Ever got confused by
Chinese cooking techniques like deep-fried, stir-fried, quick-fried,
saute, marinade? You may know their meanings literally, but you may not
know how exactly to do it in your kitchen.
This Cooking
Tips page includes some of the basic Chinese cooking techniques, tips
and methods. We hope it will be helpful to visitors when they try
the Chinese recipes.
Selecting Ingredients
Chinese cooking uses a wide range of ingredients,
including meat, meat products, fish, seafood, poultry, eggs, vegetables,
bean products, wild plants, game, and many seasonings. Most come in both
fresh and dried forms, but the most important features to look for are
freshness and quality.
Meats should be judged by their place of
origin, season of production, and any other characteristic-for example,
old or young, male or female-that may be specified in a recipe.
Appearance, color, weight, water content, and smell are also important.
Different dishes call for different cuts of meat because cuts have
different textures once they have been cooked. Cuts of the same meat may
be tough or tender, coarse or fine. For example, the Chinese distinguish
eighteen different cuts of pork. These include filet, streaky pork,
shoulder butt, ham butt, hock, and shank.
The filet is considered the best cut and is generally stir-fried or
quick-fried (see the section below on "cooking techniques" for
descriptions of these and other procedures) to take advantage of its
tenderness. Streaky pork is best when marinated with spiced rice flour
(see recipe Steamed Pork with Spiced Rice Flour) and then steamed, or red-cooked
(braised in soy sauce). The shank and hock are best suited to lengthy
simmering, with or without soy sauce, while the ham and ham butt are
often used as substitutes for filet. The ribs and feet are best prepared
'by lengthy, low-temperature methods like braising, baking or simmering,
while spareribs are suitable for sauteing, quick-frying,
slippery-frying, and deep-frying. The methods used for pork are also
applicable to similar cuts of beef and lamb or mutton.
With reference to poultry, the tenderest and most versatile part of a
chicken or duck is the breast. Chickens or ducks less than a year old
are usually quick-fried or deep-fried, while older birds need long, slow
cooking like simmering or braising to tenderize them.
Fish is as nutritious as poultry. Crab, prawns and shrimps are rich
in phosphorus, calcium and vitamin A. You can tell a fresh fish by its
tight, undamaged scales, red gills, and clear protruding eyes. Fresh
prawns and shrimps should be greenish-white, with firm bodies that curve
slightly. They should not be flat or limp, and their heads and tails
should be intact. Fresh crabs should be alive and active. They should
spit foams and have green upper shells and white under-shells.
[top]
Preparation
In Chinese cooking, preparation includes trimming
and washing vegetables, slaughtering and dressing live chickens and
ducks, gutting live fish, and reconstituting dried ingredients.
When preparing vegetables, cooks first trim and discard any wilted or
tough outer leaves. Then they wash them. Vegetables should not be cut
before they are washed, because vitamins and minerals would be washed
away. Nutrients are also lost if vegetables and other foods are cut
ahead of time and exposed to the air. The most nutritious dishes are
prepared and cooked immediately.
Chinese cooks prefer to buy live
poultry and fish and to kill them themselves whenever possible because
they believe that freshly-killed chickens, ducks and fish have a subtler
flavor. If you slaughter your own poultry, you should drain off the
blood thoroughly and soak the bird in very hot water before plucking it.
When preparing a duck, you will find it easier to pluck the eiderdown if
you force-feed it with wine, vinegar, or cold water before killing it.
To draw a bird, make an incision about 3 inches (7 cm) long along the
lower part of the breast, on the back, or under one of the wings. When
drawing out the entrails, be careful not to puncture the gallbladder;
its bitter taste would ruin the edible meat. Then wash the bird
thoroughly before continuing to prepare the recipe.
