Four-Color Vegetable Balls
铁素四色球 (Iron-Plated Four-Color Vegetarian Balls) A shaped Lu (Shandong) cuisine dish with vibrant coloring, elegant presentation, and a fresh, bright flavor. It is formed into balls using ingredients including fat choy, red root vegetables, celtuce, southern water chestnuts, and other complementary ingredients.
Ingredients
Dried fa cai (black moss), soaked and rinsed to remove sand
15 g
Red beetroot, peeled, washed, and shaped into balls
200 g
Canned water chestnuts
200 g
Canned fresh mushrooms
20 g
Celtuce (lettuce stems), peeled, washed, and shaped into balls
200 g
Chicken fat
15 g
Scallion-ginger oil
150 g
MSG (monosodium glutamate)
10 g
Cooking wine
10 g
Salt
7 g
Chicken broth
750 g
Instructions
1
Step 1
Soak the dried black moss in water and rinse to remove sand. Place it together with 2g salt into 100g chicken broth, bring to a boil, and simmer until tender. Peel and wash the celtuce and red beetroot, shape them into water chestnut-sized balls, blanch each in boiling water separately, then transfer to cold water. Arrange the fresh mushrooms in a bowl, add an appropriate amount of chicken broth along with 5g MSG and 5g cooking wine, and steam until tender.
2
Step 2
Heat a wok over the fire and warm the scallion-ginger oil. Splash in 5g each of cooking wine, MSG, and salt, along with 650g chicken broth. Add the red beetroot balls, celtuce balls, and water chestnuts, simmer for 5 minutes, then remove and drain off the broth.
3
Step 3
Place the steamed fresh mushrooms inverted in the center of a serving plate, surround them with the black moss, and arrange the red beetroot balls, celtuce balls, and water chestnuts around the plate.
4
Step 4
Bring the original broth in the wok back to a boil, thicken with diluted cornstarch slurry to a light flowing consistency, drizzle with chicken fat over the four-color balls on the plate, and serve.
