Buried Treasure

I've recently returned from a brief beach holiday on the south coast of New South Wales. I spent a great deal of time, when not languishing in the delicious heat in the confines of our beach cabin, with sand between my toes (not to mention elsewhere) and swimming in the surf. I took my oldest boy fishing for the first time (four fish!, though too small to keep), watched a late-night lightning storm build over the Pacific, ate far too many potato chips, and generally relaxed. While the relentless sun and fresh air were a welcome change from the hum of kitchen fluorescents and extraction fans, I must confess, cooking was (nor is it ever) far from my mind. Incidentally, it didn't help that the place was bloody crawling with wildlife, most of which I wanted to eat.

Perhaps this is the gypsy curse of the chef; that all living things are viewed as potential ingredients. Not a magpie flies past my window without me wondering how it might taste; a trip to the Sydney Aquarium serves only to make me hungry and is usually followed directly by a visit to the Fish Markets for lunch. My few days away on the beach were marked by a veritable parade of local animals, many of whom seemed to be in fine eating form. We had cabin visits from a small mob of 'roos (tasty when cooked rare) a flock of twenty young ducks, and a procession of what looked to be quite tender rabbits. Outside I'm all: “Look at the bunnies, boys!” while what I really want to say is: “I think the two of us could cut them off before they make it to that hole. I'll get a pot ready.”

And then there was the sea life. I saw bream and flathead and flounder and mussels and stingrays (skate, when you serve it) and prawns and crab and mullet and oysters and abalone. Together, land, sea, and air, there were so many delicious animals I couldn't stop thinking about eating. Even the plants looked good. I found myself wondering which varieties of seaweed washed up on the beach were edible. My hungry, roving eye managed to spot an accidental tomato plant near the beach boardwalk (discarded tomato slice from a sandwich?), surrounded by one of it's solanum genus relatives, blackberry nightshade, one of the few identified species of the holiday I didn't wish to eat.



Oh. And I found pipis.

For those of you not familiar, pipis are an Australian mollusk common throughout the majority of the Australian coast, and can be found from Queensland 'round to South Australia. More importantly, for myself at least, they are common in many of my favorite Chinese restaurants, steamed open, tossed in various sauces, and served on beds of rice or noodles. In fact, the tasty little clams feature in one of the signature dishes of my favorite after-hours Chinese restaurants here in Sydney's Chinatown. It's the sort of place which attracts chefs in general: late opening hours, good food, large tables. To arrive late on a Saturday night (read: very early Sunday morning) is to discover a room filled with tables of restaurant staff drunkenly consuming dumplings and whatnot. While the suckling pig is good, and the Peking duck pancakes are delicious, the one dish everyone I know orders is the Pipis in XO sauce.

XO , invented in Hong Kong in the 80's, is a spicy, salty, fishy, sauce which is used as a cooking ingredient, a condiment, and a dipping sauce. The chili level is often quasi-nuclear and so earns an instant thumbs up from me. It goes well with all manner of meats, rice, noodles, eggs, dumplings and more. However, when you suck it from the little cups that are clam shells, it seems as though the sauce was absolutely created to go with pipis.

Which, you might imagine, is lucky. For, as I mentioned, I found a beach full of pipis. Sadly, it is not legal to harvest pipis from the wild in New South Wales, as they have been deemed a possible health hazard (the little guys are pollution filters). It is legal to use them for bait, though, which we did. My family became quite good at spotting holes in the sand where the pipis reside. Digging them up is an addictive and satisfying venture, much like finding buried treasure.

Anyway, I'm home now and I can't shake the craving. I must have pipis in XO with fried noodles. Since I can't collect the shellfish, I'm just going to have to settle for homemade XO.



Pipis in XO with Fried Noodles

This recipe requires a lot of chopping and mincing and dicing. This is why god made apprentice chefs. Consider getting yourself one.

XO Sauce

Right. A few notes:

This recipe makes far more sauce than you will need for a meal of pipis. If you are remotely like myself however, you will find that addiction takes hold quickly and you'll soon be inventing reasons to use the stuff. Might I suggest scrambled XO eggs for breakfast. Great pick-me-up.

You might think that an Italian ham is out of place in a Chinese recipe, but the Jinhua ham traditionally used is not widely available in OZ, and any dry-cured ham (Prosciutto or Virginian, for example) makes a fine substitute.

