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An Easy Dinner in a Single Bowl

Bowl dinners are so easy. You layer everything you need for a complete meal in a bowl, in this case, a starch (rice), protein (shrimp) and veggies (baby bok choy plus mushrooms) combined with a sauce

You can cook the rice and keep it warm while stir-frying the veggies and shrimp. Put these on top of the rice, and you're done. So fast!

Baby bok choy is just the right size for this dish. Melissa's Produce distributes it widely, so you can find it in some supermarkets. I also get it from a nearby Korean market. 

For the rice, I cook either jasmine or basmati rice in lots of boiling water, then drain off the water and let the rice stand, covered, for 5 or 10 minutes. This way, you get perfect rice every time, don't have to measure the water, and the rice never sticks. An Indian chef taught me this method. 

You can prepare the rice in advance and and assemble the other ingredients ahead of time so it takes only a few minutes to put the dish together.

For the shrimp, I use big EZ peel shrimp that I keep in a bag in the freezer. Thawing them enough to peel takes only seconds, if you rinse them with cold water.

So here's the recipe, designed for one serving on the days when you're alone and need something that's as delicious as it is quick to prepare. 

SHRIMP AND BOK CHOY BOWL

2 dried shiitake mushrooms
1/2 cup water
1 teaspoon cornstarch
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 teaspoons oyster sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1/3 cup jasmine or basmati rice
2 heads baby bok choy
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 (1/4-inch) slice ginger root, peeled and finely chopped
4 large shrimp, peeled and deveined
Additional soy sauce, if needed

Soak the shiitake mushrooms in the water until very soft. Remove and slice or chop, discarding stems. Reserve the soaking liquid.

Place the cornstarch in a small bowl or measuring cup. Add 1/4 cup of the mushroom soaking liquid, the soy sauce, oyster sauce and sesame oil and stir until blended. Set aside until needed. Reserve the remaining soaking liquid.

Wash the rice well, then place in a saucepan and cover generously with water, which should come well above the rice. Bring to a boil and boil 10 minutes, uncovered. Drain, then let stand in the saucepan, covered, until needed. The rice may be prepared in advanced and reheated before using. 

Cut the bok choy crosswise in slices about 1-inch wide, or slightly wider. Discard the root end and any tough pieces at the bottom. 

Heat the vegetable oil in a wok. Add the ginger and garlic and stir fry a few seconds, but do not allow to burn. Add the bok choy and cook, stirring, for 3 minutes. Add the mushrooms, then the sauce mixture and cook and stir for 2 minutes, until the sauce is thickened. 

Place the hot rice in a heated large single serving bowl. Place the bok choy on top. 

Add 1 tablespoon of the reserved mushroom soaking liquid to the empty wok. Add the shrimp and cook about 2 minutes, turning once. 

Place the shrimp on top of the bok choy and serve at once, with additional soy sauce on the side to adjust seasoning if needed. 

Makes 1 serving.

Here's Where to Try Indo-Chinese Food

My favorite place for Chinese food right now is Little India in Artesia, not the San Gabriel Valley, Hong Kong or Taipei.  

The food isn't classic Chinese but Indo-Chinese, what people in India like to eat. I love Hakka noodles, vegetables Manchurian, chilli chicken, Szechuan fried rice and whatever else turns up on the lunch buffet at Wok N Tandoor. 

The buffet offers a tremendous variety of food for $12.95, not just Chinese, but Indian vegetarian and meats such as chicken tikka masala, tandoori chicken and goat curry.

Dishes change from time to time, but the selection is always big and includes soups such as hot and sour and sweet corn.

It's a novelty to accompany Chinese dishes with naan bread and vegetable biryani instead of the usual white rice. Even better, compose a series of plates, first Chinese, then Indian. Or try Chinese chill chicken and scallion chicken along with tandoori chicken for a cross-cultural experience. 

You could compose a fusion appetizer plate of corn chaat, khadi pakoras (in yellow sauce, above) and Chinese bhel, which is composed of crisp thin noodles in spicy sauce.

Papdi chat with garbanzo beans (the white dish in the photo) was in the lineup the other day, the sauce creamy, slightly sweet and cooling alongside the spicy dishes.

The food is promptly replaced as it disappears. Hakka noodles (Bombay style flat lo mein noodles, above) ran out because of customers like me, who scooped them up liberally, but the tray was quickly refilled. 

Vegetable balls in Manchurian sauce (above) were in demand too. 

The buffet ends with salad makings and a heavenly assortment of desserts, all the golden, syrup-soaked jalebis  you could ever want, carrot halwa, green dudhi halwa, which is made with bottle gourd; mango pudding and others, changing from day to day. 

Wok N Tandoor is very popular--every table was taken for lunch when I was last there, on a Sunday. Service is excellent. Water glasses are refilled constantly, and a waiter offered to bring naan when we didn't know it was included.  Plates were removed as soon as they were finished. And you can go back to the buffet as many times as you like. 

Names of the dishes are written on the glass sneeze guards, so it's easy to find out what they are.  

The restaurant is in a mall at the corner of Pioneer and Artesia Boulevards. Years ago, the same site was occupied by a Woodlands vegetarian restaurant. After that it had Parsi owners who occasionally put Parsi dishes on the buffet. 

Now it's a restaurant and bar. On weekends, get there early to avoid the crowds. Buffet days are Friday through Sunday, when Little India is crowded with shoppers. Tuesday through Thursday, the restaurant offers combo lunches instead. There's also a long a la carte menu of both Chinese and Indian dishes. 

