Daliang Stir-Fried Milk 大良炒鲜奶

Daliang Stir-Fried Milk (大良炒鲜奶) is milk cooked in a wok until it sets into soft, white curds, a well-known dish of Shunde (顺德) in Foshan (佛山), Guangdong. China News Service describes it as a classic example of the Chinese 'soft-frying' method (软炒法) with more than a hundred years of history.

Ingredients

The base is water-buffalo milk. Shunde has many rivers and rich grazing, and since the Ming and Qing dynasties its farmers have kept water buffalo. The Guangdong Study Platform (广东学习平台) puts the fat content of the local buffalo milk at up to 8 per cent, twice that of ordinary milk, with less water and a stronger milky aroma. Egg white and starch are the key supporting ingredients, and shrimp, diced ham and olive kernels (榄仁) are added for extra layers of flavour.

How it is made

The buffalo milk is boiled and left to cool, then mixed with half a spoonful of starch. Beaten egg white is stirred into this milk-and-starch mixture. The cook heats the wok, coats it with oil, pours in the mixture and turns it over a medium flame, always in one direction and at an even pace. When the milk starts to set, the garnishes, fried beforehand, go in. Any extra oil is added at the side of the mixture, never poured onto its centre. Cooked this way the milk neither weeps nor scorches and stays smooth and white.

Where it comes from

Stir-fried milk is a classic home-style dish of Shunde, one of several Shunde specialities made from buffalo milk, along with double-skin milk (双皮奶), fried milk (炸牛奶) and Jinbang milk cakes (金榜牛乳). Cookery textbooks use it as a standard case of soft-frying, and it is regarded as a typical example of the 'covering' method (覆盖法) of plating cooked food in Cantonese cuisine. In Hong Kong, China News Service reports, cooks add scallops (元贝) to suit the local liking for fresh flavours.