Just Add Tomatoes to Your Eggs! The Chinese Dinner My Mother Made Every Week

Four eggs in the refrigerator. Two or three tomatoes going soft on the counter. It is six o'clock and you are about to order takeout again. Sit down. That is already dinner. Chinese tomato and egg stir fry (番茄炒蛋) is the dinner my mother made every single week of my childhood in Guangzhou, and it is the first dish almost every child in China learns to cook. Ten minutes. One pan. A few dollars. Here is exactly how she made it. ⭐ WHAT YOU NEED (serves 2 to 3 over rice, double it for a family) 4 eggs 3 ripe tomatoes, any kind, the softer the better 2 scallions, white and green parts separated Salt A small pinch of sugar A few tablespoons of plain cooking oil Optional: a pinch of white pepper, and 1 teaspoon cornstarch stirred into 1 tablespoon water ⭐ HOW TO MAKE IT CUT THE TOMATOES INTO BIG WEDGES. Not small cubes. Big pieces collapse slowly into sauce so you get soft chunks and juice in every bite. BEAT THE EGGS. Four eggs with a pinch of salt, a tiny pinch of sugar, and the white pepper, until no streaks of white remain. Stir in half the cornstarch water. It keeps the eggs soft instead of rubbery. ⭐ 3. TAKE THE EGGS OUT EARLY. Hot pan, two tablespoons of oil, eggs in. Count to ten, then push them gently into big soft folds. When they are half set and still wet on top, take them out. Take them out before you think they are ready. That is the whole secret. My mother said an egg only wants to be cooked once. Cook it fully now and it cooks twice, and you get hard grey eggs sitting in a puddle. COOK THE TOMATOES UNTIL THEY BLEED. Same pan, a little more oil, the white scallions for a few seconds, then the tomatoes with a pinch of salt right away. Press them down and cook three or four minutes until they collapse into red juice. Add a splash of water if the pan looks thirsty. Then a pinch of sugar. It is not there to make it sweet. It rounds off the sourness so the tomato tastes more like tomato. BRING THEM BACK TOGETHER. Stir in the rest of the cornstarch water until the sauce turns glossy. Slide the eggs back in and fold gently for thirty seconds. Green scallions on top. Heat off. SERVE OVER HOT RICE. Let the juice run down into the bowl. In our house the rice at the bottom was the best rice on the table. ⭐ PALE WINTER TOMATOES? The confession: many Chinese-American mothers stir in one spoonful of ketchup with the tomatoes. It brings back the deep red color and the tang a winter tomato is missing. Tomato paste works too, with less sugar. No shame in the bottle. COOKING FOR ONE: two eggs, one tomato, one scallion, ten minutes, a bowl of rice. It tastes just as good for one as it does for eight. THE HONEST WORDS Watery: the tomatoes did not cook down long enough. Let them bubble another minute or add a little more cornstarch water. Hard grey eggs: they stayed in too long the first time. Take them out while still shiny. Too sour: one more pinch of sugar. Flat: almost always salt. Tomatoes drink salt quietly. Burnt brown eggs: pan too hot. Hot to start, then turn it down the moment the eggs go in. ⭐ THE NEXT DAY: TOMATO AND EGG NOODLE SOUP. My mother made extra on purpose. At lunch she boiled salted water, cooked a handful of noodles, and spooned in the leftover tomato and egg with every drop of its juice. The sauce turns the water into a red, tangy soup rich with egg. Scallions on top. One pan, two meals. Four eggs, three tomatoes, two scallions. A few dollars, and it feeds a family. A meal kit in a box costs many times that for one dinner. There is no money in you knowing this. That is why nobody ever put it in a box. Make it once this week and change only two things: take the eggs out while they are still wet, and cook the tomatoes until they bleed. Then come to the comments and tell me: sugar house or salt house? Ketchup or no ketchup? What state are you cooking in? Did your mother or grandmother make this? Where was she from? What did her kitchen smell like when dinner was almost ready? I want to hear it before it is gone. I put out a new video every day. Subscribe so you do not miss one.