Wok N Tandoor, 11833 Artesia Blvd. (corner Pioneer Blvd.), Artesia, CA 90701. Tel: (562) 424-4567. Lunch buffet Friday through Sunday, combo lunches Tuesday through Thursday. Closed Monday. 

A Bargain Lunch in Monterey Park

Can't read Chinese? It doesn't matter. You can still get one of the best lunch bargains around at My Way Deli in Monterey Park.

The blackboard (at top) lists four dishes. Reading from the top down, they are beef, pork, chicken and fish, which come with soup, a couple of vegetable dishes, rice and tea, all for $6.25.

I chose beef, and this is what I got: Taiwanese stewed beef with carrots, daikon and green onions, scented with star anise. The clear soup contains egg shreds and seaweed. Fried green beans are naturally sweet.

Chinese eggplant with ground pork (above the beef) is as good a rendition of this dish as I've had. Perhaps the accompaniments change from day to day, but these came with my order.  

My Way Deli draws local people, Chinese seniors and others who want good, economical food.

The regular menu includes Taiwanese dishes such as beef noodle soup, fried rice with Taiwanese sausage (above) and Taiwanese style porridges. 

The restaurant is in the same mall as a 99 Ranch Market, a bakery and other places for shopping after lunch.

My Way Deli, 735 W. Garvey Ave., Monterey Park, CA 91754. Tel: (626) 282-8997. Closed Thursdays.

Where to Find Two Yummy Desserts

If you need a great dessert recipe, you probably wouldn't look in a Chinese cookbook.

This would be a mistake if the book you skip over is "Katie Chin's Everyday Chinese Cookbook" (Tuttle Publishing, $24.95.)

Chin includes a couple of wow desserts--Chocolate-Raspberry Wontons (at the top) and Five-Spice Chocolate Cake (above). Three more with promise are Asian Pear Tart, Banana-Walnut Wontons and Lychee and Ginger Sorbet. I can personally praise the first two, because I tasted them when Chin signed books and gave a cooking demo at Melissa's Produce.

I couldn't stop eating the wontons with their fresh raspberry sauce and Nutella inside (recipe below). Others liked the unexpected taste of five spice in the cake. 

The cookbook is about much more than sweets, though. It's Chin's tribute to her mother, Leeann Chin, who rose from a 50-cent an hour seamstress to become a successful caterer and then the power behind a restaurant chain.

Subtitled "101 Delicious Recipes from My Mother's Kitchen," the book is packed with warm memories and enticing recipes. Perhaps Chin has excelled because of her mother's strict coaching. "She was the toughest boss I ever had," she said. "She just wanted me to be the best." Leeann Chin died six years ago.

The recipes include classic dishes from her mother, favorites that Chin grew up with at the family home in Minneapolis, catering specialties and Chin's own creations. I don't know the source of the wontons. The spice cake came from a pastry chef friend.  

Chin eventually moved to Hollywood, where her mother joined her to form Double Happiness Catering. Chin retired from that business but has just started another catering company, Wok Star.

She's studied acting, done TV and knows how to present a glamour image. This is how she looked at a book launch party in Hollywood.

And here's how she looked as she signed books at Melissa's.

For her demo, Chin showed how to make potstickers and Firecracker Shrimp (above), which she says is "one of the easiest recipes in the book." Worked out with her mother, it's shrimp wrapped in spring roll wrappers, fried and served with a dip of mayo and Sriracha sauce. 

Wanting to add Korean flavor to their repertoire, they composed Spicy Beef Skewers (above). These were fabulous too.

Another hit was Chin's Chinese Chicken Salad (above). Also on the buffet were a soy ginger edamame salad and Sichuan beef. 

Chin's recipes are easy to follow, replete with cooking tips such as tenderizing beef with baking soda and water. 

As she said at the demo, "Chinese cooking can be difficult. I'm going to show you how to make it simple and easy."

CHOCOLATE-RASPBERRY WONTONS
From "Katie Chin's Everyday Chinese Cookbook"

Raspberry sauce:

4 cups fresh raspberries
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch

Wontons:

1/3 cup chopped fresh raspberries
2/3 cup chocolate-hazelnut spread such as Nutella
16 round dumpling wrappers
1 egg, lightly beaten
Oil for frying
Confectioner's sugar for garnish
Mint leaves for garnish

To make the sauce, place the 4 cups raspberries in a small saucepan. Crush the berries and add the water. Stir in the sugar and cornstarch and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and press through a strainer. Set aside.

For the wontons, fold the 1/3 cup chopped raspberries into the chocolate-hazelnut spread until combined. Lay a dumpling wrapper on a clean work surface and brush the edges with egg. Place 1 scant tablespoon of the chocolate-hazelnut raspberry mixture in the center, then fold the wrapper in half over the filling, pressing the edges firmly to seal. Repeat with the remaining wrappers and filling.

In a wok or skillet, heat 2 to 3 inches of oil to 350 degrees. Deep-fry the wontons until golden brown, 1 to 2 minutes, turning occasionally. Place on a paper towel-lined sheet pan to drain. Transfer to a platter and dust with confectioner's sugar, then drizzle with raspberry sauce. Garnish with mint leaves and serve immediately. 

Makes 8 servings.

Photos by Barbara Hansen