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Sang choy bao with crispy veg

This is a favourite “special occasion” dish from my childhood - sang choy bao (lettuce cups). Growing up, we ate it a lot at my uncle’s restaurant; it is often the dish served to use up the extra meat from peking duck. At home, my mother’s version was filled with lots of crispy vegetables like celery and water chestnuts.

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A plate of lettuce wraps filled with a diced vegetable and protein mixture, topped with shredded white cheese and served with lime wedges on a marble surface.

Iceberg has a heap of crunch which makes it perfect for this dish, but it is also really hard to separate the leaves without tearing them. My mother taught me to use scissors to snip off the frayed edges to form a neat cup. A task as onerous for a 10 year old as it is for a 40-something year old.

Now, though I do love and in many ways prefer iceberg lettuce, my propensity for ease sees me using butter lettuce for my sang choy bao. Their leaves are the perfect size to hold a bundle of savoury filling, and because they are much softer in texture, they don’t tear as easily and can be easily folded up to enclose the filling. I double up on leaves for each parcel, to make a sturdier vessel. It delivers a slightly different mouthful that every much as satisfying.

Sang choy bao with crispy veg

Serves

Ingredients

neutral oil such as grapeseed or canola
1 carrot, washed and finely diced
2 sticks celery, trimmed and finely diced
2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
1 piece ginger (1 inch / 2.5cm), peeled and finely chopped
150 g fresh shiitake mushrooms or other variety, trimmed and diced
½ teaspoon white sugar
450 g extra firm tofu, preferably super firm, drained and diced into 1cm cubes
140 g water chestnuts, finely chopped
1 tablespoon soy sauce or tamari
1 tablespoon vegetarian stir fry sauce or oyster sauce for non-vegetarians
2 tablespoons pine nuts
sea salt and white pepper
2 scallions, finely sliced
2 teaspoon sesame oil
2 butter lettuce or iceberg, romaine/cos, leaves separated, washed, drained and patted dry
chilli oil or crisp, to serve
1 lime, cut into wedges, to serve

Optional crispy topping

20 g mung bean vermicelli bean thread, broken up and cut into shorter pieces
neutral oil

Instructions

Heat a wok or medium frypan on medium-high. When hot, add 1-2 tablespoons of oil, along with the carrot and celery. Stir-fry for 1 minute until slightly softened. Add the garlic, ginger, mushrooms, sugar and cook for 2 minutes until the mushrooms have softened.
Add the tofu, water chestnuts, soy sauce or tamari and vegetarian stir-fry sauce and toss to combine for 2 minutes. Add the the pine nuts and toss for 1-2 minutes. Taste and season with sea salt and white pepper.
Turn off the heat and add the scallions and sesame oil. Toss and set aside.
If you are making the crispy vermicelli, pour some neutral oil into a small pan, so that the oil comes 2-3cm up the sides. Drop in the vermicelli and fry for 30-60 seconds, turning the noodles so that they all crisp up, until they turn white and crispy. Remove and drain on a paper towel-lined plate.
To serve, lay out sets of 2 lettuce leaves (I double up on leaves to create a stronger cup), top with a tablespoon or more of filling. If using, top with chilli oil or crisp, along with crispy mung bean vermicelli. Serve with lime wedges on the side.

Tips and Variations

This recipe makes a generous serving. It will feed 4 hungry diners. Leftover filling can be kept in the fridge for up to five days – I generally like to make a large amount of filling because I eat it during the week, just topping up with more lettuce. You could turn this into a stand-alone dinner party meal by serving it alongside rice or sticky rice and adding bowls of herbs like coriander (cilantro), perilla, shiso, sliced makrut lime leaves, Thai basil, or Vietnamese mint (called Vietnamese coriander or Rau Răm in the US) for guests to add to their parcel, similar to Korean ssam wraps. The fried mung bean vermicelli topping is how it is served at many restaurants but is completely optional. You could easily subtsitute with store-bought crispy fried onions.