Tinned dace with lettuce

Ingredientsserves 4

Method

1. Open the tin, lift the fish out and break it into large flakes; pick out the coarse bones if cooking for children (the fine ones are soft and edible). Keep the black beans and the oil from the tin separately.
2. Wash the lettuce and drain it thoroughly; it must go into the wok dry or it stews.
3. Heat the wok hard, add the tin oil and a tablespoon of fresh oil, fry the black beans and garlic twenty seconds until fragrant, and lift the beans out.
4. Put the greens in on full heat and toss a minute until they wilt and begin to release water; tip off the excess.
5. Return the beans, add the sugar and chilli, splash in the wine and toss.
6. Add the fish for the last twenty seconds, tossing just enough to heat it through without breaking it up, and serve. The tin is salty enough, so no extra salt.

Take care

• Contains fish and soy (black beans). The tin has small edible bones, which need care with young children. Once opened, refrigerate what is left in a covered container and use within two days.

The story

By the Chinese Wikipedia account, dace in black bean began as the food Pearl River Delta men carried to Southeast Asia before the 1950s: dace fried and packed in black beans so it kept. It was first tinned in Guangzhou at the end of the nineteenth century; in the poorer Hong Kong of the 1960s the cheap, long-keeping, intensely savoury tin became a standard rice dish, and tossing it through 油麥菜 is how it survived into the modern kitchen.

Same technique

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Lo Fo Tong is cultural food-heritage reference, not medical advice. If you are pregnant, unwell or on medication, talk to your doctor or registered practitioner before changing what is in the pot.