Velveting or cornstarching is a Chinese cooking technique which stops fish or meat from drying out when fried. Marinating, poaching then stir-frying sounds like a lot of effort but it’s all well worth your while.
When I first time ever saw a recipe for velvet fish – it was Sam Sifton’s from NY Times Cooking – I got terribly excited expecting a thrilling new kind of fish that I’d never come across before.
There was a bit of an anti-climax, of course, when it read ‘halibut, cod or flounder’ in the list of ingredients. The ‘velvet’ element simply means marinating fish chunks with help of a spoonful of corn flour, which I’m sure I’d done before.
Things got much worse when I googled ‘velvet fish’. It’s a disease! It’s a parasite or some such nastiness infecting fish in aquariums. That doesn’t sound appetising at all, does it?
Thankfully, in cookery it has nothing to do with parasites or infections.
What is velveting?
Velveting is a Chinese cooking technique whose purpose is to seal and coat fish or meat pieces before stir-frying and thus keep them moist and juicy.
It makes perfect sense: dipping meat in corn starch creates a sort of soft coating, a little fluffy, a little fuzzy, just like velvet. Thus marinated (velveted) fish is poached in water briefly, to be next gently stir fried in a fragrant sauce.
It reminds me slightly of chicken general Tso where marinated chicken meat gets deep fried, then cooked in a sticky sauce. But you might think that what is good for chicken, might an awful lot of cooking and processing for delicate fish flesh.
It isn’t though. it’s a gorgeous outcome. But I’ll say the fish does need to be very firm, otherwise it might fall to bits if not handled extremely gently.
How to velvet fish
The marinade consists of an egg white, corn flour, salt and a little Shaoxing wine. It’s not a paste! It should be quite runny so the fish slices are coated very lightly.
After about half and hour, it’s time for poaching. Best to do it in a wok: the recipe does involve quite a bit of work and several dishes so I suggest you use the same wok for the poaching and the stir frying. Every little helps as far as washing up is concerned.
It will need less than a minute in barely simmering water before it turns opaque and has to be lifted with a slotted spoon. Needless to say, at all the stages the fish must be handled gently.
The wok, emptied of the water and wiped with a paper towel, can be re-employed for cooking the sauce.
The vegetables stir fried to accompany the fish can be anything you like. Sam Sifton’s version features mushrooms and I make mine with sliced asparagus and they make the dish light and bright all round.
The vegetables are lightly stir-fried with the usual aromatics, spring onions, ginger and garlic, then sauce is added and cooked for a couple of minutes, with a drop of water if necessary to loosen it up.
The fish goes back to the wok and it needs, again, careful handling, and only long enough to warm it up and coat in the sauce.
The fish can be served classically with plain steamed rice on the side, but if you end up with any leftover, don’t bin it: it makes a fantastic fish butty.
More fish stir fry recipes
Scallops, asparagus and baby aubergine chunks stir fried one after the other, coated in spicy sweet sauce are so, so good. It’s important to cook the ingredients separately but you use just one pan.
A very easy recipe for stir fried salmon with lemon and ginger which is best served with noodles. The sauce for the stir fry salmon is made with caramelised lemon, palm sugar and ginger.
Fish stir fry is a even greater dish if you souse the fish with Thai flavours. Still, make sure you use firm fish: cod, haddock, hake, monkfish or similar.
More Asian seafood recipes
Whole grilled trout with Thai style marinade, oven or barbecue ready. Asian flavours of ginger, chilli and coriander go well with trout's meaty flesh.
Chinese five spice seasoned prawns in a warm layered salad served with crispy fried noodles – simply fantastic!
Prawn fried rice spiced with cinnamon and star anise is light, healthy and extremely satisfying.