Savory steamed Chinese sticky rice with ribs (Rib Lo Mai Fun), yielding well flavored sticky rice with juicy and tender ribs.
The weather drops a lot recently in my city. So we use our steamers more frequently. I have found an extremely easy way to prepare a warm sticky rice with ribs. After absorbing the rib sauces, the rices have a perfect softness and well balanced flavor while ribs, in addition to the original marinating taste, obtain a small touch of rice aroma.
Chinese sticky rice with ribs
Ingredients
1 cup sticky rice (糯米), around 200g
200g ribs, 4cm sections
5 dried shiitake mushrooms, hydrated and cut into small strips
Seasonings
a small pinch of salt
½ tablespoon light soy sauce
1 teaspoon dark soy sauce
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
⅛ teaspoon sugar
1 thumb ginger
½ tablespoon sesame oil
½ tablespoon Chinese cooking wine
Sauce and Garnishing
½ tablespoon oyster sauce
1 /2 tablespoon light soy sauce
1 tablespoon sesame oil
Chopped scallion
Instructions
Rinse the sticky rice and then soak with enough cold water at the previous night. Room temperature in winter and fridge in summer.
Soak the ribs with cold water for around 30 minutes. Change clean water once and then drain with kitchen paper. Add all the seasonings sauces and ginger except sesame oil. Mix well. Cover with plastic wrapper and marinate overnight. Fridge in hot days.
Line the steamer with a clean gauze (I use dried lotus leaf). Drain the sticky rices completely and spread them on the lined steamer. Mix sesame oil with the ribs and then place on the sticky rice one by one. Then sprinkle the hydrated shiitake mushroom strips.
Set up the steamer and steam for around 1 hour over slow to medium fire after boils. I usually make a broth or stock along with the steamed rice. Note: if you do not want to steam them, you can place all the ingredients in a rice cooker and cook as normal rice. The sticky rice will be softer and much watery.
In a small bowl, mix light soy sauce, oyster sauce and sesame oil well. Drizzle the sauce over the rice. Serve with scallions as garnishing.
Although this is quite yummy, do not eat too much once. Usually I serve each person in my family one small bowl of this and match with other greens and soups. Sticky rice needs longer time to digest.
🧾Recipe
Chinese Sticky Rice with Ribs
Ingredients
- 1 cup sticky rice , around 200g
- 200 g ribs , 4cm sections
- 5 dried shiitake mushrooms , hydrated
Seasonings
- a small pinch of salt
- ½ tbsp. light soy sauce
- 1 tsp. dark soy sauce
- 1 tbsp. oyster sauce
- ⅛ tsp. sugar
- 1 thumb ginger
- ½ tbsp. sesame oil
- ½ tbsp. Chinese cooking wine
Sauce and Garnishing
- ½ tbsp. oyster sauce
- ½ tbsp. light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp. sesame oil
- Chopped scallion
Instructions
- Rinse the sticky rice and then soak with enough cold water at the previous night. Room temperature in winter and fridge in summer.
- Soak the ribs with cold water for around 30 minutes. Change clean water once and then drain with kitchen paper. Add all the seasonings sauces and ginger expect sesame oil. Mix well. Cover with plastic wrapper and marinate overnight. Fridge in hot days.
- Line the steamer with a clean gauze (I use dried lotus leaf). Drain the sticky rices completely and spread them on the lined steamer. Mix sesame oil with the ribs and then place on the sticky rice one by one. Then sprinkle the hydrated shiitake mushroom strips.
- Set up the steamer and steam for around 1 hour over slow to medium fire after boils. I usually make a broth or stock along with the steamed rice. Note: if you do not want to steam them, you can place all the ingredients in a rice cooker and cook as normal rice. The sticky rice will be softer and much watery.
- In a small bowl, mix light soy sauce, oyster sauce and sesame oil well. Drizzle the sauce over the rice. Serve with scallions as garnishing.
Nutrition
Enjoy! If you make one of my recipes, you can use hot tag @chinasichuanfood on instagram and let me know. Thanks for visiting. If you are a sticky rice lover as me, check the following recipes too.
