Two-egg Spinach
SINGAPORE
This dish marries the silky texture of both spinach and gently cooked eggs. A beaten egg is stirred into the spinach broth right at the end to form soft wispy strands. For flavour, the rich salty yolks from salted duck eggs are used instead of your standard seasonings. This dish doesn’t really work with salad bags of prepared baby spinach leaves. I use spinach that has larger, ruffled leaves that come with their stalks still on; Swiss chard also works perfectly.
Serves 2
- 500g spinach
- a 2.5cm piece of ginger
- 2 cloves of garlic
- 1 salted duck egg (see here)
- 1 tablespoon groundnut oil
- 200ml chicken stock (see here)
- 1 tablespoon Shaoxing rice wine
- 1 free-range egg, lightly beaten
- sea salt, to taste
- Rinse the spinach and drain well. Separate the stalks from the leaves. Chop the ginger and garlic finely.
- Separate the salted egg yolk from the white. Chop up the yolk roughly and set the white aside.
- Set a wok or a large frying pan over a high heat. Add the oil, and when it’s hot, stir-fry the ginger, garlic and salted egg yolk until fragrant.
- Toss the spinach stalks in first, and fry until they become tender. Pour in the chicken stock and rice wine and bring to the boil. Add the spinach leaves, reduce the heat to low and cook till just wilted.
- Let the spinach broth come to a simmer again. Drizzle in the salted egg white, followed by the beaten egg, all the while stirring the broth gently. Turn the heat off and let the eggs finish cooking in the residual heat of the wok. The dish is ready when the whites turn opaque and form wispy strands. Taste and season with a pinch of salt, if necessary.
