There are two primary components to it: the lettuce leaf and the filling. You fold the leaf up like a pocket and eat it with the filling inside. 1 head of fresh butter lettuce leaves (or a few Romaine hearts, if butter lettuce not available) Carefully separate the leaves from the stem, wash, and pat dry. Stack leaves on a plate and set aside.
Filling ingredients
1 lb lean ground beef a few stalks of green onion, white part only, chopped
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil one 8oz can of sliced water chestnuts, minced
1/2 cup dried shitake mushrooms, reconstituted, minced
a few stalks of green onion, green part only, minced
2 tsp sesame oil 2 cloves fresh garlic, minced
2 tsp fresh ginger, minced
1 tbsp rice wine vinegar
1 tbsp soy sauce
1/3 c. hoisin sauce (optional)
1+ tsp chili pepper sauce or 1+ tsp Tabasco sauce (depends on how much heat you want in this dish)
Directions
1. In a large skillet over medium-high heat (if using olive oil, high heat if using other cooking oil), brown the ground beef and stir often so that it doesn't burn or stick to the bottom of the pan. Remove beef to a bowl and set aside. Leave the juices in the pan, this will help keep the next set of ingredients from burning.
2. Add the chopped white part of the green onion and stir frequently. Add garlic, ginger, soy sauce, vinegar, hoisin sauce, and hot sauce (optional) together. Stir/mix in water chestnuts, shitake mushrooms, sesame oil, and chopped green part of the green onion stalks.
3. Return ground beef to the skillet and mix until well combined. Remove from heat and set aside.
4. Assembly: Take one lettuce leaf and place it on a plate. Fill it with a few tbsp of ground beef filling. Wrap like a pocket and eat.
Oh, a kitchen note on the spacing between ingredient sets. You could save yourself some time and combine each set of ingredients into its own bowl. Then add the bowls of already combined ingredients to the skillet as they are fried together. I'm thinking that this would be a good filling for a Chinese meat pie or potsticker.
