Braised Eel (Shengqiao Style)
Fry large yellow eel segments until golden-brown with a "tiger skin" texture, then braise together with garlic cloves and aromatics. Reduce the sauce over high heat until richly golden in color and intensely fragrant.
Ingredients
Live Large Yellow Eel (slaughtered, backbone removed, wiped clean with cloth, cut into 7 cm segments)
1.5 kg
Rendered Lard (for frying, with 50 g drizzled at the end)
900 g (about 100 g actually used)
Cooking Wine
50 g
Soy Sauce
20 g
Sugar
7 g
Salt
5 g
Scallion
12 g
Ginger
12 g
White Pepper
1 g
Garlic Cloves (sautéed until fragrant)
60 g
MSG
5 g
Water (amount not specified in original)
to taste
Instructions
1
Fry the Eel
Slaughter the eel and remove the backbone, wipe off the blood with a clean cloth, and cut into 7 cm segments. Pour into a wok with lard and fry until the surface turns a tiger-skin color, then remove and drain off the oil.
2
Braise and Finish
Using the same wok, reserve 50 g of the base oil and heat it. Sauté the garlic cloves until fragrant, then add the fried eel segments along with scallion, ginger, soy sauce, sugar, cooking wine, salt, and an appropriate amount of water. Bring to a boil over high heat, then reduce to low heat and braise until the eel is about 80–90% tender. Switch back to high heat to reduce the sauce until thickened, add MSG, drizzle with 50 g of lard, and sprinkle with white pepper to finish.
