This is fried Hor Fun, with nice big prawns and a rich gravy made from the heads and shells of the prawn. The humble Tze Char dish, upgraded with premium prawns and plated out!
Hor Fun is a Tze Char dish that I have found to be quite fun to cook, and not too hard to duplicate at home. The list of ingredients is relatively short, and its quite impressive during a dinner party if you plate it out nicely.
Once you learn the basics of frying the hor fun, the ingredients can be very much whatever you want! It can be super easy, or as complicated as you want it to be.
Ingredients:
(for four gourmet portions, three normal ones, and two big ones :))
- 500 g fresh Hor Fun
- 500 g whole prawns (ideally “glass” prawns, not tigers), plus extra prawn heads and shells if possible
- handful of leafy green veggies
- garlic
- fish sauce
- dark soya
- oyster sauce
- corn flour
- gourmet option : splash of savignon blanc
Prep and mise
You need to do two main things : prepare the prawns and make a rich prawn stock, and pre-fry the hor fun
For the prawn stock, you need to have prawn heads and shells. Set the prawn meat aside (if you like, marinate them with Chinese wine and soya sauce – they will be wonderful). Take the heads and shells from 500 g of prawns, and, on medium-low heat, brown them in a fry pan with a little oil till they are nice and crisp. You can add some whole garlic cloves if you like. This step really brings out the flavour.
Pour some water into the fry pan (so that you can scrape up every bit of prawn flavour from it). Transfer everything to a pot and simmer for at least twenty minutes. The total amount of water you use should be about 800 ml.
In the meantime, you need to pre-fry the hor fun. Some care is needed here, wise you might end up with a cake of clumped up hor fun. I source my hor fun from my local wet market, and they are thicker and broader than kway teow. Take the hor fun out of the packet and, with you hands, loosen the hor fun on a tray. Dot the hor fun with some dark soya and fish sauce. Mix with you hands, being careful not to break up the sheets.
Heat a pan with some oil till very hot, almost smoking, and toss in the hor fun. I find that a hot pan helps prevent the hor fun from clumping up. I use a large non-stick pan and fry 500 grams of hor fun in two batches.
I say its best to toss, as it moves the hor fun around without risk of them breaking up. Ok, it also makes me feel like a pro. It’s not totally needed.
If you can’t toss, you can use a pair of tongs – keep the hor fun moving, till nice and tossed. Set aside and keep warm, or if you are ready, portion them onto plates.
Mince garlic, wash and cut your green veggies. Make up a corn flour slurry.
You are now mised and ready to cook!
Cook and assemble
I am doing the gourmet option, so I am cooking the veg, prawns and sauce separately and assembling. This ensures every element is prefect and plates up nicely.
First, stir fry your leafy green veg and set aside. This should be less then two minutes.
Nice, fry up your prawns on a hot wok. I am using prawns their heads on (shells off), so they look prettier. (I had extra prawn heads for the stock.)
Let the prawns take on some char and colour. If desired, splash in some white wine on to the hot pan when you prawns are frying. It makes for some drama and adds flavour.
Remove the prawns and set aside.
The wok is now full of nice prawn flavour. Use the same pan for the gravy. Add in some more oil, and then the garlic.
Fry garlic till fragrant, and in goes the prawn stock, you will need about 200 mls of gravy (slightly more then one rice cup) for each gourmet portion (125 g of hor fun).
Allow stock to come to as simmer as you taste it, and add oyster sauce and fish sauce to your desired taste. Once it tastes the way you want, thicken with the corn flour.
Assemble. Pour that rich, delicious gravy over the hor fun, and plate the rest of the ingredients on top. You will make lots of friends with this!
