Back in the kitchen: Lumpia
So happy to be back in the kitchen. Part of it is just being happy to be in the kitchen, the other part being that I don’t feel like crap anymore so I actually feel like cooking again.
Made lumpia tonight – basically Phillipine eggrolls, but much, much better. Had them the first time when we were overseas, and they’ve always been a favorite of mine. The wrappers are thinner and fry up smoother than eggroll or springroll wrappers and well, they’re just better, you’ll have to trust me on this one. Little labor intensive getting them wrapped up, but worth it.
Lumpia (Phillipine eggrolls)
1# ground pork (can use ground beef, half beef/half pork, or the beef/pork/veal mix usually marked as “meatloaf mix” in stores)
2-3 cloves crushed garlic
1/2 c. chopped onion
1/2 c. minced carrot
1/2 c. chopped green onion
1/2 c. thin sliced cabbage
1 t. ground black pepper
1 t. salt
1 t. garlic powder
1 t. soy sauce
~20-25 lumpia wrappers (hard to find anywhere but an asian market, but worth it)
Brown the beef/pork/whatever, set aside to drain, leaving some of the oil in the pan.
Saute the garlic & onion until tender.
Add the beef/pork back along with all other ingredients. Reduce heat to low, cover and let sit 5-10 minutes. Remove from heat, let cool to the point where you can handle it without burning yourself.
Take a lumpia wrapper, put an oversized teaspoon of the filling in and pretty much just wrap it up like you would a burrito. Seal the edges with water. Once everything is wrapped, fry in hot oil (veg is fine) 1-2 minutes until golden brown.
These can be frozen before they are fried up and will do fine defrosted and fried later. Can also be put in the fridge before frying for a day or two.
Sauce – basically nothing more than a sweetened, thickened soy sauce. I usually toss some soy, brown sugar and cornstarch in a small saucepan and let it go on low heat until it’s the way I want. I’ve not used the recipe below, but it looks like it should work:
1 c. sugar
3 c. water
3T soy sauce
3T cornstarch
1.5 t salt
Melt sugar in saucepan. Make pase of the soy, cornstarch, salt and some of the water, then add the rest of the water and add it all to the sugar. (All over low heat.)