Preparing a fresh, whole fish involves scaling, chopping off the
fins, taking off the gills, gutting and washing. To gut the fish, make a
cut along the belly or spine and take out the black membrane in the
belly cavity. If the recipe calls for a whole boned fish, you should
first gut it by cutting along the spine. Then cut parallel to the spine
almost up to the top and separate the flesh from the top and bottom of
the center bone. Lift out the center bone and small side bones and cut
the spine away at the head and tail. Finally, wash the cavity and the
outside and arrange the fish as closely as possible in its original
shape.
The easiest way to shell shrimps and prawns is to hold the head in
one hand and the tail in the other hand and squeeze the meat out of the
shell at the neck end. Wash the vein away under cold running water or
pick it out with the tip of a knife. Wash the shrimp, drain, dry well,
and set aside. Sometimes shrimp and prawn heads are also used in dishes.
Drying makes meats, seafoods
and vegetables tough and fibrous. To reconstitute dried foods, first
soak them in cold water until they soften. Then soak them in warm water
until they expand and regain their original texture and pliability. When preparing dried veget-ables such
as wood ear (an edible fungus) or golden needles (also known as dried
tigerlily buds), you need not use cold water first. Wash the vegetables
well to remove any dirt or sand, and then soak them in hot water until
soft. Dried black Chinese mushrooms are prepared the same way, but
require less soaking time.
[top]
Cutting
Chinese recipes call for ingredients to be cut
into different shapes because different ways of cutting affect the
texture and appearance of a finished dish.
Chinese cooks use three
main cutting techniques (see illustrations): straight-cutting (also
known as perpendicular-cutting), horizontal-cutting (slicing), and
slashing (scoring). Both straight-cutting and slicing are used to create
chunks, slivers, slices, strips, cubes, and even pulps and pastes.
Slashing means making shallow parallel cuts on the surface of an
ingredient, usually a meat or fish. This exposes a larger area to the
seasonings and to the heat source. If an ingredient is scored in a
crisscross or diamond pattern, it will shrink to form a raised
flower-shaped pattern when cooked.
[top]
Balance Among Ingredients
Chinese cooks attach great importance to the
balance among the ingredients in a dish. This important step should
result in a harmonious blending of textures, colors, aromas, flavors,
shapes and nutritional qualities. To do this well, you must understand
the required cooking methods of the dishes and the characteristics of
different ingredients and how they fit together.
Balancing amounts
The major
ingredient should be the most plentiful one in a dish. If you are making
stir-fried meat shreds, for example, the total quantity of other
ingredients should not exceed the amount of meat. If there are two or more
main ingredients, you should use about the same amount of
each.
Balancing flavors
All the ingredients
in a dish should enhance the flavor of the main ingredient. This is why
asparagus or bamboo shoots are often cooked with chicken, duck, and
fish: the blandness of these vegetables enhances the light, delicate
character of the meat.
Similarly, the blandness of shark's fins and sea cucumbers (beche-de-mer,
sea slug) can be offset by cooking them with Chinese ham, chicken, or
pork, or in a highly-flavored stock. You can also cut the heavy, greasy
character of a main ingredient by adding lighter secondary ingredients.
This is why many Chinese recipes call for pork to be cooked with fresh
vegetables.
You must also take seasonal factors and personal preferences into
account. Summer is the season for light, juicy foods, while heavier
dishes, or ones with thick gravies, are better suited to cold weather.
When you plan a menu, you should balance sweet, salty, sour, and hot
dishes to suit your taste and that of your family and guests.
There is also a Chinese sequence for serving dishes: salty dishes are
served before sweet ones, while heavy- and light-flavored ones are
served alternately.
Balancing textures
Texture refers to the crunchiness, crispness, softness, or tenderness
of a food. In Chinese cooking, ingredients with similar textures are
usually cooked together. However, crisp and soft foods are sometimes
combined in a single dish. This requires careful attention to cooking
temperatures to retain the differences in textures.
Balancing
shapes Chinese cooks usually cut all the ingredients in a dish into
similar shapes. For example, chunks of meat and chunks of vegetables are usually cut to about the same size. This makes it easier
to cook all the ingredients evenly and also gives the final dish a
pleasing appearance.
