Bon Appetit and Mission Chinese’s Danny Bowien visit Chengdu, and report back on Szechuanese food. Video above, but nice article here.
It was the start of one of the most memorable lunches of my life: alligator soup with radish, house-smoked pork belly stuffed with sesame paste, and Sichuan-peppercorn ice cream.
More soon on the peppercorn ice cream….
(image from wikipedia)
Zha Jian Mian (炸酱面), commonly listed as “noodles with bean paste and meat,” is one of my favorite noodle dishes. According to a cursory internet search, the dish originates from the Shandong region of China, in the north.
The flavor is earthy, sweet, and meaty, and has that authentic flavor that only broad bean paste can bring. It’s also easy to make if you have the right ingredients (Chinese pantry staples) and makes great leftovers.
The diagram of this dish is simple. The sauce is made from pan fried ground meat with the right ratio of fermented bean paste, sugar, onion, and sesame oil. Spoon the sauce wheat noodles and add sliced cucumber on top.
(image from savory bites)
I started with this recipe. The only difference is that I left the cucumbers raw to put on top afterwards, used thai red chilis and a bit of sesame paste in the sauce at the end because I was short on bean paste, replaced onions with shallots, and used a mixture of ground lamb and ground pork. Not exactly Zha Jiang Mian by the book, but still so good.
It’s best poured over thick wheat noodles, but it’s good with anything you have laying around.
I brought this into my classroom for lunch one day at the School of the Art Institute, and one of my students told me it smelled just like the noodles from his hometown. This was maybe my proudest moment as an amateur Chinese chef.
Oxtail, yam, and asparagus noodle soup with basil and Peking duck broth. Accompanied by salty bean paste relish.
Brown Candy in Pieces: a type of crystallized sugar used to make chinese desserts (nian gao) or to add to tea (in small crumbles)
Smells like Maple Syrup. Ingredients: Cane sugar and water.
Lu Flavor Eggs, found at RasaMalaysia. This style of cooking is known as Red-Cooked or Lu (滷). There is also HongZhao cooking, which is a little less time intensive and somewhat different. Confusingly, both are known as “Red-Cooked” on the English language Internet. I actually have not had much luck trying to find a good Lu Wei recipe. The egg one here is fast and easy, but kind of “light.”
When cooking in Lu broth, you basically simmer the ingredients in an aromatic broth flavored with star anise, cinnamon/cassia bark, cloves, fennel, peppercorns, licorice, ginger, tangerine peel, etc. If you are crazy, you can even use seahorses and dried lizards, probably not available at Chinese supermarkets in the USA.
Families often have a master Lu broth that they maintain indefinitely. Looking forward to starting my own.
It’s popular year round, but great to serve at New Year because of its lucky red color.
I plan to make some version of this in the next couple days, from Yan Kit So’s Classic Food of China book, starting with a beef shin and eggs.
A couple of menu notes from my Mother on the phone today:
Dan Dan Noodles
Hong Zhao Chicken — a whole chicken braised in a shiaoxing rice wine
Stir fried white cabbage with parsley (i think she means ciilantro?) and scallions
Red cooked eggs and bean curd
a cold tofu dish - cold tofu and green onion
nian gao (chinese new year cake)
More developments to come!
