Christmas Cooking

We received a thoughtful gift from our sister-in-law Meg. She emailed us a whole bunch of good recipes that can be made without an oven. For our Christmas Eve dinner, we tried out steamed tilapia and it was great! Here’s the recipe:
2 small tilapia fillets
1/4 cup soy sauce
2 tablespoons powdered ginger
1 tablespoon oil
3 tablespoons minced fresh garlic
2 cups chopped collard greens
4 onions, chopped up

1. Make 3 or 4 shallow slashes on each side of the fish, to absorb the marinade.
2. Mix soy sauce, ginger, oil, and garlic. Put the fish in the bowl and spoon marinade over it.
3. Add shredded greens and onions to the remainder of the sauce, and mix.
4. Put greens and onions in a small pot, put fish on top, pour the rest of the sauce over it, and put it into a bigger pot that has about 3 inches of water in it and something like spoons or metal jar rings in the bottom for the smaller pot to sit on.
5. Cover the big pot, turn on the stove, and steam fish 15-20 minutes, until it flakes easily.



And for Christmas dinner, we made Mongolian Beef! Due to being in Uganda, we made some substitutions, which you can see in parentheses.
1 lb. flank steak
1/2 cup cornstarch
1 cup oil
1 bunch green onions (2 cups chopped collard greens and 4 onions)
1 Tbs. minced ginger and garlic
1/2 cup soy sauce
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup brown sugar

Slice steak 1/4” thick at 45° angle. Coat in cornstarch. Fry in 1 cup vegetable oil until edges look crispy. Drain and remove beef. Retain 2 Tbs. oil and sauté sliced green onions (or collard greens and onions) for a few minutes. Return beef to pan and add ginger, garlic, soy sauce, water, and brown sugar. Boil for 2-3 minutes.