Advice to Self: You Need to Add Enough Salt

September 7, 2024 by soLing

The best thing about stir-frying leafy vegetables is how fast the dish comes together after cleaning and cutting everything. For a new one that I tried this year, I just needed to concentrate on adding enough salt toward the end of the cooking session.

Below are some links to more details, including photos:

• My Story
• Inspiring Recipe
  • First Try
    • Ingredients to Use
    • Steps to Prepare
    • Time to Eat
    • Recipe Rating
  • Second Try
    • Ingredients to Use
    • Steps to Prepare
    • Time to Eat
    • Recipe Rating
• Continuous Improvement
• Lesson for Dumber Self
• Next Step for You

My Story

I’m always on the look-out for vegetables that are on sale. One time, I found one that I hadn’t cooked before, so I purchased a bag. However, I had to find a recipe before making it.

Inspiring Recipe

After some searching online, I found the recipe, Stir Fry A Choy (Taiwanese Lettuce), from the blog, Oh Snap! Let’s Eat! This was the second time referencing the website, the first of which was for Chinese Mustard Greens.

First Try

Since I had already bought a bag of A Choy, all I needed were three additional items from home.

Ingredients to Use

For the remaining ingredients in the recipe that needed to be measured, I used the following for the 2.02 pounds of A Choy:

1. 4 tablespoons + 1/4 teaspoon of cooking oil
2. 17 cloves of garlic

Steps to Prepare

For the process, I made a couple of modifications as follows:

• Step 1 – After trying the method in the recipe, I peeled the leaves off before washing them again. This way, it was easier to handle the long leaves and wash away the dirt hidden deep inside the base.
• Step 3 – The A Choy wasn’t tender after 2 minutes of stir-frying, so I continued for another 2 minutes.

Time to Eat

Here’s a plate of A Choy ready to be served.

Recipe Rating

Below are the results of the recipe after the first try:

# of Ingredients	Effort	$ / Serving	Try Again?
4

The A Choy came out crunchy and reminded me of shrimp sauce with Ong Choy for some reason. In addition, it could’ve used more salt.

Second Try

During the second attempt, my goal was to make the dish saltier.

Ingredients to Use

As for the ingredients used in the second round, they were the same as before.

Steps to Prepare

Regarding the process, there were slight differences in the second try as shown below:

• Step 1 – I went straight to peeling the leaves off the stem before washing them.
• Step 2 – Stir-frying the chopped garlic until they were aromatics required less than 1 minute.
• Step 3 – This time, the A Choy wasn’t tender until after 3 minutes of cooking.

Time to Eat

Here’s the plate of A Choy from the second try.

Recipe Rating

Below are the results of the recipe from the second attempt:

# of Ingredients	Effort	$ / Serving	Try Again?
4

Again, this dish needed more salt. However, my family enjoyed it, especially my older son.

Since I’m planning to cook A Choy again, I will improve the taste next time by doing the following:

Continuous Improvement

1. Spend more time adding salt to the dish, tasting it, and repeating the steps as needed.

During the experience with this recipe, I realized why the A Choy wasn’t salty enough. To help prevent this situation for my previous self, I would like to share the following:

Lesson for Dumber Self

1. Be patient while seasoning your dish before serving.

What will you do now?

Next Step for You

1. Try the recipe, Stir Fry A Choy (Taiwanese Lettuce), from the blog, Oh Snap! Let’s Eat!?
2. Share your favorite A Choy recipe?
3. Ask a question or leave a note in the Comment box below about this post?

It’s your choice!