Sweet and sour pork with fresh lychees
Lychees are in season now, so they replace pineapple in this sweet and sour pork, shallow-fried until crisp outside and tender inside.
- 40 min
- Serves 2
- Pan-fry
- Medium
Why it suits you: A yang-deficient constitution feels the cold, with chilly hands and feet, and cold summer food easily brings on stomach ache. Lychee is sweet and warm, supporting the spleen and warming the middle, and it comes into season right now. With pork to nourish and peppers to warm and whet the appetite, the sweet-sour sauce gets everyone eating.
Method
Prep 20 min · Cook 20 min- 1Marinate the pork with the soy sauce and egg yolk for 15 minutes, then coat each piece in cornflour and rest for 5 minutes until the coating looks damp.
- 2Heat the oil in a frying pan and shallow-fry the pork over medium heat until golden and cooked through. Lift out, pour off most of the oil and stir-fry the onion and peppers.
- 3Mix the ketchup, vinegar, sugar and 2 tbsp water, pour into the pan and bubble until thick. Add the pork and lychees, toss quickly until coated and serve at once.
Cautions
- Too many lychees can cause internal heat, so keep to 10–12 per meal. Diabetics should cut the sugar and watch portions.
Chef's tips
- Add the lychees last and turn off the heat as soon as they're coated, or they go watery; pineapple works if lychees aren't available.
The TCM view
Lychee is sweet, sour and warm, supporting the spleen and liver, nourishing blood and warming the middle to ease pain. Pork is sweet, salty and neutral, moistening and nourishing qi and blood. Sweet peppers are pungent and warm, dispelling cold and aiding digestion; onion moves qi and settles the stomach. Warming without being drying, it lets a yang-deficient body eat warm through summer.
