplated the meaning of the phrase, then earnestly turned to Xie Baomin and said:

"Thank you for your guidance!"

"There’s no need to thank me, even if you ask your dad, he would say the same thing."

In front of the stove, Cheng JianShe, who had marinated the beef, began to prepare the side dishes.

Onion cut into strips, chive and scallion cut into roughly five-centimeter sections, all cut and then put chives and scallions together, onions and silver sprouts together.

The purpose of adding onions is to enhance the flavor of the rice noodles.

In the restaurants of the Lingnan Region, to improve kitchen efficiency and ensure consistent taste in dishes, they specifically use light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, soy sauce, sugar, chicken powder, flavoring, oyster sauce, and other seasonings. Using a certain ratio, they stew these into a sauce for dry-fried beef rice noodles.

When stir-frying beef noodles, simply ladle some of the sauce into the pan.

Using this sauce to stir-fry beef rice noodles makes the taste very rich and also greatly improves back-end kitchen efficiency.

But today, without specialized sauce, it’s necessary to add some onion to utilize its inherent sweetness to elevate the rice noodle taste and also increase its texture.

Crispy onions and silver sprouts not only remove greasiness but also make the rice noodles more aromatic and chewy.

With the ingredients prepared properly, Cheng JianShe shakes apart the rice noodles in the basket and breaks apart those that were stuck together, making cooking easier and allowing flavors to penetrate.

Having done this, he sets the wok on the stove and heats it on high flame.

Next, he adds cold oil, sweeps the pan, then pours it out, adds a little bit of cooking oil again, then throws in silver sprouts and onions, adds a touch of table salt, and stir-fries on high heat for ten seconds, then drains it with a colander.

This step is to stir-fry out the excess moisture from silver sprouts and onions, removing any off-flavors from the two ingredients.

At the same time, stir-frying to slightly tender but still crisp lays the groundwork for the next cooking step.

After removing the silver sprouts and onions, he cleans the wok, heats it again, and adds more peanut oil.

With the oil at sixty percent heat, Cheng JianShe empties the marinated beef in, using the back of the ladle to quickly rotate in the pan, opening the beef in the hot oil.

Once the beef’s surface changes color, he immediately places the colander above the oil vat, holding the wok, he pours both beef and hot oil in.

He then sets the wok back on the stove to reheat.

At this time, much of the beef’s surface oil has been drained, and the beef in the colander is returned to the wok.

Seeing this step, Qi Zhentao’s master sighed softly:

"It’s truly in their hands now; this Chef Cheng is much more skilled than we imagined."

The previous steps were similar to any Cantonese chef, but this step of draining oil and stir-frying the beef dry showcases the deep mastery of a chef.

When beef is taken out after color changes, although its tenderness is sufficient, the interior might still lack some cooking through.

With the beef soaked in hot oil, it would contain more oil than desired.

So, it requires dry stir-frying in the pan.

Through this stir-frying, the beef is completely cooked through, while also removing excess oil, making the beef taste delicately aromatic and soft.

The biggest problem with dry-fried beef rice noodles is that they’re prone to being greasy.

The pursuit among Cantonese chefs is achieving dry aromatic tastiness of beef and rice noodles, without greasy aftertaste, while retaining a hint of oily fragrance.

Cheng JianShe’s dry stir-frying steps are a demonstration of greaseless technique.

But this step requires extreme control over heat, a slight mistake can lead to beef being overcooked, dried, and hardened.

Therefore, without substantial Cantonese culinary skills, one wouldn’t attempt it lightly.

Rather delay beef’s exit from oil by five seconds than take this risk.

Seeing this step, He Jiajun fully realized his three-of-a-kind just handed over to Chef Cheng.

No wonder he dared to come to Yanjing restaurant as head chef here.

Indeed, he has skills to boast.

After stir-frying the beef for a few seconds, Cheng JianShe flips it and fries for a few seconds more.

Once more pours out.

But this time does not pour into the colander on the oil vat but into the one with silver sprouts and onions, and after pouring it in, he casually adds the chives and scallion together inside.

Soon, these ingredients will be added to the pan simultaneously.

The wok returned to the stove, heated on high flame, he then scatters the rice noodles loosely into the wok.

When adding, spread them out, striving as much as possible to arrange the rice noodles in a pancake shape, which better helps rice noodles fry with a rice scent.

For dry-fried beef rice noodles to taste good, they must first fry a bit when added to the pan.

Frying not only enhances the aroma, giving rice noodles a scorched feeling, but also makes them less prone to breaking apart, keeping them intact for better presentation.

It’s most taboo for dry-fried rice noodles to break apart, regardless of how good the taste might still be, that constitutes failure.

During frying, Cheng JianShe grabbed one ear of the double-eared wok consistently shaking to cook uniformly all over the bottom.

When sounds of sizzling emerge from the pan base, he uses a spoon to ladle a little peanut oil, quickly circling around the pan edge, sparingly adding a belt of oil.

Shaking the wok again, letting peanut oil quickly soak underneath the rice noodles.

Then shaking the wok fast, letting rice noodles rotate inside, performing a large flip, reversing the rice noodle pancake.

As the underside rose up, even seated Guo Jichang couldn’t help but stand.

The rice noodles were beautifully fried, slightly scorched, fragrant, with limited oil maximized in usage.