Andreas
Hi Elaine,
is that the same "sticky rice" you use in the "Thai Sticky Rice Recipe with Mango"?
Or maybe you could do an extra article on rice perhaps? See the standard rice I get here in the supermarket is parboiled long grain rice.
In the Asian grocery stores I get mainly rice of Thai origin, ie long grain fragrant rice, short grain glutinous / sticky rice and some mid/short grain variant labeled "Sushi Rice" (even though it's from Thailand, too and not from Japan). I have seen packages labeled "broken rice" but I don't know what that means or what I should use it for.
Then there is Basmati Rice, Italian or Spanish short grain (which is somewhere in between the glutinous and the "Sushi rice") and some other French long grain variants. But I don't think that is what you use.
So even though this might seem obvious to you, I'm sometimes a little bit lost on which rice to use...
Elaine
Hi Andreas,
It is a great suggestion to introduce rices used in Chinese cuisine. I will draft it in following days.
It is ok to use Thai style sticky rice in almost every sticky rice recipe on my blog. I use lots of Thai sticky rice too.
Pre-boiled rice and broken sticky rice is known as 阴米 in Chinese. It is mainly used for congee or porridge. So they are not the ones.
Both short and long grain rice can be used for this recipe. I use long sticky rice from Thailand.
Sushi rice is a kind somewhere between normal rice and sticky rice. It is less glutinous than sticky rice.
Ngan Nguyen
OMG your blog is amazing!! Thanks for the work and effort put into this. I will be your loyal supporter from today lol!
Elaine
Thanks, Ngan Nguyen. I'm very happy that you love those recipes!
Denny Li
Did the prep yesterday and made it for brunch this morning. So easy and so good. Much, much better than another very popular sticky rice recipe on the Internet. My kids loved it and I'm definitely making this again. Only alteration I made was to add some sugar to the finishing sauce and to steam it on a splatter screen since I couldn't find my cheesecloth and I don't have any lotus leaves.
Thank you for another great recipe!
Heng Ang
Morning Elaine, I am going to cook this meal today. Without any meats, just vegetables, any suggestion for the vegan Elaine? thanks
Best Regards.
Elaine
Hi Heng,
If you plan to make use only vegetables, I highly recommended using sweet potatoes or pumpkin.
Michele Ooi
Hi Elaine,
I've just came across this recipe of yours. May I know need to give a quick drench of hot water on the lotus leaf?
Elaine
No. Just wash them before using, lotus leaf is quite clean.
Nancy Perine
Hello! I had so much fun cruising around your website/blog. Your recipe for Chinese Sticky Rice With Ribs caught my eye. I actually had all the ingredients on hand except for the shitake mushrooms. Our friendly grocery store just a couple blocks away was able to fix me right up with the fresh shitakes. When I lived in Washington state, we used to go wild mushroom hunting in the fall and spring. We almost always found a nice bunch of shitake mushrooms. I also had some sticky rice left over from dinner the night before. We had friends over for dinner and we all loved the dish. Thanks for sharing!
Elaine
Nancy,
Your description of wild shitake mushroom rice makes me mouthwatering. I am on a holiday in a large mountain. And there are lots of wild mushrooms. Sometimes, we add them into plain steamed rice too. Or other time, we make a yummy soup out of it. Very yummy and comforting.
So-Young
This is one of the best fried rice so far 😀
Elaine
Thank you, dear!
Joanne
Are you adding the seasonings just to the ribs? The directions are a bit unclear to me. Do you:
1. Soak the sticky rice overnight
2. Soak the ribs 30 minutes and marinate just the ribs while the rice stays separate
3. Cook the next day
Or do you: (Option 2):
1. Soak the sticky rice overnight
2. The next day, soak your ribs and then mix the seasonings over the ribs and the sticky rice, then marinate overnight?
3. Cook the next day
Ken
Tuyệt vời.... bạn có thể làm món bean curd with taro