Hot and Sour Chicken Soup

Hot and Sour Chicken Soup

It was about 25 years ago in San Francisco's Chinatown that I discovered that hot and sour soup could really be a thing of beauty. I was splitting my time between Virginia and a residential hotel in Sunnyvale, down the 101 from San Francisco and I was spending most of my free time between Napa/Sonoma and Chinatown, learning both wine and Chinese food. This was back in the day before most of the good Chinese food had fled the city.

I was already a disciple of Henry Chung, at whose Kearny Street hole in the wall I was a frequent visitor before the scary 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake shuttered it for good. The storefront was tiny: five or six tables and a counter, my haunt, where I could watch the ladies making the dishes. What amazing smoked ham and scallion cakes came out of that kitchen! Thanks to the Chung family's help and that of many other generous souls in Chinatown, I was just learning how amazing real Chinese food could be and I was cooking a lot of it back at home in Virginia, learning the ingredients, the techniques, and the metaphors. And already I knew enough to know that I didn't like hot and sour soup, that insipid gloppy crap that every Americanized Chinese restaurant served.

Once I got invited to a fancy fixed menu dinner at one of the big touristy Chinese restaurants in Chinatown, a place that hole-in-the-wall-spelunker-me would never have entered. One of the early courses in our banquet was a cup of hot and sour soup that blew me away with its rich broth, carefully curated spice, and fresh vegetables. A light went on that evening!

Yesterday was a wan, bleak day. Schools closing right after lunch signaled the coming rain, sleet, and ice and scared off all our lunch and dinner customers, so I decided to take the night off and cook dinner at home. The weather had me thinking soup. I proposed chicken soup to Ann and somehow we arrived at hot and sour chicken soup.

A quick stop at the market yielded some chicken legs, straw mushrooms, pressed tofu, lop cheung, slivered bamboo shoots, and a couple kinds of pickled vegetables. There are two kinds of preserved vegetables at the market of which I am especially fond right now, the one that is mainly stem mustard in chile oil labeled "Tasty Vegetable Good with Meal," and a sweet-and-spicy turnip pickle that is not labeled at all in English.

Ordinarily, I would make a rich pork stock for my soup, but given that this was a spur of the moment dinner, I went with chicken and added sliced pork lop cheung for the pork component. I poached the chicken in water with a splash of soy sauce, ginger, whole garlic, a couple of star anise pods, and a half a cinnamon stick, just enough spice for a background hint and nothing more. Once the chicken was tender, I fished it out and strained the seasonings out of the stock.

Into the stock went dried daylily buds, tree ear and straw mushrooms, tofu, both preserved vegetables, slivered bamboo shoots, and the lop cheung. I'm not a big fan of straw mushrooms, but Annie is and so I added them for her. Next, I picked the chicken and added the meat to the soup and let the whole simmer for about 15 minutes to rehydrate the dried vegetables. At this point, I then started to season, working the balance of sweet (rock sugar), salty (soy sauce), sour (Chinkiang black vinegar), and spicy (ground white pepper).

The very moment I was happy with the seasoning, I swirled in the tiniest amount of cornstarch just to amp the body slightly (something I wouldn't have done with a super-rich pork stock) and served the soup with a scattering of green onions over the top.

This was the soup I was meant to make on this dreary day. Not only was it warm and comforting, but it brought back some great food memories from my days in California, of a time when each new dish was a revelation, a discovery. Those days are mainly long behind me now, but the memories are vibrant still.

Hot and Sour Catfish

Hot and Sour Catfish

For dinner, Ann wanted me to reprise the fried catfish dish with mapo dofu topping that I did this time last year. But I was in a soup mood, so I split the difference. This didn't stop Ann from giving me grief about not cooking exactly what she wanted, for doing some riff, but that's what Eds do: they take inspiration from whatever source and then map that inspiration onto something deliciously edible (and I don't think that judging from her happy noises that she really has any grounds to complain about the results). ;)

Earlier in the afternoon, I simmered for a couple of hours a couple pounds of chicken necks in chicken stock with garlic, ginger, and cilantro stems. Meanwhile, I soaked a handful of dried daylily buds and tree ear mushrooms in hot water.

Just before dinner, I strained the chicken stock and added the rehydrated lily flowers and mushrooms, broth and all, to the stock. To this, I added soy sauce and vinegar in equal parts to the soup until I got just the right amount of salt and sour. I added three parts rice vinegar to one part black vinegar. Into the soup went finely diced tofu, chopped Shanghai bok choy, and spicy preserved mustard stems. I didn't add any more spice to the soup, but if I had, the classic hot and sour soup spice is ground white pepper (which I did add to Ann's soup because she wanted more spice). I did not add cornstarch to the soup: I am not a fan of the gloppy consistency. If that's your speed, go for it.

While finishing up the soup stock, I roasted a whole sheet tray of catfish in the oven (to have something to eat for dinner late night when I get home later this week) and then placed a small filet in the bottom of a soup bowl. Over this went a couple ladles of soup and on top, fresh cilantro and green onions. And presto! Hot and sour catfish.

Chow Mein

Monday a week ago (I'm getting behind in posting) Ann really wanted "those noodles you make." Those noodles I make are classic chow mein, fried noodles. First you fry a pound of fresh wheat noodles on both sides:

Fry Noodles on Both Sides, Tossing to Flip

and then you top them with something delicious. In this case, a stir fry of snow peas, lop cheung, pressed tofu, dried daylily buds, tree ear mushrooms, preserved vegetable (pickled mustard stems, zha cai), garlic chives, and lots of ginger and garlic.

