Fried Dace Fish Ball Patties 香煎鯪魚餅

These Fried Dace Fish Ball Patties 香煎鯪魚餅  are a delicious seafood treat originally from Shunde 順德 and now a local HK favorite, though usually served up in the form of steamed or deep fried balls.  We love the fragrant golden skin that comes with frying but, since we don't often deep fry at home, we flatten our fish paste balls so that we can just pan fry them instead.

These tasty patties are made with the paste of the dace fish 鯪魚, much loved for its sweet, firm, flavorful meat.  The dace fish paste is used in many delicious dishes like Three Fried Stuffed Treasures 煎釀三寶 and Watercress & Fish Ball Soup 鯪魚球西洋菜湯.   The fish itself is used to make the fabulous and famous canned Fried Dace with Salted Black Bean 豆豉鯪魚.

Pan Fried Cheung Fun (Rice Rolls) with Egg 香煎腸粉炒蛋

Recently we were really excited when a new little food shop opened on our street and we saw that they sold all kinds of chinese noodles (like Cantonese egg noodles), and most exciting of all, at least for me, was that they sold really fresh Cheung Fun 腸粉, also known as Rice Rolls or Rice Noodle Rolls.  

Cheung Fun is used for all kinds of dishes, both savory and sweet, but for myself the favorite preparation is the classic Hong Kong snack food Pan Fried Cheung Fun with Egg.  Chewy fragrant rice, just fried egg clinging to the rolls, splashes of sweet soy sauce and oh, the tasty deliciousness of hoisin sauce!  YUMM...comfort food alert!!

Fragrant Pan Fried Squid Paste 香煎魷魚滑

Ah, the mysterious creature of the deep, the delicious squiggly squid!  The stuff of legends, sailors of old telling tales of ginormous squid rising wrathfully from the seas to shallow them whole, boats and all.  

Did you know that the giant squid is a real creature, growing up to the size of 30-60 feet (13-20 meters)!!  It's true, they really exist and I'll bet they're super yummy too, if ever I get a chance to snack on a bit o' giant tentacle.  

For now , though, I'll have to be content with the wonderfully fresh squid that we can find at the wet markets in Hong Kong and especially, especially with our latest yummilicious discovery, the amazingly scrumptious freshly made squid paste that one can find at selected wet market stalls.  

It's really fabulous that they did all the hard work of making the squid paste already (so fresh too!) and you can just pick some up and TA-DA!!, just like that, a drool worthy, super easy to make and yummilicious dish, the Pan Fried Squid Paste 香煎魷魚滑!