Balancing colors
Chinese cooks tend either to select ingredients of the same color, or
to use many contrasting ingredients to add color to a dish.
[top]
Blending Seasoning
A well-prepared dish should have a distinctive
flavor. But it is not enough just to select the right blend of foods and
the correct cooking temperature-a good cook also needs to master the art
of blending the right seasonings with the right combinations of
ingredients. Without the correct seasoning, even delicious ingredients
can taste bland and uninteresting. Seasonings are also important in
Chinese cooking because they create the special flavors that
characterize different regional styles.
The condiments used in Chinese
cooking come in two ways, singly or blended. They lend single flavors
(salty, sour, sweet, etc.) or blended flavors (sweet and sour, sweet and
salty, hot and spicy, etc.) to foods. Some examples of these flavors and
the condiments used to create them are:
Salty flavor
Salty flavor is basic to most dishes, with other flavors usually
added. Salt and soy sauce, are the main seasonings used to impart a
salty taste.
Sweet flavors
Sweet flavors counteract fishy odors, cut the greasiness of rich
dishes, and enhance delicate flavors. The main seasonings use to give a
sweet flavor to foods are confectioner's sugar, brown sugar, rock sugar,
granulated sugar, honey, and saccharin.
Sour flavors
Sour flavors help the digestion and increase the absorption of
inorganic salts. They also lighten heavy or rich dishes. Red and white
rice vinegar are the main seasonings used to add sourness to a dish.
Hot flavors
Hot flavors are appetizing because of their sharpness. Hot seasonings
include fresh and dried red chili (chilli) peppers, pepper,
ginger,
scallion, and
garlic.
Bitter flavors
Bitter flavors have a special aftertaste that can be palatable and
refreshing. Ingredients such as bitter melon, Chinese yam, tangerine
peel, and-Chinese wolf-berry give a bitter flavor to dishes.
Spicy flavors
Spicy flavors help mask off-odors or fishy smells, cut greasiness,
and whet the appetite. In Chinese cooking, the main spicy condiments are
cassia bark, which resembles cinnamon, star anise, fennel, clove,
Sichuan red peppercorns, sesame, sesame oil, sesame paste, wine, red
wine mash and flavoring essence.
The first five spices are often ground and mixed together into a
combination called "five-spice powder."
Delicate flavors
Delicate flavors are natural food essences, generally the principal
amino acid of the ingredient. Shrimp eggs, crab meat, oyster sauce, fish
sauce, and meat stock impart delicate flavors.
Sweet and sour flavor
Sweet and sour flavor comes from sweet and sour sauce, a mixture of
sugar and vinegar, jam, and ketchup (catsup).
Sweet and salty flavor
Sweet and salty flavor comes from a combination of shrimp eggs, soy sauce, and shrimp paste.
Peppery and salty flavor
Peppery and salty flavor comes from mixtures like the combination of
roasted ground Sichuan peppercorns and salt known as "spiced
pepper-salt."
Spiced pepper-salt is sometimes referred to as "prickly ash." One
basic recipe for making it is:
4 tbsp salt
1 tbsp whole Sichuan peppercorns
Heat a dry wok over moderate heat and pour in the peppercorns.
Cook, stirring constantly, about 1 minute, or until they release their
fragrance. Grind to a fine powder in a mortar or blender, strain out any
large husks, and set aside. Reheat the wok and pour in the salt. Cook,
stirring constantly, about 5 minutes, or until it just begins to turn
golden brown. Pour into a bowl and let cool slightly before mixing with
the ground peppercorns. Store in a tightly-closed jar. Makes about 1/4
cup and will keep indefinitely.
Sharp and salty flavor
Sharp and salty flavor is obtained from chili (chilli) peppers or
Sichuan peppercorns and salt.
Hot and spicy flavor
Hot and spicy flavor comes from seasonings like curry and mustard.
Hot and salty flavor
Hot and salty flavor is found in condiments like chili (chilli) sauce
and Worcestershire sauce.
