Cold weather casserole: Shanghai sandpot

We used to order this at our favorite Shanghainese restaurants without fail during Taipei’s dreary season, which stretches unbroken from November through March. With a couple of bowls of this inspired soup—which manages to be hearty without being terribly filling—we’d happily brave the weather and splash in the puddles afterwards.

The only really unusual ingredient is băiyè jiĕ 百葉結, or fresh bean curd knots. At the time of this writing, they can be most usually found fresh or frozen in vacuum-packed 8-ounce packages. If your Chinese market doesn’t hold them, you can roll up sheets of fresh “hundred leaf” bean curd (băiyè) and tie them in knots. 

And if even that isn’t available, just cut very firm fresh bean curd into squares and call it a day; they won’t need soaking, so just toss them in the soup.

This is what you're looking for

Two ingredients are absolutely essential here: good ham and good Shaoxing rice wine. Chinese ham is sometimes labeled Smithfield in Chinese markets, and it’s a much saltier and drier ham that what Americans usually eat; Spanish jamón or Italian prosciutto are great substitutes, and if you can find the ends, they’ll be both cheap and flavorful. 

There are not a whole lot of substitutes for the toasty, mushroomy aroma of Shaoxing rice wine, but in case of an emergency, use dry sherry instead. 

The first four steps should be done more or less at the same time, as this is all prep work. As with just about every good soup, though, this tastes much better if it is made at least a day ahead of time. So, if you can, assemble it up through Step 5 the first day, so that the flavors have the time to marry, and then proceed with Step 6 just before serving.

Shanghai sandpot

Yāndŭxiān 醃篤鮮

Shanghai cuisine

Serves 6

Stock:

1 quart | 1 liter unsalted chicken or pork stock

1 tablespoon Sichuan peppercorns

6 fat, dried Chinese black mushrooms, soaked until plump (use the soaking water in the stock)

Plumped-up knots

3 scallions, trimmed but left whole

2 finger-sized pieces of ginger, sliced

¼ cup | 60 ml Shaoxing rice wine

Soup ingredients:

1 piece of Chinese ham or prosciutto with skin and bone, about 4 ounces | 125 g

Around 8 ounces | 250 g fresh pork belly, preferably with skin

Water, as needed

Around 4 ounces | 125 g frozen or fresh bean curd knots, or very firm bean curd (see headnotes)

1 quart | 1 liter boiling water

½ teaspoon baking soda

1 large bamboo shoot, fresh or frozen, sliced about ¼-inch | 6 mm thick

½ cup | 125 ml Shaoxing rice wine, plus more as needed

A large handful of ice cubes

A pinch or two of sea salt, if needed

8 small green bok choy, sliced lengthwise in half, or 3 large bok choy, cut into thin wedges

Half a leek, white and light green parts only, cleaned carefully and sliced thinly

Wash the bok choy carefully

1. Again, start this recipe at least a day before you wish to serve it. Place the stock in a large (2 quart | 2 liter) sandpot or casserole. Wrap the peppercorns in a piece of cheesecloth or a tea ball. Toss in the mushroom soaking liquid, Sichuan peppercorns, ginger, green onions, and rice wine, but don’t add any salt at this time. Reserve the mushrooms for Step 4. Bring the pot to a boil before lowering it to a simmer, and then cover lightly. While the stock simmers, prepare the rest of the ingredients.

2. Rinse the ham and pork and blanch them in boiling water for about 10 minutes. Rinse them off again, scrape off any black areas on the ham skin, and return them to a clean saucepan and cover with water. Boil the meats for around 30 minutes and remove the pork. When it is cool, slice it against the grain into thin pieces.

3. Continue to cook the ham for another 30 minutes, or until it is tender enough to be easily pierced through with a chopstick. Remove it from the ham stock. When the ham is cool enough to handle easily, slice off and discard any skin, gelatinous bits, and bones, and then cut the ham into thin slices. Ever ham has a different level of salt, so pour the ham stock a bit at a time into the pork stock until it is as salty as you like; reserve the rest of the ham stock for later.

4. While the pork is cooking, place the bean curd knots in a heatproof bowl and cover them with the boiling water. Add the baking soda and stir. After about an hour, the knots will have plumped up. Rinse the knots in several changes of water. Slice the mushroom caps into pieces about ¼ inch | 6 mm wide.

Time to skim off the solid fat

5. Remove the Sichuan peppercorns, scallions, and ginger from the stock and discard. Arrange the sliced ham, pork, bamboo shoots, mushroom caps, and rice wine in the stock. Bring the soup to a boil. Lower the heat to a simmer and cook the soup for around 30 minutes. Taste the soup and add more pork or ham stock as needed to cover all the ingredients. Add the bean curd knots and simmer the soup for another 20 to 30 minutes. If you can, make it up to this point and let it sit covered overnight in a cool place.

