The Mala Market | Inspiration & Ingredients for Sichuan Cooking Blog

Restaurants, Travel & Interviews

Chengdu Noodles: Above and Beyond Dandanmian | Jordan Porter

The Straight-up, Lo-down on the Infinite Chengdu Noodle Varieties The Mala Project’s first-ever guest post is by Jordan Porter, owner and chief experience officer at Chengdu Food Tours. A Canadian who has lived in Chengdu since 2010, he began his culinary tour company in 2015 and has since led tours of the streets of Chengdu and the countryside of Sichuan for travelers like you and me and for food VIPs (many of whose articles you probably read, after Jordan schooled them in Sichuan cuisine). As many of you know, I also...

How to Cook With Doubanjiang / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / How to Cook With Tianmianjiang / North (Shanxi, Beijing) / Pork / Sichuan Pantry Compatible

Eddie Huang and Tianmianjiang Pork (Jing Jiang Rousi, 京酱肉丝)

On Immigrants and Chinese Food: ‘No Coupons’ The National Immigrant Integration Conference came to Nashville this past weekend, and one of my favorite immigrant writers showed up to give the opening talk. The one and only Eddie Huang—Taiwanese-Chinese American chef, author and provocateur  of Fresh Off the Boat and Huang’s World fame—was in fine form (and even wore a suit!), giving a speech he wrote called “No Coupons.” I dragged my little Chinese immigrant along with me, hoping she would take to heart what he had to say.  He talked about...

Braises / Chinese New Year / Fish & Seafood / How to Cook With Doubanjiang / How to Cook With Shaoxing Wine / Sichuan Pantry Compatible / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Doubanyu: Fish in Pixian Doubanjiang (Chili Bean Sauce), 豆瓣鱼

Doubanyu, Fish-Fragrant Fish As you can see in the photo of 豆瓣鱼 (dòubànyú), fish in Pixian doubanjiang (fermented chili bean sauce), this long, lithe Spanish mackerel didn’t fit on my serving tray. Nor did it fit in the wok; even though I finally wrestled it into the wok, I had to be content to let its steely silver tail pop out from under the tin wok lid. But Fongchong likes her fish “to have taste,” so we always opt for mackerel over the shorter, easier-to-handle, milder red snapper (the only two fresh...

Cold Dishes / How to Cook With Chinese Black Vinegar / How to Cook With Dried Chilies / How to Cook With Yacai / Plant / Sichuan Pantry Compatible / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan) / Vegetarian

Sichuan Cucumber Three Ways: Hot-and-Sour, Mala and Sesame (Paihuanggua)

Cool as a (Spicy) Cucumber Sichuan knows how to treat a cucumber: with spice! Here are three cucumber preparations, using three different forms of chili pepper, and resulting in three very different tastes. The first is hot-and-sour and similar to a Western quick pickle with the addition of pickled or fresh red chilies. The second is mala, the smacked cucumber smacking strongly of that incomparable toasty chili and tingly Sichuan pepper taste that makes mala so addictive. And the third is so flavor-packed with chili oil, sesame paste and yacai preserved vegetable that it...

Braises / Chinese New Year / East (Jiangnan) / How to Cook With Shaoxing Wine / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Non-Spicy / Pork / Restaurant Classics

Classic Shanghai Pork Belly: Hongshaorou (红烧肉), Red-Cooked Pork

Inspired by Red Cook: Hongshaorou I can’t tell you how many times I’ve red-cooked something. I’ve red-cooked the traditional pork belly many a time and have also tried red-cooking pork shoulder, chicken thighs and beef short ribs. But I’ve never settled on a favorite 红烧肉 (hóngshāoròu), red-cooked meat, recipe or method. Perhaps because I’m not Chinese, and my mom (or other family member) did not hand one down to me. But I have to have one. Because I have to pass the family red-cooking recipe down to my Chinese daughter. Otherwise,...

Cold Dishes / How to Cook With Chinese Black Vinegar / How to Cook With Huajiao / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Plant / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan) / Vegetarian

Hot-and-Sour Eggplant (Suanla Liangban Qiezi)

Chengdu Challenge #28: Eggplant, a Girl’s Best Friend What to send to school in your daughter’s lunchbox when she’s changing high schools as a sophomore and facing a lunchtime cafeteria where she knows no one and has no one to eat with? Her favorite vegetable, of course. The vegetable that makes her feel happy as she eats it no matter what is going on around her or how alone she feels. For Fongchong, that vegetable is eggplant. Now, I’d rather go over there and eat lunch with her in that...