Seasonings can be added to foods before, during, and after cooking.
Because the success of Chinese dishes depends so much on how they are
seasoned, the following guidelines may be helpful.
Fish, shrimp, beef, lamb, and mutton sometimes have off-odors. Adding
wine, vinegar,
scallions,
ginger, or sugar before or during cooking
helps counteract unpleasant odors.
Do not over-season dishes that feature delicate foods like fish,
shrimp, chicken, duck, or mushrooms, or you will kill their flavor.
Bean threads (also known as "cellophane noodles"), shark's fin, and
sea cucumbers are so bland that they should always be cooked with a
highly-flavored sauce or stock.
The amount of seasoning used should be correct. When a dish has
several flavors, the principal and complementary flavors must be
balanced to enhance the principal flavors.
The predominant flavors of Chinese dishes change with the seasons.
Fresh, crunchy foods and sweet-and-sour cold dishes are best for hot
weather, while winter is the time for heavier, fattier dishes, or those
that call for long, slow cooking techniques like stewing or braising.
Hot pot, in which a variety of fresh ingredients and meat is cooked in a
boiling broth in a special cooking pot, is also a special cold-weather
dish.
[top]
Cooking Techniques
Chinese cooking has developed many methods that
take advantage of the wide range of foods and ingredients available
throughout the nation. Different regions use different methods, and
often the same foods will be prepared quite differently.
The basic
techniques used in Chinese cooking are precooking techniques such as
parboiling and partial frying, and cooking techniques such as frying,
sauteing, braising, stewing, boiling, simmering, steaming,
"flavor-potting," and smoking. This section also describes cooking
temperatures, cooking with oil, marinades, sugar and other coatings,
sauces, gravies, stocks and flavoring sauces.
Precooking Methods
Some meats need to be partially
precooked just long enough to get rid of off-odors but not so
long their flavor or texture changes. Some vegetables also
need precooking to get rid of astringency or bitterness or to
heighten their fresh color. Parboiling and partial frying are
the two most common methods of precooking foods before they
are combined with other ingredients for the remaining steps in
a recipe.
Parboiling
There are four methods of parboiling. Each uses different
timings and temperatures and yields different results.
Parboiling
Parboiling vegetables like taro root, Chinese yams and
fresh bamboo shoots by cooking them in boiling water before
they are cooked with other ingredients, helps to remove their
astringent taste and makes peeling easier. These vegetables
should be parboiled in their skins, if possible, and peeled
and cut as required afterwards to avoid loss of nutrients.
Slow-boiling
Slow-boiling is used for foods like pork tripe that take a
longer time to cook than the other ingredients in a recipe.
These foods should be simmered in boiling water until tender
and then combined with the rest of food and seasonings called
for in the recipe.
Hot-plunging or blanching
Hot-plunging or blanching is used for some tender, fresh
vegetables to set their color and texture. Celery, spinach,
green beans and other vegetables are plunged into a large pot
of boiling water and removed as soon as the water returns to a
boil. They are then drained and run immediately under cold
water to stop the cooking process.
Quick-boiling
Quick-boiling is often used to rid meat of bits of bone and
the off-odor that comes from the blood. The meat is placed in
cold water and removed and drained as soon as it comes to a
boil. However, the method used for pork kidney, fish, and
chicken is closer to blanching: the meat is dropped into
boiling water and removed as soon as it is cooked.
Chinese cooking also uses two methods of partial frying
foods as an intermediate step in many recipes.
Sliding through the oil means placing an ingredient in warm
oil which has been heated to
[Back
to Cooking Techniques]
[top]
Cooking Temperatures
Heat is what causes all the changes that
take place in foods when they are cooked. Because different
temperatures and cooking times lead to different results,
temperature control is a key element in Chinese cuisine.
Chinese recipes call for three kinds of heat: high heat, used
in stir-frying, quick-frying, and deep-frying; medium heat,
used in sauteing, slippery-frying, and deep-frying coated
foods; and low heat, used in steaming, simmering, braising,
and stewing.
