Tjap Tjoy (Stir-Fried Vegetables in Glossy Sauce)
Tjap tjoy
Crisp mixed vegetables and thin strips of pork, cooked fast in a hot wok and bound in a light, shining sauce, the way a Dutch Chinese takeaway makes it.
IIIStews & Braises- Prep
- 25 min
- Cook
- 15 min
- Serves
- 4
- Level
- Beginner
On a Dutch Chinese menu, tjap tjoy is the dish that sits between the fried things: a tangle of vegetables and thin strips of meat in a light, shining sauce, sold with pork, chicken or prawns. It is what people order when they want something from the takeaway that still looks like a plate of vegetables, and it goes with everything else in the bag.
A Hokkien name in old spelling
The name comes from Hokkien, the language of many Chinese families who settled in Indonesia, and is usually glossed as "mixed vegetables". Modern Indonesian writes it capcay. The Dutch spelling keeps the older convention from the colonial era, in which tj stood for the sound Indonesian now writes as c. It is the same reason Dutch shops still sell ketjap rather than kecap. The dish came to the Netherlands as part of the Chinese-Indonesian repertoire and spread with the Chinees-Indisch restaurants from the 1960s onward. It shares a name and an idea with American chop suey, but the two grew up apart.
Hard vegetables first
A stir fry is mostly a question of order. Carrot and cauliflower go into the wok first and get a minute under a lid with a splash of water, so they soften before the leek and cabbage arrive. The soft leaves and bean sprouts go in last, with the sauce, and need only seconds. Get that order right and every vegetable in the bowl has bite. Get it wrong and the sprouts turn to string while the carrot is still raw.
The meat is cooked separately and briefly. A little soy and cornflour on the strips before they hit the wok keeps them tender, a gentle version of the velveting Chinese cooks use. Lifting them out after a quick sear stops them turning grey while the vegetables cook. Use a carbon steel wok over the fiercest heat you have, and cook in two batches if it is small.
Tjap tjoy is the vegetable drawer of the takeaway, sorted by how long each thing needs.
The sauce comes last and is the lightest part: stock with oyster sauce and soy, thickened with cornflour until it turns clear and glossy. It should coat the vegetables, never drown them. Serve it straight from the wok while it still steams, with rice and a spoon of sambal on the side.
“Cook in two batches if your wok is small. A crowded wok stews the vegetables, and tjap tjoy should crunch.”
Ingredients
Serves 4
The meat
- 300 gpork fillet or chicken breast, or peeled prawns, in thin strips
- 1 tbsplight soy sauce
- 1 tspcornflour
- 1 tspShaoxing rice wine, optional
The vegetables
- 1carrot, thinly sliced on the diagonal
- 200 gcauliflower, in small florets
- 1leek, in 1 cm rings
- 250 gChinese cabbage or paksoi, stalks and leaves cut separately
- 150 gmushrooms, sliced
- 100 gbamboo shoots, tinned, drained
- 150 gbean sprouts (taugé)
- 2garlic cloves, sliced
- 2 cmfresh ginger, cut into fine matchsticks
- 3 tbspneutral oil
The sauce
- 250 mlchicken stock
- 2 tbspoyster sauce
- 1 tbsplight soy sauce
- 1 tspsugar
- 1 tbspcornflour, slaked in 2 tbsp water
- 1 tsptoasted sesame oil, to finish
Method
- 1
Prepare everything first
Slice the meat thinly across the grain and toss it with the soy, cornflour and rice wine. Cut the vegetables to a similar thinness, keeping the hard ones (carrot, cauliflower, cabbage stalks) apart from the soft ones (cabbage leaves, sprouts). A stir fry moves too fast to chop anything once the wok is hot.
- 2
Sear the meat
Heat 1 tbsp of the oil in the wok over the highest heat until it just smokes. Spread the meat in one layer, leave it for 30 seconds to colour, then toss until barely cooked. Lift it out, because it will finish in the sauce and toughens if it stays in the wok.
- 3
Hard vegetables first
Add the rest of the oil, then the garlic and ginger for a few seconds. Add the carrot and cauliflower, toss for two minutes, then add a splash of water and cover for one minute so the florets steam until tender but firm. Add the leek, cabbage stalks, mushrooms and bamboo shoots and toss for two minutes more.
- 4
Bind the sauce
Pour in the stock, oyster sauce, soy and sugar and bring to the boil. Stir in the slaked cornflour and cook for about 30 seconds, until the sauce turns clear and glossy. Return the meat with the cabbage leaves and bean sprouts and toss only until the leaves wilt.
- 5
Finish and serve
Drizzle with the sesame oil and taste for salt. Serve at once with rice, or alongside foe yong hai as part of a takeaway spread at home. The vegetables should still have bite when they reach the table.
Alongside the braise
Slow pots want something to catch the sauce and something sweet against it.
- Boiled potatoes, or a mound of plain rice for zuurvlees
- Rode kool met appel, red cabbage stewed with apple
- Appelmoes, apple sauce, the eternal Dutch side
- Zoervleisj on fries, Limburg-style, over frites
Questions from the kitchen
What does tjap tjoy mean?+
The name comes from Hokkien and is usually glossed as "mixed vegetables". Modern Indonesian writes it capcay. Tjap tjoy is the older Dutch spelling, the same one that gives Dutch shops ketjap rather than kecap.
Is tjap tjoy the same as chop suey?+
The names and the idea are related, but the dishes grew up apart. Chop suey developed in American Chinese restaurants. Tjap tjoy reached the Netherlands through Indonesian capcay and is first of all a vegetable stir fry.
Can I make it vegetarian?+
Yes. Leave out the meat or use firm tofu, swap the chicken stock for vegetable stock, and use a mushroom-based vegetarian oyster sauce or a little extra soy with a pinch of sugar.
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