6. Place the ice cubes on top of the cool soup, and after a few minutes remove any coagulated fat and unmelted ice cubes. Heat the soup up until it is at a full boil. Just before serving, taste the soup again and add more rice wine and ham stock to taste; there should be a nice, winey punch to the soup, and you can adjust the seasoning as you like with a pinch or two of salt, if necessary. Add the bok choy and leeks to the soup and bring it only to a boil, as you want them just barely cooked through. Set the sandpot on the table and serve in small soup bowls. 

Yangzhou fried rice done right

To many Chinese, this is the ne plus ultra of fried rice dishes. And I’d have to agree that Yangzhou's favorite rice dish really is a classic.  

Like pasta carbonara or a good ham and egg sandwich, the moving parts here make complete sense and are open to endless variation. In other words, try as you might, it’s really hard to mess this one up. But some folks seem determined to do just that. 

The problem, as always, with places that put Yangzhou Fried Rice – sometimes calling it something instead like Yangchow Fried Rice – on the menu is that the magic often isn’t there. It’s just fried rice with some scrambled eggs, bits of sweet roast pork, maybe a dash of soy sauce, a sprinkle of green onions. Standard fare, nothing too exciting.

Traditionalists in Jiangsu go to the opposite extreme, though, and pack way too much stuff in there, or at least that's my take on it. In an attempt to make this as luxurious and as memorable as possible, these folks decorate a simple masterpiece with way too many ornaments, with dried scallops, duck gizzards, bamboo shoots, black mushrooms, sea cucumbers, fresh pork, and chicken all fighting with each other in a bowl. What you end up with is the kitchen sink of fried rice dishes. Definitely not my style, either.

A home run

But when this dish is done right, it sparkles. As far as I’m concerned, if you really make this a perfect Yangzhou-style dish, stick with the basics: start with excellent long-grain rice, coat the cooked grains with fresh eggs so that each one has a golden jacket, season it with a bit of good country-style ham, and stud it with small langoustines or baby shrimp.  Other than a dash of salt, a bit of oil, and a dusting of chopped green onions, those are your ingredients, and you really don’t need anything else.

So let’s talk about the rice, since that should be the star of this show. Long-grain rice, as always, is perfect for fried rice because it’s not bulky, yet it possesses enough character to stand up to being cooked twice without breaking down. Softer rice – and especially sticky rice or overcooked rice of any kind – will gum up your wok, stick to your spatula, and refuse to play right, so get the right grain and then cook it correctly.

Hom Mali jasmine rice

Go to a busy health food store and head for the bulk bins, locate the long-grain rice, and start smelling them. What you want is something that has a fresh, sweet aroma, for these grains need to be able to hold their own against the other wonderful ingredients in this dish. I like especially jasmine rice here, and will happily play around with whatever smells particularly good that day. For this recipe I used Hom Mali Jasmine from Thailand, but use whatever looks (and smells) especially good to you.

Now, that bulk bin will probably have cooking directions on it, so write them down if you like. But the basic recipe is 1 part rice to 1½ parts water, and that’s it. No oil, no salt. You don’t even have to soak it. Just rinse the rice in a sieve, cover it with the right amount of water, bring it to a full boil, reduce the heat to the lowest possible, cover the pan, and cook it for 17 to 20 minutes. Check the rice to ensure it’s done, and then keep it covered for another 10 minutes to give the steam a chance to make each grain blossom fully. Then, let the rice come to room temperature and refrigerate it. 

Chilling the cooked grains is absolutely essential to achieving great fried rice, because it cuts down on the starchiness and allows the grains to maintain a sort of integrity and chewiness. And then, just before you start to fry the rice, you will want to wet your fingers and break that ball of rice up to make it as lump-free as possible.

Now you’re ready to start cooking.

Breakfast, lunch, or dinner

And if you're wondering what to do with those two extra egg whites, stay tuned for next week's recipe...

Yangzhou fried rice

Yángzhōu dàn chăofàn 揚州蛋炒飯

Jiangsu

Serves 4 as a main dish, 8 as a side

About 4 cups cooked, cooled long-grain rice (see headnotes and Tips)

2 large eggs

2 large egg yolks

Around 20 (4 ounces / 100 g) shelled langoustine tails or small shrimp, fresh or frozen and defrosted (size around 80/100), raw or cooked (see Tips)

Around 2 ounces (50 g) country-style ham or Hunan-style cured pork (see Tips)

4 tablespoons (60 ml) fresh peanut or vegetable oil

Around 1 teaspoon sea salt, preferably something flaky like Maldon (see Tips)

2 green onions, green leaves only, chopped into circles

1. If you haven’t done so already, cook the rice the day before you want to make this dish and chill it. Dump the rice into a large work bowl and use your wet fingertips to break up the lumps as much as possible. Lightly beat the eggs and yolks together and then toss them with the rice to coat each grain. These eggs, by the way, will also help get rid of any determined chunks of rice.