Chinese recipes also often specify three levels of flame
(or heat, on the electric ranges which are common in the West)
to regulate the levels of heat of water.
High flame or heat is used to produce a fast boil, in which
the water or liquid is kept bubbling rapidly. The fast boil is
used to reduce and thicken broths or stocks and in
hot-plunging and quick-boiling.
Medium flame or heat keep liquids at a moderate boil and is
used in some types of braising.
Low flame or heat is used to keep liquids at a slow boil or
simmer in stewing, simmering, and flavor-potting.
[Back
to Cooking Techniques]
[top]
Cooking with Oil
Many of the recipes in this book call
for deep-frying foods in large amounts, from two to eight cups
(500 ml to two liters), of
vegetable oil. When foods are
deep-fried at the proper temperature, they absorb very little
oil, but, it can be difficult to judge whether oil is at the
right temperature.
Although many Chinese recipes call for
oil to be heated "to the smoking point" when deep-frying, it
should be pointed out that the cooking oils used in China are
often less highly refined than those used in the West. The
presence or absence of impurities changes the appearance of
oil as it heats.
We therefore suggest using thermometers to gauge how hot
oil is.
Warm oil is about n this temperature range, no bubbles will
appear around a small piece of vegetable leaf like a piece of
scallion green or spinach, or a slice of
ginger, that has been
tossed into the oil.
Moderately hot oil is about . In this temperature range,
small bubbles will sizzle around a piece of
ginger, or
scallion tossed into the oil.
Very hot oil is about , a one-inch cube of day-old bread
will turn brown in one minute when dropped into the oil.
Boiling oil is above . A heavy haze appears and the oil
bubbles vigorously.
Most Chinese recipes call for oil to be heated to the hot
or very hot stage. Lower temperatures are used in methods like
sliding through the oil, while extremely hot oil is used to
crisp and brown coated foods that have already been fried at a
lower temperature.
[Back
to Cooking Techniques]
[top]
Coating
Chinese recipes often call for meats and
other ingredients to be first marinated and then dipped into a
batter-a paste which may contain
cornstarch or flour, egg
white, salt, sugar, and monosodium glutamate. When the food is
later deep-fried, the coating seals in juices, keeps the food
from falling apart, and reduces the loss of nutrients. These
coatings also cook into light, crisp crusts that contrast with
the tenderness of the food inside.
Cooking pastes and
coating are also used for foods that will be stir-fried,
quick-fried or slippery-fried because they impart a soft,
slippery quality to the dish.
The most common batter is made of
cornstarch and water. It
is usually made of two parts
cornstarch to one part water and
is used in deep-frying and slippery-frying. It cooks into a
crisp, yellowish-brown crust when deep-fried.
A batter of egg white and
cornstarch is used in stir-frying
and slippery-frying. The batter remains white after cooking,
but the food inside is tender.
An egg yolk and
cornstarch batter may also be used in
deep-frying and slippery-frying. It results in a golden-brown
coating.
The flour and egg yolk coating is actually a two-step
process. The food is first dipped in flour and then into
beaten egg yolk.
Another two-step process is egg and bread-crumb coating.
The food is first dipped in beaten egg yolks and then rolled
in bread crumbs. When deep-fried, the coating turns crisp and
golden-brown.
[Back
to Cooking Techniques]
[top]
Cooking Methods
Frying
Chinese cooking uses many
methods of frying, including
several types of deep-frying,
"slippery-frying,"
"quick-frying," and several
types of stir-frying.
Deep-frying (zha)
In deep-frying(zha),
ingredients are fried in four
to six cups of vegetable or
peanut oil over a high heat.
Dry deep-frying (gan zha)
In dry deep-frying(gan zha),
foods are given a thick
coating of
cornstarch (corn flour) before being
fried. They come out very
crisp outside and tender
inside.
