Claypot Waxed Meat Rice (Lap Mei Fan)

Lap Mei Fan (Jan 2012)

Happy Chinese New Year, everyone! May the Year of the Water Dragon bring lots of prosperity (shui) to all!

Every household celebrating this auspicious day would have had a Lap Mei Fan, may it be an elaborate claypot with assorted waxed meat or just simply steaming waxed sausages and serving it with rice. I had an blooming petal inspiration while watching a Hong Kong cooking show. The Chef had this elaborate yin yang design he did with white & black glutinious rice. Yes, why just plain dull rice when I could jazz it up with a lil deco that was already part of the dish?

Mummy told me that arrowhead (Nga Ku) goes well with waxed meat. So I tried that on the 1st day of Chinese New Year. Turned out that nga ku actually brought a kind of fragrance to the dish, just as sweet potato would have to porridge!

On the 10th day, as I was preparing for another claypot for a party of 8 (Mummy's dear dancing kakis), I couldn't get a decent arrowhead. I searched my pantry and guess what I found? A New Moon brand abalone! What a rich flavour it lent to the dish. It now looks "expensive" and unknowingly looked like dahlia amongst rose petals.... bear with me, I have a rather wild imagination when it comes to food!

Lap Mei Fun with Abalone (Feb 2012)

Lap Mei Fan Recipe:

I made really huge claypots with 5 cups of rice. I've reduced the portions for the recipe to 1 cup of rice, enough for two. Do multiply when required.

Ingredients:
1 cup of rice
3 waxed Chinese sausages (meat/liver/mixture)
1/2 cup of diced "lap yuk", air dried pork belly (optional)
1/2 waxed duck leg (optional)
5 slices young ginger
Jullienne strips of ginger for garnishing


Seasoning (mixed together):
1 tbsp oyster sauce
1 tsp soy sauce
1/2 tsp sesame oil
A dash of pepper
A pinch of salt & sugar

Method:

1. First, blanch the sausages for a few seconds in boiling hot water. Take the sausages out and use a fork to poke some holes all over its surface. Then, put the duck into the water and leave it there for 5 min. This will not only help soften the duck slightly but it also helps get rid of the strong smell of the duck oil that most people do not like.
2. If you've never used a claypot to steam rice, I suggest that you cook the rice as you normally would in a rice cooker. However, do measure up slightly less water than indicated as juices from the sausages will compensate. Place only the sausages into the rice cooker before switching it on.
3. Meanwhile, chop the duck into bitesize bits and the lap yuk into small chunks.
4. Remove the sausages from the cooked rice. Leave to cool before slicing them into thin pieces.
5. Heat up the claypot. Add a little sesame oil and stir fry the ginger slices till fragrant. Then, transfer all the cooked rice into the claypot.
6. Arrange all the meat on top of your rice. Pour the seasoning around the dish. Cover & cook under low heat for 5 minutes or when you start to smell that wonderful sweet aroma of Chinese sausages and fragrant rice from the claypot.