Recipe(tried): Szchuan prawns/calamari/squid

Dear BG,

I do agree with you about most of Chinese restaurants in US. (Unless you visit Chinese area, such as the Chinatowns in NY and SF. or Montery Park in LA.) Being a Chinese myself, I don't eat much sweet and sour stuff, to be honest. My mother was shocked shen she visited US and found most of the so-called Chinese food isn't really Chinese food. Cantonese food is from Canton Province and Szchuan dishes are from Szchuan and go on and on... There are all sorts of food from differnt regions of China and from Taiwan and Hong Kong and etc...
But in US, because most of Americans don't like spicy food, they tend to make dishes into "sweet and sour" and most of time, OVER do it!!! I only like certain dishes from certain regions, such the Cantonese roast duck/chicken/pork, or Szchuan hot and sour soup, chili pepper prawn or Shanghai dumplings, or Taiwanese oyster pancake and etc.(I am from Taiwan originally...) But anyway, I might cause some debate here so I'd better stop...

Here is the recipe of the spicy shrimp. My mother just cook without measure anything. So I tried to measure it for you...

Michelle
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Sichuan Salt and pepper prawn/ Calamari/Squid

500 - 750g king prawn/ Calamari/squid
(I normmaly use large shrimp in this recipe.)

Marinnade:
1 egg white
1 t. white pepper powder
1 T. cornstarch (But we tend to use tapioca flour...)
only little pinch of salt

5 slices of young ginger, cut into thin strips
(If you can't find young ginger, use only about 3 slices of older ones or ginger mince in a jar.)
2 dried chilies/ or 1 fresh bird's eye chili, sliced thinly
(If you don't like it too spicy, get rid of seeds before using these. They are almost always very spicy!)
about 1 T. Chinese cooking wine (The best one is called Shao Xing or you may use Sherry)
- 1 t. Szchuan pepper powder (If you can only find Szchuan peppercorns, crush them!)
- 1 t. salt
1/2 T. cornstarch/topioca flour

Wash and shelled the prawns. Keep all shell and heads for stocking later. DO NOT THROW THEM OUT! (If use Calamari or squid, you need to clean them and get rid of the ink begs and eyes and peel off the skins. Score a criss-cross pattern on the outside, then cut into small pieces.)

Marinate the shrimp with egg white, white pepper, cornstarch and salt for 15 min or just leave it in the fridge until you need it.

Put all shell and heads in a small pot and add about 1 cup of water or enough to cover the shell. Bring to a boil. Turn off the fire right away. Leave the shell in the stock for at least 20 minutes. Reseve the stock for use later.

Heat up the frying pan until very, very hot!
Add enough oil to coat the whole pan, about 3 T.
When the pan is smoking, add in the shrimp with it's marinade.
Fry it until color changes, push the shrimp to one side. (Don't over cook the shrimp. If they aren't totally cooked, it is OK. They will be cooked further later.)
Add in ginger and chili at this time. Quickly stir-fry the aromatic until fragrant.
(Watch it! Don't make your shrimp burn. Toss them now and then.)
Now you mix shrimp with the aromatic.
Add in the Sichuan pepper and salt to taste at this stage.
Add the wine, & keep stirring.
Add about 1/2 c or more (we tend to add mroe than 1/2 c as we like the sauce) of the stock.
Mix 1 T. corstarch/tapioca with a little more stock and thicken the sauce. If the sauce appears to thick, add more stock and vise versa.
That's all. The shrimp should be totoally cooked. If any remaining stock left, you can use it to stir-fry green vegetables to go with the shrimp. Do not leave the stock for too many days or you might get poisoned!