Clear deep-frying (qing zha)
In clear deep-frying(qing
zha), the foods are not coated
with
cornstarch before being
cooked.
Flaky deep-frying (su zha)
In flaky deep-frying(su zha),
foods are parboiled or steamed
until they are almost cooked
through. Then they are dipped
in a thick batter of
cornstarch and water and
cooked in boiling oil until
the coating turns crisp and
flaky.
Soft deep-frying (ruan zha)
In soft deep-frying (ruan
zha), the ingredients are not
precooked, but are given a
light coating of
cornstarch
before being fried. They come
out tender but not crisp.
Chinese cooking also uses
two techniques for deep-frying
ingredients in wrappers.
Paper-wrapped deep-frying (zhibao
zha)
In paper-wrapped
deep-frying (zhibao zha), the
food is wrapped in sheets made
of glutinous rice flour.
Crisp deep-frying (cui zha)
In crisp deep-frying (cui
zha), the wrappers are made of
dry bean-curd sheets.
Both methods involve first
deep-frying the packets of
food in moderately warm oil
over a high heat and crisping
them by frying them briefly
when the oil comes to a boil.
Slippery-frying (liu)
Slippery-frying (liu)
involves two processes. The
ingredients are deep-fried and
then covered with a
cornstarch-based sauce
prepared in a separate pot
during the frying or
immediately afterward. When
the sauce is poured over the
food, it results in a texture
as slippery as satin. Foods
prepared this way are
fragrant, crisp, and tender.
Deep-frying before
stir-frying (peng)
In deep-frying before
stir-frying (peng), foods are
deep-fried in very hot oil
until cooked. Then the excess
oil is poured out and a sauce
which unlike slippery-frying
does not contain
cornstarch is
added. The dish is stir-fried
for a few moments to blend the
ingredients before being
served. Dishes prepared this
way are crisp outside and
tender inside , with each
morsel covered in a velvety
sauce.
Quick-frying (bao)
In quick-frying (bao),
foods are deep-fried in very
hot oil over high heat and
then the oil is poured out and
seasonings are added to the
food, which is left in the
wok.
Chinese cooking
distinguishes four types of
stir-frying (chao). In all
four types, ingredients are
cut into small cubes, strips,
shreds, or slices, and cooked
over high heat in a few
tablespoons of very hot oil in
a wok. The technique of
stir-frying involves using a
flat scoop to toss and turn
the ingredients so they cook
evenly in the oil. Sometimes
the wok is also shaken.
Stir-frying usually takes only
a few minutes. The food must
be removed as soon as it is
cooked to guarantee its fresh
flavor and crunchy-tender
texture.
Raw stir-frying (sheng chao
or bian)
In raw stir-frying (sheng
chao or bian), raw ingredients
are quickly stir-fried,
resulting in a fresh, tender
dish with little sauce.
Stir-frying pre-cooked food
(shu chao)
In stir-frying pre-cooked
food (shu chao), the
ingredients are parboiled or
precooked before being
stir-fried.
Soft stir-frying (ruan chao)
In soft stir-frying (ruan
chao), the food to be
stir-fried is coated with a
batter before being cooked.
There is also
stir-frying
without coating (gan chao).
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Sauteing
Chinese cooking uses three
methods of sauteing, which is
also called "shallow-cooking."
Sauteing uses much less oil
than deep-frying and is done
at lower temperatures than
stir-frying. Ingredients are
usually cut into slices or
flat pieces. Seasonings are
added after the food is
browned.
Sauteing on both sides (jian)
In sauteing on both sides (jian),
foods are browned slowly on
both sides in oil but do not
have a coating.
Sauteing on one side (tie)
Sauteing on one side (tie)
means browning batter-coated
foods on one side only.
sauteing followed by
cooking in sauce (ta)
In sauteing followed by
cooking in sauce (ta), foods
are coated in a batter and
sauteed on both sides. Then a
sauce is added and the dish is
simmered until the sauce
thickens. The food will be
soft inside, but with some
crispness outside, and the
thickened sauce will be
slippery.
