Category: South (Guangdong)

Bao & Dumplings / How to Cook With Chinese Spices / How to Cook With Furu / How to Cook With Sesame / How to Cook With Shaoxing Wine / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Non-Spicy / Pork / Restaurant Classics / South (Guangdong)

Chasiubao (叉烧包) BBQ Pork Buns: From Scratch

Red Chasiu Without Red Yeast Rice Powder or Food Dye Guangdong’s famous 叉烧包 (chāshāobāo/caa¹siu¹baau¹), aka chasiubao or “char siu bao,” are a dimsum staple!  Soft, fluffy buns envelop the chasiu—barbecue/roast pork—in these steamed bao that ooze with juicy filling. Although I didn’t grow up in a family that made or ate chasiu, we always bought chasiubao from Chinese bakeries. (Especially the “pineapple” bun version that took me 25 years to figure out had no pineapple whatsoever.) At home, Ma’s humble 包子 (bāozi) enclosed minced cabbage/chive and pork, a typical filling,...

tossed reganmian in ceramic bowl

How to Cook With Chinese Spices / How to Cook With Sesame / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Non-Spicy / Noodles / Plant / Restaurant Classics / South (Guangdong) / Vegetarian

Wuhan Reganmian Hot Dry Noodles (热干面) ft. Dried Jianshui Alkaline Noodles

Guozao With Wuhan’s Famous À La Minute Sesame Noodles In South-Central China’s landlocked Hubei province, the capital city Wuhan is beloved for its breakfast staples and snacks—chief among them 热干面 (règānmiàn) “hot dry noodles.”  Served steaming and soup-less in to-go bowls with a barely-saucy coat of ground sesame paste and simmered house stock, reganmian was invented and popularized around 1930 by two local noodle shop owners, Li Bao and his apprentice Cai Mingwei. Now, reganmian is regarded alongside Sichuan 担担面 (dàndànmiàn), Shanxi 刀削面 (dāoxiāomiàn) knife-cut noodles, and Beijing 炸酱面 (zhájiàngmiàn)—not to be...

Steak Chow Fun

Beef, Lamb & Game / How to Cook With Douchi / How to Cook With Shaoxing Wine / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Non-Spicy / Noodles / Restaurant Classics / South (Guangdong)

Cantonese Steak Chow Fun (Ft. Dried Ho Fun Noodles)

Chow Fun Any Place, Any Time The most important thing to know about this recipe is that unlike all other recipes for Cantonese beef chow fun, this one does not require you to make or find freshly steamed rice noodles. Instead it shows you how to make do with dried rice noodles. And in fact, more than make do, make something genuinely great. But first, a bit of why I, who cook almost exclusively Sichuan food for my spicy girl, am making Cantonese noodles. Spicy Sichuan dishes are Fongchong’s favorite,...

Gai lan with oyster sauce and fried shallots by The Mala Market

Non-Spicy / Plant / South (Guangdong)

Blanched Gailan ft. Fried Shallots: Teoswa (Chaoshan) Food With Diana Zheng

Tasty Chinese You’ve (Probably) Never Heard Of Just when you think you’ve schooled yourself on most—or at least many—of China’s regional cuisines, along comes one that is wildly interesting and influential but also surprisingly obscure—even in China itself. I’m talking about Teoswa cuisine from southeastern Guangdong province. After a dozen years of food study and travel to China, the sum total of what I know about Teoswa comes from 2019. That is when Netflix unleashed a documentary series on the region’s foodways and when I met Diana Zheng, who wrote...