Baby Kailan with Garlic & Stir-Fried Noodles

I finally managed to get my hands on some Baby Kailan from Tesco.

I’ve been trying to match the Baby Kailan with Garlic served at our favorite Chinese Restaurant. Today I have discovered the trick.
Of course, not everything goes to plan as usual … I was expecting prawns in my Tesco order, but when I checked again I hadn’t added it to my cart.

So the Baby Kailan will have to be highlight of the meal.

Since I also managed to get thick egg noodles with my Tesco order, I decided to make Stir Fry noodles.

I also added some fish cake and tofu to go with the noodles.

Start by prepping the Kai Lan. Unlike full-grown Kai Lan, with baby Kai Lan the leaves are mostly bite-sized and the stems are not too thick. So they cook easily together.

For the thicker stems, I spliced them into two, leaving the leaves attached.

I removed the flowers; some people eat them, some don’t.

Rinse and clean.

Meanwhile … I prepared a pot of boiling water, to which I add 1-2 teaspoons of salt.

Toss in the Kai Lan, and cover the pot with the lid.

After two minutes, remove and strain the Kai Lan.

(Sorry for the bad video, I had one hand holding the camera, leaving just the other hand to lift and manipulate that heavy pot of boiling water).

Quickly fill a bowl with iced water (ideally, with lots of ice cubes) and toss in the Kai Lan. This prevents the retained heat from cooking the Kai Lan further.

At this point, you can have a taste … you will find that the Kai Lan is now cooked but still retains its crunchiness.

I could eat it as is, but there is better to come!

Try to remove any excess water at this point.

Next I cut two squares of Tofu into cubes, coated them with oil and lightly sprinked some salt.

Fired up the wok, added some oil, and once the oil was hot, I put the tofu in. Let it fry until the outsides are brown. I then removed the Tofu from the wok and let it sit over some kitchen paper to drain excess oil.

I also sliced the fishcake (this doesn’t need any added salt) and fried them. Once the outside browned, there were removed from the wok and again let sit over some kitchen paper.

Next add to the wok some sliced garlic. Once the garlic is golden, turn up the heat and toss in the Kai Lan.

Since the Kai Lan is already cooked, here we are just coating it with the garlic oil to add flavour — so it doesn’t need much time in the wok. Stir vigorously and then quickly remove the Kai Lan and garlic.

And there you have it, Kai Lan with Garlic, perfectly cooked and still crunchy.