Braising, Stewing, Boiling
and Simmering
Chinese cooking has many
methods of cooking foods in
liquids.
Stewing one kind of meat (ao)
Stewing one kind of meat (ao)
means slow-cooking chunks,
slices, cubes, or shreds of
meat after first stir-frying
them briefly until the
surfaces have lost their raw
look but before the insides
are cooked. Seasonings and
broth are added and the liquid
is brought to a boil. Then the
heat is turned down and the
meat simmers slowly until
done. The sauce is not
thickened.
precooking before stewing (hui)
In precooking before stewing (hui),
several ingredients are
parboiled or precooked before
being placed in one pot for
slow simmering. Unlike ao, the
final step involves thickening
the sauce.
Stewing over low heat (men)
Stewing over low heat (men)
resembles braising. The meat
is stir-fried briefly to
brown. Then seasonings and a
sauce are added and the dish
simmers over low heat until
the sauce is almost all
reduced.
Stewing over medium, then
high, heat (shoo)
Stewing over medium, then
high, heat (shoo) means
braising foods over medium
heat until tender, then
turning the heat to high to
reduce the sauce.
Both of the above methods
can be applied to
"red-cooking," or braising in
soy sauce. The soy sauce
imparts the reddish look that
gives this technique its name.
Stewing meats with bones (ju)
Stewing meats with bones (ju)
is similar to the above
methods, but the meat or
poultry is first marinated in
rice-wine and soy sauce. Then
it is deep-fried before being
simmered in sauce and water.
The meat is not boned.
Stewing and adding thickening
(pa)
Stewing and adding thickening
(pa) is similar to stewing
meats with bones, but the
sauce is thickened with
cornstarch instead of being
reduced and thickened by
simmering.
In quick-boiling in broth (cuan),
thinly-sliced ingredients are
cooked quickly in a boiling
clear broth, or in water.
Dip-boiling (shuan)
In dip-boiling (shuan), as
with the "hot pot" dishes
referred to earlier, diners
pick up morsels of meat,
seafood and vegetables and
cook them by dipping them into
boiling water or stock in a
fire-pot.
Boiling (zhu)
Boiling (zhu) simply refers to
cooking ingredients in a large
amount of water over high
heat. The sauce is reduced and
the food comes out tender. No
cornstarch
is used. The gravy
or sauce is rich but light and
fresh.
Simmering (one of several
forms of dun)
In simmering (one of several
forms of dun), foods are put
into cold water and brought to
boil. Then seasonings are
added and the heat is reduced
for long, slow cooking.
Simmering over high heat (wei)
Simmering over high heat (wei)
also starts with cold water,
as in dun, but the food is
cooked at high heat over a
long period. This method
tenderizes tougher meats and
poultry and yields a thick,
heavy sauce.
Simmering over charcoal (wo)
In simmering over charcoal (wo),
the food is cooked over very
low heat from a charcoal
burner for three or four
hours. This gives it a
delicate flavor and a soft,
tender texture.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Steaming
Chinese cooking uses two
methods of steaming, or
cooking foods over, rather
than in, liquids.
Basic steaming (zheng)
In basic steaming (zheng), the
ingredients are placed in a
heat-proof container with a
seasoned sauce. Then the
container is placed in a
steamer partially filled with
water and set over high heat.
The food cooks quickly in the
vapor and is removed when
barely done. The result is
fresh and tender.
Placing one tightly-closed
pot inside a larger pot
(steaming dun)
Another form of steaming
involves placing one
tightly-closed pot inside a
larger pot (steaming dun). In
this method, the ingredients,
a seasoned sauce, and a large
amount of stock go into one
pot, which must have a
tight-fitting lid. The pot is
half-immersed in boiling water
in another larger pot and
steams for two or three hours.
The result is very soft.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Flavor-Potting
This method refers to stewing
foods in a highly-flavored
sauce (see the section on
"Stocks and Flavoring Sauces"
below) that permeates the
dish.
