I love spring rolls or popiah as we affectionately call it back home in Malaysia and Singapore.

My mum make one of the best spring rolls.  Oh I sooooo love it.  I miss it.  My mum usually make a vegetarian spring roll consisting of lots of mang kuang (sweet turnip), carrots, green beans and cabbage.  She will stir fry the ingredients, cool it, then using her two hands to squeeze the excess fluid out so that the spring rolls are nice and crispy when she wraps or fry them.

When I came to OZ, my late FIL has another recipe.  Meat forms a big part of my in-laws diet which I am still getting used to.  But my FIL would used lots of cabbages, carrots and minced beef.  That’s his version and I like that too.

But as I eat more vegetables, fish than meat, I decided to do a vegetarian one at home.

I use:

  • Cabbages, shredded
  • Carrots, chopped very finely
  • Bean sprouts
  • Chinese mushrooms, soaked and sliced finely
  • Glass noodle (tang hoon in Chinese), pre-softened with hot water and drained
  • Black fungus, sliced finely

In a wok, stir fried some garlic, then pour in the cabbage and carrots.  Stir fried until the cabbage has softened and you can taste its natural sweetness.  Then, add in the bean sprouts, mushrooms, glass noodle, black fungus, mixed in together and seasoned it with some pepper, salt, or a very tiny bit of oyster sauce .

Next cool the ingredients because wrapping the spring rolls when the filling is hot would make it look wrinkly.

My kids and  I love both the fried and non-fried versions.  Infact as I was wrapping it, my 2 kids were hanging around me, asking for one after another, hee.

The filling…

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Nicely wrapped and making a healthy snack for some…

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Or fried and dressed up a little bit….a delicious snack too…

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Well, I don’t usually “dress up” my meals at home.  We were all so eager to eat that night that I have forgottent to take a picture of the fried spring rolls.  And when I realised it, we  had only 2 left on the plate.  To take a picture of 2 leftovers would make it look quite sad, so I dressed it up a bit, and you know, some fancy restaurants here would serve a spring roll appetizer served in the exact same manner for some $12!  Mine probably cost 20 cents, hahahaha!

Oh, all that filling I probably make around 30 spring rolls, I gave 10 spring rolls each to our friends that were visiting and we finished the rest, burp!

If you prefer a healthier version, you can always choose not to fry it.  I probably should not have the fried one since I have skipped the gym for at least 2 weeks, yikes!