Eggs Rolls with Duck Sauce Anyone?

I just had to share this recipe with you all.  It’s really quite easy and the family thoroughly enjoyed it.  I love finding new recipes.  Even recipes for things like Fried Grasshoppers.  Now do you really think I would make anything that unusual?    Hee Hee.  I’ll leave it for you to wonder.

But this recipe, from a cooking blog, you can trust me on.  There’s nothing strange or unusual about it except the dry glass noodles, and I can promise they won’t cut or kill you.  

The recipe mentions lumpia throughout it.  This is a Filipino and Indonesian wrapper that is thinner than an egg roll.  Our store did not carry lumpia’s thus, I used egg roll wrappers.

1 pkg. mung bean noodles (dry glass noodles)

Step 1: Soak to soften: 2 cups dry glass noodles (mung bean noodles), about 15 minutes

Step 2: Heat 1 Tbsp oil. Slowly saute and brown 2 minced fat garlic gloves and 1 diced onion (this isn’t’ a typo—if you can’t sauté your garlic before your onion without burning your garlic, then just add the onion first, then the garlic, but if your heat is just below med and you keep your spoon moving your garlic, you shouldn’t have any problem). Season with salt and 3-5 grinds of black pepper.

Step 3: Add and brown 1 pound of meat—ground or diced pork, chicken, turkey, beef, etc. Season with 1 ½ Tbsp soy sauce.

Step 4: Stir in and thoroughly cook 4 cups julienned cabbage and ½ cup julienned carrots. Season with ¼ tsp salt.

Step 5: Drain and cut glass noodles into 1” lengths (you don’t have to be precise)

Step 6: Stir in and cook to soften all the glass noodles. Let the filling cool. If it’s watery from all the veggies, place it in a sieve to drain as it cools.

Step 7: One it cools, scramble one egg into a dish and get a pastry brush ready.

Step 8: Open up your wrappers, and carefully unpeel a few. If you’re kinda slow at first, you may want to keep your wrappers on a plate, covered with its own package or a very slightly damp towel so they don’t dry out. Wrap your lumpia like burritos.

Seal your lumpia with some egg, and place them seam-side down on a platter.

As you get close to finishing the wrapping step, heat up a half inch of oil in a skillet, and get a paper towel-lined colander ready, setting it on a plate or bowl to catch whatever grease escapes through the paper towel.

Step 9: Once the oil looks a little shimmery, around the time some very fine wisps of smoke start to waft up, and once your hand feels afraid when held a few inches over the oil, then you can dip a lumpia end to see how quickly it fries up. Know matter how scary it might get, don’t just fling it into the oil—just lay it in there, away from you so any accidental panic-induced splash goes away from you. Cook until it’s golden brown, then flip the lumpia over. It shouldn’t be very brown, since it will continue to cook a bit after you remove it from the oil. Set the fried lumpia into the paper towel-lined colander, let them cool a little (avoid lawsuit, in other words) and serve with duck sauce.

Note: If you have more than one filling, you can wrap them a little differently so that everyone knows what’s what; I had my friends wrap the chicken lumpia diagonally so the showing end would be a point, and the tofu lumpia squarely so the showing end would be a straight edge.

Duck Sauce

1/2 cup apricot jam

3 Tablespoons soy sauce

1/4 teaspoon ginger

1/2 teaspoon chili flakes for heat