Lion's Head Meatballs
Cooking time: 1 h 30 minutes
Difficulty: Medium recipe
Recipe yield: 4-6 servings
Chinese Food Recipes
Lion's Head Meatballs – Chinese New Year recipe. In China, such names as “Lion's Head”, “Phoenix” and “Dragon” are very often used. Dragon and phoenix mean symbols of the emperor and empress. The lion is the king of the jungle, which also represents power. In this recipe, the lion's head is represented by a large round piece of meat, laid on a pedestal of cabbage, which symbolizes the mane. The lion's head meatballs is a traditional New Year's recipe in the Yanzhou region in East China. This recipe can be cooked not only for the New Year, but also on other holidays. If you are cooking it specifically for the Chinese New Year, then it must be four round big meatballs. Four because they represent four gifts: luck, prosperity, longevity and happiness.
Lion's head meatballs ingredients
- Pork 500 g
- Soy sauce 3 tbsp
- Rice wine 1 tbsp
- Green onions 1 twig
- Ginger 1-2 cm
- Water chestnut 4 pcs
- Eggs 1 pcs
- Potato starch 5 tbsp
- Chicken broth 8 tbsp
- Chinese cabbage 500 g
- Sugar 0.5 tsp
- Vegetable oil 2 tbsp
Lion's head meatballs recipe
The lion's head meatballs recipe is completely uncomplicated. First you need to prepare all the products. Grind the pork in a meat grinder. Ginger grate, beat eggs lightly. Dilute starch in cold water and broth, and dilute 4 tbsp in one bowl starch in 8 tbsp chicken broth, and in the other bowl 1 tbsp starch in 2 tbsp water. Finely chop the green onion and chop the chestnuts. Measure the sauce, wine and sugar.
Add ground onion, egg, ginger, chopped chestnuts, 2 tbsp soy sauce, wine and 1 tbsp starch diluted in broth, to the ground meat and mix.
To form round meatballs from prepared ground meat. If the “Lion's Head” is preparing for the New Year, then force the ground meat into 4 parts and form 4 meatballs. On a typical day, the ground meat is divided into 6 pieces, respectively 6 meatballs.
Chinese cabbage is divided along in half, and after each half, cut crosswise in increments of approximately 7-7.5 cm. Something should form in the form of triangles. Put chopped cabbage to the bottom of the pan with a capacity of 2-2.5 liters.
Moisten rested balls of ground meat in starch with diluted broth and fry in a pan with heated oil. Fry the balls from the spirit sides until golden brown. Put the fried balls over the cabbage, add sugar, the remaining spoonful of soy sauce, the remaining starch with broth and put on medium heat. After 2-3 minutes, cover tightly, reduce heat to a minimum and simmer for 45-60 minutes. Ready Lion's Head Meatballs to put on a plate, and, at the beginning, spread the cabbage, like a pedestal, on top of the balls. The sauce remains at the bottom of the pan, add diluted starch with water to it, bring to a boil and pour the finished dish with this sauce.
