Preparation time:
- 70mins
Cooking time:
- 20mins
Specialty:
- Dairy-free
- Gluten-free
Home-made XO sauce enhances the flavors of many dishes, not just this one. You can usually buy this from a Chinese supermarket, but we wanted to make this from scratch at home and really only requires the key ingredients below. Home-made also ensures that you control the quality of ingredients that go into the sauce. This is a simple dish by itself, but it's the sauce that takes the most time. This dish is one of the ways to showcase how XO sauce can enhance a simple dish. Look out for more recipes that incorporate XO sauce!
Ingredients (2 Servings):
- 60g Chinese Vermicelli (made with Rice Flour)
- 100g Crab Meat
- Extra-virgin Olive Oil
- Sea Salt
XO Sauce (1 Jar):
- 2 Tablespoons of Dried Scallops
- 2 Tablespoons of Dried Prawns
- 2 Tablespoons of Dried Chilies
- 2 Tablespoons of Garlic Cloves
- Extra-virgin Olive Oil
- Sea Salt
Instructions:
XO Sauce:
This is the most time-consuming part of this recipe and we recommend to start preparing this. When you prepare the XO sauce, we recommend making a jar, since this sauce can be store for months (we keep it refrigerated) and can be used in a lot of dishes (including vegetables) to add a spicy and seafoody touch! It's made of 4 main ingredients (dried scallops, dried shrimps, dried red chilies, garlic) and we use a 1/4 ratio for each ingredient.
- Soak the dried scallops in boiling water and the dried shrimps in warm water for 30-40mins. You want the scallops and shrimps to become very soft.
- Once the scallops and the shrimps are fully re-hydrated, pour the water out. You can keep the water as a fish broth for other recipes. The water is really tasty and has a delicious seafood flavor.
- Shred the scallops with your hands as much as possible - this will enhance the flavor of your sauce.
- Finely dice the garlic cloves and the chilies and mix together.
- Finely dice the shrimps.
- Add to a wok the shredded scallops, the diced shrimps and the mix of garlic and red chilies. Add 1 tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil and 1 tablespoon of the water used to soak the scallops/shrimps.
- Stir all the ingredients at medium heat until all the liquids dry out. Turn off the fire.
- Warm 3-4 tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil in a separate pot. Once the oil reaches the boiling point, pour the oil into the wok. Mix all together and let it rest until it cools down.
Vermicelli with Crab:
- Boil the water in a saucepan and once it's boiling, pour the vermicelli and cook for 2-3 mins.
- Separate the vermicelli from the water and rinse it under cold running water and let them cool down completely.
- Warm a tablespoon of extra-virgin olive oil in a pan and add the vermicelli. Press the vermicelli with a spatula, creating a pancake shape and making sure they stick together.
- Cook at medium heat until you get a crispy consistency on both sides.
- Once you obtain a crunchy and crispy vermicelli pancake, the vermicelli is ready to be served. Season with the XO sauce.
- In the same pan, stir the crab meat for a couple of minutes with some extra-virgin olive oil and season with sea salt. You don't want to overcook the crab otherwise it will become very chewy and will lose its favor.
- Place the crab meat on top of the vermicelli pancake and you're ready to go!