I’ve written about my love of Chinese food; one of the hardest decisions of my childhood was to have Italian or Chinese food for my birthday dinner.
My all-time favorite Chinese restaurant was The Jade Isle in Scotch Plains, NJ. I loved the shrimp in the pineapple! As a kid, I couldn’t wait until I was an adult to have one of those fancy drinks with umbrellas!
Growing up in NJ, there was a lot of good Chinese food from take-out only to my favorite place called The Jade Isle. Technically it was a Polynesian restaurant, but they had Chinese food and a pool inside with turtles and fish. I loved their pupu platter!
Pupu platter and other dishes at the Jade Isle.
Being gluten-free has put a damper on my ability to eat Chinese food. We used to go to PF Changs, which has a gluten-free menu with ok joined and ok food. Then we heard about Ala Shanghai in Albany.
Ala Shanghai is very gluten-free friendly, with choices clearly marked on the menu. Some of the menu items are a gluten-free dream come true, like sesame or crispy beef. Other fried dishes are prepared in a non-contaminated fryer; dishes like General Taos, sesame, sweet and sour, and orange chicken. This may not seem like a big deal to some people, but these items are never available in Chinese restaurants because the frying oil has wheat in it.
The drink was delicious even without an umbrella.
My favorite is their steamed shrimp dumplings, another thing you can’t get at traditional Chinese restaurants. The owners are very nice, and the service is fast and professional. Even if you aren’t gluten-free and in the area, you should check it out. Call ahead for a reservation since the place is always packed.
Making Chinese food in a home kitchen is hard to do. I make pretty good Thai & Korean food, but Chinese cuisine is still a challenge. It never really tastes like authentic Chinese food except for Chicken & Broccoli.
I have been making this Chinese dish for ten years. The recipe is easy and on point. I have posted photos and the link to Simply Whisked recipe on my Facebook page for years. Many people have used the recipe with the same success. Even though I use a Chinese wok, you can use any large skillet.
Chicken and broccoli are dishes I also used to order at Chinese places. Because it has soy sauce in it, which has wheat, I can’t have it anymore. Gluten-free people use tamari sauce with us like soy sauce just without wheat.
The well-known brand La Choy’s soy sauce is also gluten-free and cheaply found in any grocery store. It says gluten-free right on the bottle. Their teriyaki sauce is gluten-free as well.
I use boneless chicken thighs when making this recipe. It takes a bit extra time trimming away the fat, but the thighs have more flavor than boneless breasts and stay moister.
I won’t take credit for this recipe because it isn’t mine. It is one of the very few recipes I follow and don’t change. I included the link to this recipe above.
Egg drop soup is a very simple soup to make. My recipe tastes pretty darn close to egg drop soup at a Chinese restaurant. I experimented with different ingredients and amounts until I found what I liked best.
Most recipes don’t tell you to keep the ginger and scallion bottoms whole, steeping them in the broth. This takes away the task of fishing out ginger and scallions in your broth. I remove them before I add the cornstarch slurry and eggs. The flavor is subtle, but it’s there. Another trick that I learned from trying many recipes is adding the sesame oil to the eggs while scrambling them. It helps the eggs come together better in the broth without it.
I have written many times about trying a new recipe once to see if you like it, if you don’t you can adapt it to your taste. With this recipe, I taste it throughout the process. After adding the ginger rounds and scallion bottoms, I let the broth simmer for 10 minutes; I taste it.
Tonight, I was satisfied with the taste coming from the scallions and removed them. There wasn’t enough ginger taste, so I added another ginger round and let it simmer for five more minutes. That did the trick! I removed the ginger rounds from the broth.
The other secret to making egg drop soup is to stir the broth in a whirlpool manner while adding the cornstarch slurry. I check to see if the soup is too thin or too thick. I make adjustments if necessary. I do the same whirlpool method when adding the eggs and sesame oil.
I give the soup a taste and decide if it is salty enough. Instead of adding kosher salt, I add 1/2 tsp soy sauce at a time to adjust the seasoning. This depends on the saltiness of the chicken broth you used for the soup. Tonight I added 1/2 tsp to the finished soup. Some recipes call for white pepper in their egg drop soup. I don’t like it, so I leave it out but add it if desired. Be careful; it is potent stuff. I think it takes away from the lovely ginger flavor.
I hope if you are a Chinese food fan like me, you will try these recipes that have proven successful over and over, saving yourself a trip to get Chinese take-out.🙂
Egg Drop Soup
Ingredients
4 cups chicken stock
2-3 rounds of fresh ginger
2 white scallion bottoms
2 Tbsp cornstarch
3 Tbsp water
2 large eggs
1/2 tsp sesame oil
2 sliced green scallion tops
*** 1/4 tsp white pepper optional
***Soy sauce to taste
Directions
Add the chicken stock, ginger, and scallion bottoms to a pot. Bring to a boil. Simmer for 10 minutes. Taste the broth. Remove the ginger and scallion bottoms when you are happy with the flavor.
For the cornstarch slurry, mix the water with the cornstarch well in a small bowl. Stirring in a circle, add the slurry to the simmering broth. Stir aggressively to prevent lumps from forming.
In a small bowl, scramble the eggs well and add the sesame oil to the eggs.
Add the egg and sesame oil mixture to the broth in a circular motion to the thickened simmer broth. Add the sliced green scallions. Simmer for 5 minutes.
Check for seasoning adding optional white pepper or soy sauce to taste.
To serve, garnish the egg drop soup with more sliced green scallions. Enjoy!
Makes 3-4 servings.