Kaim Chye Boay – a melting pot of delicious leftovers!!!!!

This is an amazing dish to make using your leftovers!

“Kiam chye” – is salted vege and “boey” is leftover. Kaim Chye Boey is a sourish and salty vegetable dish cooked with leftovers – and in English terms, we call it Mustard Green Stew.

Normally we cook this dish after the steamboat on Chinese New Year’s eve, and we use the leftover soup and ingredients, and add salted mustard green, other vegetables like tomatoes, and brew this dish for a few hours.

It may look like a big pot of leftovers, but it actually tastes amazing, especially if you eat it with plain porridge or rice with sambal belachan.

This is a melting pot of leftovers made with love!

OK, so this is how I make my Kiam Chye Boey the easy way – I freeze all my leftover roast pork, roast duck, roast chicken or any leftover meat without the gravy. I don’t add leftover vegetables as I prefer to cook the vegetables fresh on that day.

The best leftover to add to this dish is roast pork. If you don’t have any leftovers, the easiest way is to visit your local BBQ shop, purchase any roast pork, BBQ pork or and any roasted dish.

As for the stock, if you have any leftover stock from the steamboat, that would be THE BEST; however, you can add chicken bones to it or just plain water.

As for the mustard, you can use the pickled mustard green from the Chinese grocers; however, I am going to use the fresh mustard green. For sourness, I use tamarind pieces instead of pickled mustard green.

OK, here is a quick and simple Kiam Chye Boay recipe for anyone who misses this dish as much as I do.

Fresh mustard green, tomatoes, ginger, chillies, cabbage, roast pork, leftover meat.

Ingredients:

  • 2-3 litres water (prefer stock if you have any) – depending on the quantity of ingredients. Go with 2 litres first, then add more if needed.
  • Mustard Green – washed and chop into smaller pieces, set aside
  • Mix vegetables – cabbage, tomatoes, ginger, chilli – washed and set aside
  • Roast pork – I use leftover roast pork.
  • 2 inches ginger – sliced thinly
  • Leftover meat dishes – I use frozen leftover meat/roast dishes.
  • 3-6 Tamarind pieces – use 3 pieces first, after an hour of boiling, if need to, add a few more.
  • Other ingredients you can add: fish balls, meat balls, baby corn, canned mushroom etc.

Methods:

  • Boil water/stock
  • Add all cooked ingredients including vegetables into the boiling water.
  • Boil for at least 1.5 hours on low heat.

Start adding all the leftovers into the boiling water.

Cook’s note:

  1. There is no right or wrong on how many ingredients you want to add in. If you have more leftovers, add them into the dish. The more leftovers, the more flavour you will have.
    If you prefer your dish to be on the sour side – add more tamarind pieces. If you want it more spicy, add more chilli (dry).
  2. Tamarind is “cooling”, i.e. in other words a bit “ying” by nature, thus it is important to contrast it with ginger, which is considered “yang” in nature. Otherwise, some people with sensitive stomaches may feel bloated or uncomfortable.
  3. This dish can last 2-3 days in the pot.

Preparation Time: 15 minutes
Cooking Time: 1-2 hours
Number of People: 2 – 8 people

Enjoy!! Love to hear what else do you add in your kiam chye boay. Leave a message below!

This is the tamarind pieces I use. Get it from Nyonyalicious’s online store

Grab your fresh food ingredients: