The 15th day of Luna New Year (元宵节, YuanXiao) is known as the day of the spring lantern festival. I made a few simple dishes to enjoy with a few of our friends. One of the dishes I made was a chilled ‘liangban’ salad with chewy tofu knots (百页结), tasty enokitake mushrooms (金菇), crunchy wood ears fungus (木耳), green shallot and coriander.

Ingredients

• 2 handful of tofu knots, soaked in hot water for 2 hours, drained and squeeze out as much liquid as you can
• 1 handful of wood ear fungus, soaked in hot water for 20 minutes, drained, squeeze out as much liquid as you can, and thinly sliced
• 1/2 of a enoki mushroom, remove part of the stem so the mushroom needles can be separated and washed
• 1 tbsp. oyster sauce
• 2 tbsp. mirin or white wine
• 1 tbsp. sesame oil
• white pepper, to taste
• some coriander, roughly sliced
• some toasted sesame seeds (to garnish)
• cooking oil

Method

Bring some cooking oil to medium heat in a frying pan, add wood ear fungus, stir fry briefly for 1-2 minutes; add oyster sauce, toss; add tofu knots, mirin, sesame oil and white pepper; put on a lid and let it cook over medium heat for 5 minutes; turn off heat, add enoki needles, toss; remove from heat, set aside to cool, preferably chilled in the fridge for about 2 hours. Once it is chilled, toss in the coriander.

Garnish with sesame seeds and serve.