Basic flavor-potting (lu)
means stewing the food in a
mixture of soy sauce,
rice wine, sugar, salt, red
fermented rice mash, and
five-spice powder,
scallions,
ginger, chicken stock and
water. The food cooks over low
heat for several hours and
comes out tender and full of
flavor.
Marinating and
flavor-potting (jiang) adds
the step of marinating the
food in salt, soy sauce, and
soybean paste (also known as
ground bean sauce) before it
is stewed in the
flavor-potting sauce.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Smoking
Chinese cooking treats smoking
and roasting as similar
methods.
Smoking(xun)
In smoking (xun), foods are
parcooked and then cured in
smoke from burning wood or
peanut shells.
Roasting (Kao)
In roasting (kao), raw
ingredients are marinated in
seasonings before being
roasted in an oven or
barbecued over direct heat
from a coal or charcoal
burner.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Marinades
Marinades are an essential
part of many Chinese recipes
and marinating may take place
before or after ingredients
are cooked.
Ban
In ban, raw foods or those
that have been cooked and
cooled are cut into small
pieces and mixed with soy sauce, vinegar, and sesame
oil. Other seasonings, such as
garlic,
ginger, sesame paste,
sugar, or ground peppercorns,
may also be added to heighten
the flavor.
Qiang
In qiang, the main ingredient
in the marinade is peppercorn
oil, mixed with other
seasonings and poured over
foods that have first been
parboiled or partial fried.
Yan
The yan method of marinating
uses saltwater brine, water,
or liquor. In salt-marinating,
the food is soaked in brine,
which draws out the moisture
from the food so it can better
absorb the seasonings in the
marinade that follows.
Wine-marinating is similar to
salt-marinating, but uses
fermented rice liquor instead
of seasonings in the marinade.
Finally, the Chinese
specially called
"drunk-marinating" means
soaking live food, especially
seafood such as shrimps, in a
clear liquor and then
marinating them in salt. Then
the food is often eaten while
still alive (see recipe
"Drunken Fresh Shrimps").
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Sugar and
Syrup Coating
Chinese cooking has three
methods of coating foods with
sugar or syrups.
Spinning
In spinning a thread of syrup
(basi), the ingredients are
deep-fried or boiled before
being dipped into sugar that
has been melted in either oil
or water and cooked until it
thickens and spins a thread.
Preserving in syrup (mizhi)
In preserving in syrup (mizhi),
foods are partially cooked and
then boiled in a sugar and
honey sauce until the syrup
thickens.
Coating with frost (guashuang)
In coating with frost (guashuang),
foods are cooked by
deep-frying while sugar is
melted with water or oil in
another pot to make a white
syrup. When the food is mixed
with the syrup, it looks as if
it is covered with a layer of
frost.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
Sauces
and Gravies
Thickening the liquids in the
pan into a sauce or gravy is
often the last step in a
recipe, and can be crucial to
the success of a dish.
Sauces are made either by
stirring a mixture of
cornstarch that has been
dissolved in an equal amount
of water into the liquid and
cooking it until it thickens,
or by making a sauce or gravy
in another pan and pouring it
over the dish just before it
is served.
Sauces help blend the
flavors of all the
ingredients, impart an added
aroma, and give the dish a
shiny, glistening finish.
Chinese recipes usually
rely on two kinds of gravies.
The first is a mixture of
cornstarch, soy sauce or salt,
sugar, vinegar,
MSG, and a
little water. It is usually
used for stir-fried and
slippery-fried dishes and is
added to the pan at the last
stage of cooking.
The other way to make gravy
is to add seasonings gradually
while the dish cooks and to
thicken it at the last minute
with
cornstarch and water.
This lets the flavors of the
seasonings permeate the food
and is generally used with
long, low-heat cooking
methods.
[Back
to Cooking Methods]
[top]
You have just learnt some
secrets of cooking real and
healthy Chinese food. Click
here
for more cooking tips and 500+
great Chinese food recipes
