Cook & eat
Recipes
Every Chinese recipe on Stellaok in one place: easy stir-fries, braises, noodles, steamed buns and baking, written in English for the home cook. Each dish is rebuilt from the ingredient ratios and techniques cooks in China publish, then checked against a second source before it runs here.
Cheese Potato Bowls Filled With Pork and Sweetcorn
Mashed potato shells are baked until they hold their shape, then filled with a soy-glazed pork and sweetcorn mixture and finished with camembert. A weeknight dish built from one tray.
Har Gow With a Thin, Translucent Wheat Starch Wrapper
Shrimp and carrot wrapped in a dough of boiling water and wheat starch, then steamed for five minutes. The wrapper is the hard part, and it is mostly about temperature.
Coconut Lye Breadsticks With a Dark, Chewy Crust
A part-wholemeal dough rolled around sweet coconut paste, frozen, dipped in a lye bath and baked hot. The bath is what gives the crust its colour and its particular snap.
Tomato and Potato Beef Stew Braised Until the Meat Gives Way
Brisket browned in caramel, then simmered with two kinds of tomato, potato and carrot until the sauce thickens enough to coat rice. The long braise is what makes a cheap cut taste expensive.
Silken Tofu Cooked Under a Blanket of Set Egg
A block of silken tofu browned briefly, then covered with beaten egg and left to set under a lid. A soy and oyster sauce thickens around it in two minutes.
Green Bean Braised Noodles Steamed in the Vegetable Liquid
Pork, green beans and potato braised in a shallow pool of sauce, with fresh noodles laid on top to steam rather than boil. The liquid is measured so the noodles absorb it.
Pumpkin Cheese Buns Tied Into Shape With Kitchen String
A soft pumpkin dough wrapped around a cream cheese and pumpkin filling, with a cube of camembert hidden in the middle, then tied with oiled string so it opens like a flower.
Chongqing Chicken Fried Twice and Tossed With Chillies
Breast meat marinated in soy and cornflour, fried once to cook and again to crisp, then tossed with garlic, Sichuan pepper and a pile of dried chillies. The chillies are the point.
Red-Braised Pork Belly, Rendered First So It Stays Light
Belly cubes are blanched, then fried in their own fat before the caramel goes in. Half a bottle of beer does the braising, and an hour later the skin is soft.
Taiwanese Pineapple Cakes With a Jammy Fruit Filling
Pineapple cooked down with rock sugar and maltose until the fibres turn clear, then wrapped in a cream cheese shortcrust and baked in moulds. The filling has to be weighed, not guessed.
Spare Ribs With Garlic Sprouts and Black Beans
Ribs fried hard until the edges crust, then finished with fermented black beans, garlic sprouts and a little sugar. Twenty minutes, one wok.
Scallion Pork Buns With a Loose, Juicy Filling
A wet pork filling loosened with spiced water and packed with scallion, wrapped in a risen dough and steamed. The water is what keeps the centre soupy.
Camembert Apple Muffins With a Core of Soft Cheese
A one-bowl muffin batter with sautéed apple and a cube of camembert in the middle, so each one opens onto a molten centre.
Matcha Monster Cookies With Chocolate Faces
Soft matcha cookies rolled around chocolate chips, chilled, baked on sticks and finished with melted chocolate so they read as little monsters.
Pumpkin Cheese Scones With a Cream Cheese Centre
Pumpkin puree in the dough, a core of cream cheese beaten with osmanthus jam, and a camembert cube hidden inside. Baked to look like little pumpkins.
Chia Seed Mini Baguettes With a Crisp Cut Face
A high-hydration dough with toasted chia and quinoa flour, baked twice so the split face turns golden and crisp. Small loaves, long proof.
Brown Sugar Chocolate Cookies With a Soft Centre
Brown sugar and melted butter make a soft, slightly chewy cookie that stays tender for days. Chocolate chips go in at the end, by the handful.
Six Mini Basque Cheesecakes From One Batter
One custardy base split six ways with pistachio, oreo, earl grey, comte, chocolate and strawberry. Baked hot for a burnt top, chilled for a molten middle.
Creamy Mushroom Pasta With a Two-Minute Pan Sauce
Mushrooms and onion browned in butter, a quick flour roux, cream and a slice of cheese. The sauce comes together while the pasta boils.
Garlic and Black Pepper Cheese Scones With Ham
Cold butter rubbed into flour, then cream cheese, ham and a lot of black pepper folded through. The dough stays rough on purpose and bakes into layers.
Snow Peas With Cured Sausage: A Ten-Minute Stir-Fry
Blanching the peas for thirty seconds and then shocking them is the whole trick; after that the stir-fry takes four minutes and cannot go wrong.
Yunnan Ham Pastries With Blue Cheese and Honey
The sweet-savoury ham pastry from Yunnan, with blue cheese folded into the filling and a lard pastry that opens into a hundred layers.
Sweet Potato Tart With Camembert and Cream
A cocoa tart shell, almond cream, sieved sweet potato and a mound of white chocolate cream, with cubes of Camembert hidden in the middle.
Red-Braised Chicken With Green and Red Pepper
A fast home braise: the chicken is dry-fried first so the skin renders, then sugar and soy go in and the whole thing reduces to a sticky glaze.