Stir Fry Pork Strips with Basil and Pine Nuts
Pork with Basil? Sounds familiar? That’s right, a particular Thai dish may have come to your mind, minced pork with thai basil, a common dish in Thailand. In order to try cooking my first dish with my flourishing home-grown basil, I immediately thought of this thai dish. But my version doesn’t have any fish sauce in it as I didn’t have any in my pantry. Fish sauce seems to be an important ingredient in most Thai dishes. I figured that they use it like how we use soy sauce? I’ve been wanting to buy a bottle but not sure which brand to get. I’m not sure if the taste of basil differs from thai basil. Can anyone enlighten me on this?
Since I only had some pork loin in my freezer, I’ve decided to just cook the pork my way (with just some soy sauce), with basil and some pine nuts. I’ve seen NoobCook cooked one of her dish with pine nuts. In another occasion, I had a nice deep fried yam ring at a restaurant, topped with pine nuts instead of the usual cashew nuts. Pine nuts are really delicious. I bought them solely for my hamsters. And I thought I should put them into better use before they expires. I had wanted to make some pesto sauce with my basil and pine nuts, but have yet to make it as B didn’t really like basil that much.
Stir Fry Pork Strips with Basil and Pine Nuts
Serves 2
200g pork loin
1 tsp garlic, chopped
1 tbsp cooking oil
10 to 15 basil leaves
20 to 30 pine nuts, toasted
Marinade
½ tbsp light soy sauce
½ tbsp hua teow wine
1tsp corn flour
Use the back of the knife to ‘chop’ the pork loin evenly throughout, this is to make the meat thinner. Then cut the pork loin into ¼ inch strips. Marinate the pork loin strips with the above marinade and set it aside for about half an hour in the fridge.
To start cooking, heat oil in pan. Fry the chopped garlic until they starts to brown. Add meat to stir fry for a few minutes or until the meat is cooked. You do not need to fry the meat for too long as it might gets too tough. Add in the basil leaves and pine nuts. Stir fry for another 1 or 2 mins until the basil leaves wilt. Serves hot with rice.
You can add more basil and pine nuts if you like. Or try out the authentic thai minced meat with basil, by adding fish sauce. Paw paw has got some nice Thai recipes on her blog. Do try them out. It’s definitely tastier with some fats in the minced pork. Gosh.. me and my pork fats. Haha..