Restaurants, Travel & Interviews

L.A.’s Chengdu Taste Spreads the Sichuan Love

Chengdu Taste Coming to a City Near You? We Ask the Owners When it’s silent for too long on this end, you know it means Fongchong and I have been traveling or, in this case, spending our summer in Northeast Los Angeles and the San Gabriel Valley, America’s most progressive Chinese enclave. Without a kitchen while we play in the sun, hang with dear old friends, and Fongchong goes to summer school, we use the time off from cooking Sichuan to eat other people’s Sichuan cooking and get newly inspired....

How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Poultry

Cooking With The Godmother: Laoganma Black Bean Chicken

A Sichuan “Mom Recipe” My blog is all about cooking “authentic” Sichuan food. But my definition of authentic doesn’t mean always using specific recipes, it just means cooking Sichuan food the way it would be cooked in Chengdu. So I do not feel guilty about this shortcut recipe for black bean chicken, since I know that people in Sichuan cook this way and would eat this in a heartbeat. People all over China—and increasingly the world—love Laoganma and cook with her often. My ode to The Godmother—China’s Best Chili Oils and...

Chinese New Year / How to Cook With Chinese Black Vinegar / How to Cook With Dried Chilies / How to Cook With Soy Sauce / Poultry / Restaurant Classics / Sichuan Pantry Compatible / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Gongbao Chicken With Cashews (Gongbao Jiding, 宫保鸡丁)

Chengdu Challenge #27: The Do’s and Don’ts of Kung Pao The Mala Project (now The Mala Market blog) turns two years old this month. It hasn’t made me rich or famous (far from!), but that wasn’t the goal. The immediate goal when I started it was to be a better mom to my immigrant daughter by being a better Sichuan home cook. I did it in blog form because I thought that if I committed publicly I’d be far more likely to stick with it. And it worked! Two years on,...

How to Cook With Chinese Spices / Noodles / Pork / Soups & Stews / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Pork Rib Noodle Soup in Sichuan Broth (Paigu Mian)

Chengdu Challenge #26: Paigu Mian, My Favorite Mistake This is one of those recipes that is the result of a beautiful mistake. I was merely attempting to make Sichuan-style stock when I ended up with an entire soup. My daughter has been mostly deprived of one of her favorite foods—homemade soup—because I don’t particularly like or crave soup and just don’t ever think about making it. She grew up in China eating freshly made wonton soup every morning for breakfast at school. I grew up in Oklahoma eating Campbell’s chicken noodle...

Yu Xiang Pork

How to Cook With Chinese Black Vinegar / How to Cook With Doubanjiang / Pork / Sichuan Pantry Compatible / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Yuxiang Pork (Yuxiang Rousi, 鱼香肉丝)

Chengdu Challenge #25: This Is Not Pork in Garlic Sauce Yuxiang pork is often translated in the U.S. as pork in garlic sauce. But yuxiang is so much more than a garlic sauce. It’s sweet-and-sour-and-chili-and-garlic sauce. To me, it is what sweet-and-sour sauce should be, but more intriguing and deep. It’s got the tang of dark vinegar just barely tamed by sugar, plus the trinity of garlic-ginger-scallions. But garlic does not dominate, it is just perfectly balanced with the slightly sweet-and-sour and the spicy chili element. The literal translation of...

How to Cook With Shaoxing Wine / Poultry / Restaurant Classics / Southwest (Sichuan, Yunnan)

Sichuan Crispy Duck (Xiangsu Ya, 香酥鸭)

Chengdu Challenge #24:  Crispy Duck for Luck Happy Year of the Monkey! Chinese New Year calls for lucky food, food that calls down health, wealth and happiness for the new year. But be careful what you wish for. The Chinese eat dumplings shaped like gold ingots, whole fish because the word for it sounds like the word for surplus, long noodles to symbolize long life, and a whole chicken to represent family togetherness. I’m especially interested in laying the groundwork for family happiness and togetherness in the coming year, so...