Seeding dried chilies, as is called for below, is best done before soaking by breaking each in half and gently rolling them between your thumb and forefinger, open end down, allowing the seeds to fall out. Seeding fresh chilies, also called for, is best done by splitting each down the middle and removing the seeds (and white pith) with a spoon. Consider wearing rubber gloves.

Also, for the roasted shrimp paste, buy a bit of shrimp paste and wrap 5g (something like a teaspoon) in a loose foil parcel and roast it in a 200ºC oven for 5 minutes.

Finally, tradition dictates that this spicy sauce has no nuts in it. However, I once had a version with a fine kibble of cashew through it, and I really enjoyed both the rich crunch and oily undertones they added. Besides, “traditional” is quite the label for a sauce that is only about 25 years old. Mix it up, I say. Here I'm using macadamia nuts, as I like their creamy, oily texture, and, as you probably know, they are Aussie natives.

50g dried scallops
75g dried prawns
500ml vegetable oil
2 heads garlic, peeled, fine mince
8 medium shallots (that's an “eshallot” if you live in France or NSW), fine dice
50g prosciutto, fine dice
4 lg long red chilies, seeded, fine dice
20g dried long red chilies, seeded, soaked, fine dice
5g roasted shrimp paste
100g macadamia nuts, reduced to a fine kibble in a mortar and pestal

Soak the dried scallops and the dried prawns separately in 200ml of water each, overnight in the fridge. The next day, drain both, reserving the water. Using your fingers, shred the scallops into fine fibres. Chop the prawns as finely as possible.

In a small, heavy-bottomed pot on medium-high flame, heat 200ml of the oil until it is nearly smoking. Add the shredded scallops and cover with a loose-fitting lid, as they will fry quite violently and will spit oil. Cook for about 2 minutes, until the color deepens and the shreds become crisp. Remove from heat, strain, reserving oil and scallop shreds separately.

Wipe the pot clean and add the remaining 300 ml of oil and the reserved scallop oil. Heat on medium-high flame until nearly smoking and add the minced prawns, garlic, and shallots. Cook until deeply golden brown, stirring frequently. When done, the mixture should smell of roasted garlic and caramelized onion, with no “raw” aromas remaining.

Next, stir in both the dried and fresh chilies, and the diced ham. Cook for 1 minute. Then add the reserved scallop and prawn water, the roasted shrimp paste, and the fried scallop shreds.

Simmer, stirring occasionally, on low heat until all the water has evaporated and the mixture smells sweet, fishy, and richly hot. Add the macadamia kibble and cook for an additional 5-10 minutes, until the nut particles taste toasted. Remove from heat and cool. Transfer the XO to jars, top with more oil if needed, and store in the fridge for a month or two.

Pipis in XO

As with all bivalves, pipis have a high shell-to-meat ratio. If you are serving the mollusks on rice or fried noodles (as we are here), allow about 500g raw weight per person. You'll need about 150g of XO for each kilo of pipis. Purge your pipis (to remove any sand they might be harboring) by soaking them in a cold salt water solution (30g sea salt/1litre water) overnight in a cool, but not cold place. If you keep them in the fridge they will not open and disgorge sand. Drain thoroughly before using.

1k pipis
50ml shaoxing rice wine
150g XO sauce
2 spring onions, sliced

Heat a large pan on high heat. When the pan is blazingly hot, add the shellfish and rice wine at the same time. Cover with a lid, shake the pan constantly, until the majority of the pipis open: about 3 minutes. Using the lid, strain off all of the liquid. Add the XO to the pan, and return to the heat. Toss for 30 seconds. Add the spring onions, toss once or twice more, and serve on fried noodles (below).

Fried Noodles

Pipis are good served on rice or boiled noodles, as long as you have something to catch the sauce. Frying them adds a an extra crunchy dimension.

150g dried egg noodles
150ml vegetable oil

Bring a large pot of slated water to the boil. Drop the noodles in and cook, separating with tongs or chopsticks.Boil for 3-4 minutes, just until the noodles are tender but still firm. Drain and rinse under cold water immediately. Spread the noodles to dry on a tray for half an hour. Arrange into two portion-sized (10cm) nests.

Heat the oil in a small pan on medium-high heat until nearly smoking. Cook the noodle nests one at a time by sliding into the oil and frying for 1-2 minutes, flipping, and frying for 2 minutes more. The outside of the nests should be crisp while the insides remain soft. Drain on paper towels and keep warm until serving.