Chow Mein: a Thing of Beauty

If you've seen a lot of chow mein on this blog, it's because we love it, it's easy to do, and there's never a problem getting Carter to eat it.

Red-Cooked Duck

Back in July (the first of July to be exact), Yael and Dan had us over to their farm for a splendid dinner feast and we have been trying to return the favor forever. Such is the nature of the restaurant life and the resulting 2-3 days off per month that it was the first of December before we could actually all get together for dinner at our house.

I have had duck on the brain for a month, red-cooked duck specifically, so I built a (non-traditional) Chinese menu around that.

Turkey and Black Truffle Rillettes

We had an extra jar of truffled turkey rillettes in the refrigerator from Thanksgiving that we started with. The flavor is now better than ever and it would probably get even better still except that now all three jars are gone, gone, gone.

Jook, Fully Garnished



Jook Garnishes: Cilantro, Spicy Cowpeas, Green Onions, Mustard Stems

Now that the weather is cold, my brain is about all things braised/slow-cooked and I have been on a jook tear recently. Jook, also known as congee, is quintessential Chinese comfort food: rice cooked in broth until it disintegrates and becomes a thick porridge.

For mine, I cooked down several chicken hind quarters and a bunch of chicken feet with about a pound of fresh ginger and a bunch of cilantro stems to make the stock. I picked the chicken meat and reserved it. Into the stock went some Carolina Gold heirloom rice and after simmering for about four hours, it had turned to a silky soup. Just before serving, I mixed the chicken back in and prepped a plate of garnishes: cilantro, spicy salted cowpeas, green onions, and preserved mustard stems (zha cai).

I know that jook is traditionally breakfast food, invalid food, and/or a meal by itself, but I like it as an appetizer in a western format meal.


Mise en Place for Pan-Fried Noodles

Because we had rice as a first course, I didn't want to serve it again with the main meal, so I decided to go with pan-fried noodles topped with a variety of vegetables and fungi: shiitakes, tree ear mushrooms, dried daylily blossoms, spiced and pressed tofu, snow peas, garlic chives, green onions, shallot rings, ginger and garlic. I finished the vegetables with a splash of soy sauce and sugar.

Red-Cooked Duck and Bok Choy with Pan-Fried Noodles in Background

Red-cooking is one of my all time favorite braising methods. I cut the duck into serving pieces and browned them. Then cut up the carcass and browned it very deeply in the oven. From this I made a rich duck stock. The duck slowly braised in the duck stock, soy sauce, brown sugar, and a really nutty Sherry with lots of green onions, a dried clementine peel, crushed garlic, and loads of sliced ginger. For spices, I added a sachet containing a few star anise pods, a cinnamon stick, and a handful of Sichuan peppercorns. The duck braised on Saturday for about three hours after which I removed the duck, defatted the stock, and reduced it to the point where I was happy with the flavor. Highly reduced soy-based liquids can get way too salty in a hurry.

Sunday, I put the stock back with the duck in a very slow oven and let it rewarm gently. Then at service, I pulled the duck and lightly thickened the sauce by adding a touch of hoisin sauce. I plattered the duck with some bok choy and poured the sauce over. Really, really good.

Binyamina's Farmer Series, Cab-Shiraz 2009

And speaking of really good, Dan and Yael brought this Cabernet Sauvignon-Syrah blend from Binyamina Winery, one of the largest wineries in Israel. The soft fruit went beautifully with the duck!

I Love Sichuan Food

A few days back, Ann emailed me a photo of a Chinese fish dish along with a recipe and said she wanted me to make it. Just quickly glancing at it, it was obviously just the classic mapo dofu over fish instead of rice. Easy enough and a dish I haven't cooked in more than 20 years when I was teaching myself Chinese fundamentals.

Here you see my mise en place. Ann accuses me of doing this just for photographic reasons, but after years of seeing me operate in the restaurant kitchen, she ought to know better. I always have and I always will get all my ingredients together ready to cook before lighting any flame (and you should too!) From the top left dish: Shaoxing wine, light soy sauce, fermented black beans and broad bean paste, black mushrooms, cornstarch slurry, and tree ear mushrooms. On the righthand plate: tofu (I prefer mine firm; eat what you like) and green onions. And clockwise from the red chile paste on the other plate: preserved vegetable, ginger, garlic, and bamboo shoots in chile oil. You don't see the ground pork or the catfish, which are still in the fridge at this point.

A word about ingredients. Sichuan cooking is famous for use of preserved ingredients that are often spicy. You will almost always find dried, pickled, or salted ingredients in Sichuan food, and these are huge flavors that appeal to my palate. I am in love with the inelegantly named preserved vegetable, a salted mustard green, more about which on the restaurant blog. This was Ann's first encounter with this spicy, salty bit of goodness, which now comes conveniently packaged in single serving foil packets, and she loves it as well.

So, here's an awful photo of a scrumptious dish. I started by dredging the catfish lightly in cornstarch and then searing it on both sides. This gives the fish a nice crust and then it helps thicken the sauce when the fish goes back in. After removing the fish, I built the sauce by cooking the ground pork with garlic and ginger over very high flame, then added the other flavorings except the tofu and green onions. A couple of ladles of chicken stock went in next and then the fish. Once the fish had cooked through, off to a warm plate it went while I added the tofu and half the green onions, then thickened the sauce with a little cornstarch slurry. The sauce went over the fish and the rest of the green onions on top. Yum!

A typical Sichuan sauce would most likely also contain Sichuan peppercorns, but I couldn't find mine. Bummer. I like their little electric numbing touch that the Chinese call la.