Tee Poh is Treasure of the Seabed & Kitchen 💎 地宝.比目鱼.大地鱼.扁魚.铁脯鱼.左口鱼

In Singapore, some people are obsessive about having tee poh in their food like in bak chor mee. For them, it is the defining ingredient - have tee poh 👍 good, no tee poh 👎 bad. I am also like that but often wondered what the words "Tee Poh" stand for 🤔

Spelt Tee Poh, Ti Po, or Teepo, it comes from the Teochew Chinese words 铁脯. Tee Poh is made from 地宝鱼 (De Bǎo). 地宝 is a Flounder which is a bottom dwelling flat fish. 地宝 literally means "treasure of the seabed".

Found in the seas off southern China's Guangdong and Fujian provinces, the Flounder is also known literally as 比目鱼 or 左口鱼 (Flounder), 大地鱼 in Cantonese (Earth Fish) and 扁魚 in Hokkien (Flat Fish).

(Image of Flounder courtesy of Wikipedia.)

In Guangdong and Fujian, Tee Poh fish 铁脯鱼 and other seafood is sun dried.

One of the major areas producing sun dried Tee Poh is Shanwei, 汕尾 a seaside city in Guangdong province. Shanwei is known for all kinds of dried seafood like squid, cuttlefish, eel, stingray and, of course, Tee Poh. With good sunshine and sea breeze, it takes just a couple of days to sun dry Tee Poh.

(Image of Shanwei courtesy of Wikipedia.)

Many of our Teochew compatriots' forefathers in Singapore migrated here from Shantou 汕头 and fewer from Shanwei 汕尾. Shanwei is 190km (2 hours drive) southwest from Shantou.

Tee Poh 铁脯 or dried flounder fish is a very versatile ingredient suitable for many dishes to enhance their flavour.

It is commonly used in Cantonese, Teochew and Hokkien dishes.

In Singapore, bak chor mee enthusiasts will look out for Tee Poh in their bowl of minced pork noodle.

Less obvious because it is not visible, but bak chor mee enthusiasts will also be able to taste the umami savouriness that comes from tee poh in the bak chor mee soup.

There's also tee poh in the bak chor mee wanton filling which gives the sweet minced pork an umami savoury balance.

Tee poh is also used in Teochew fish dumplings or her kiao. The filling is similar to Cantonese wanton with minced pork and crushed or powdered tee poh. The her kiao wrap is made with fish paste and a starch binder (e.g. tapioca, sweet potato or glutinous rice) instead of wheat flour and egg.

Often Tee Poh is simply fried in a wok to release its oils and flavours, and then stir fried with leafy vegetables such as kailan, choy sum, beansprouts etc.

In Guangzhou, Tee Poh known among Cantonese as 大地鱼 Earth Fish, is used to make soup. The sun dried Earth Fish is traditionally grilled over slow charcoal fire till oils appear, and flavours and aromas released from the dried fish.

Together with pork bone, ham, and prawn, sun dried Earth Fish gives wanton noodle soup depth of umami savoury and sweet flavours.

Dried Earth Fish is also fried and then ground or pounded into powder.

The Earth Fish powder is folded and mixed into minced pork used to make wantons. The dried Earth Fish powder add a savoury umami flavour to the sweet pork.

In Shanwei, powdered Tee Poh 铁脯 is mixed into fish paste to make fishballs, adding a umami savoury layer to the sweet fish meat.

Over in neighbouring Fujian province, flounder is known in Hokkien as 扁魚 (Pi Hee) Flatfish. It is also sun dried, fried and then used to make stock for soups for use in hotpot etc.

In Fujian, the 扁魚 flatfish is sun dried whole - not gutted and butterflied before sun drying (unlike in Guangdong province). After sun drying, the head, bones, skin and spiny fins are removed from the dried flatfish. Nothing is wasted as every part of the whole dried flatfish can be used for different purposes.