Egg mixed into the rice

2. Prep the shrimp or langoustines by removing any sandy veins and shells. Rinse them and pat them dry. Cut the ham into ⅛ inch (3 mm) cubes, more or less.

3. Set your wok over medium-high heat, and when it’s hot, add the oil and swirl it around the inside of the wok. First fry the langoustines or shrimp until they are barely cooked through (see Tips); use a slotted spoon to remove them to a small work bowl. Then, toss the ham in the oil until it is lightly browned before adding it to the shrimp. Drain any of the nicely seasoned oil back into the wok.

4. Now fry the rice: Take the wok off of the heat and let it cool down for about 2 minutes before adding all of the egg and rice mixture to the wok. Quickly toss the rice and eggs together away from the fire to gently glue the egg to the grains – starting them out on a relatively cool wok is the secret to this sort of golden egg fried rice, as the rice will then have the chance to get acquainted with the oil and gentle heat without turning into clumps of rice and eggs. Once the oil and rice and eggs have combined well, return the wok to medium-high heat and toss them continually with a wok spatula until the rice is hot; as you toss the rice, lift the spatula up and shake it so that it stays light and not clumpy. Add the shellfish, ham, and green onions, as well as salt to taste, and toss well. Serve hot.

Tips

You can use more or less cooked rice here without really affecting the dish. That being said, if you want to feed more people, and are serving this with other dishes, a cup more rice will be fine. But as a main course, don't stretch this out too far.

Buy only shrimp that are both wild and responsibly harvested. Slavery is still a problem with some shrimpers, especially in Southeast Asia, and farmed shrimp may not be the healthiest option, so do your homework and be careful. If you only can get ahold of cooked shrimp, that's fine - just be sure not to heat them for too long, as they will toughen, so merely try to get rid of the chill.

Chinese style ham

Many Chinese grocery stores will offer country-style hams, which means that it is not brined, but rather cured with salt and then pressed. This ham is generally sold as whole legs or in more easy to handle slices. Look for the smallest bone, the most meat, and no mold. A more Chinese-y flavored country ham is starting to appear in the markets around here, too (see the picture to the right). Made in the States, it's actually not bad at all when used as a seasoning, as in this recipe.

I like to use Maldon salt here because it’s added to the fried rice at the very last moment, which allows it to retain its lovely character. This way you get to enjoy little sparks of salt when you eat, and it’s a terrific touch. The amount of salt you add will depend upon a number of factors: the saltiness of the ham, what you’re serving the rice with, and whether it’s going to just be eaten on its own.

Yunnan's ham & wild mushrooms come together

Yunnan has one of the most varied assortments of flora and fauna in China. This includes a delicious array of mushrooms that grow wild in the rainforest. Many of these, like porcini and morels, are prized by the best cooks in Europe, while others have yet to have even their names properly translated into English.

I like to make today's recipe with as much a variety of the best mushrooms as possible. The different flavors and textures breathe sensuous life into something that becomes more than a mere bowl of soup. Fat slices of porcini rub up against nubby morels, which curl around the feathery maitake (hen-of-the-woods)... and so on. Each mouthful contains a whole range of pleasures to be slowly savored.

Parma ham & ginger

And while the wild wealth of the highlands is featured here, one also gets a taste of Yunnan’s great ham. Along with the hams of Rugao (Jiangsu) and Jinhua (Zhejiang), the ham known as Yuntui (Yunnan ham) is also referred to by the city most closely associated with its creation, Xuanwei. It is also the most prized of all China’s many dry-cured meats.

At present, true Chinese hams cannot be purchased in the United States. Until the day arrives when this beautiful charcuterie makes its way into our markets, substitutions will have to do. One of my favorites is a good Parma ham or prosciutto. They go perfectly with all of those chewy mushrooms; another possibility is Hunan-style charcuterie.

Enjoy this in cool autumn or spring weather when the best mushrooms are on display. If none are available, use good dried mushrooms in their stead. This is more of an outline than a recipe, as it should celebrate the seasons and the mushrooms.

Luscious

Yunnan ham and wild mushroom soup

Yěgū Yúntuĭ tāng 野菇雲腿湯

Yunnan

Serves 8 generously

2 tablespoons rendered chicken fat

2 tablespoons finely julienned peeled ginger

3 to 6 tablespoons (depending upon how salty and flavorful it is) finely julienned Parma ham, prociutto, or other dry-cured ham

6 tablespoons Shaoxing rice wine

2 quarts chicken stock, salted or unsalted

2 cups (or so) assorted fresh mushrooms (wild ones best), or rehydrated dried mushrooms of any kind plus their soaking liquid

4 or more pieces of bamboo pith fungus, soaked until soft in hot water

Sea salt to taste

Freshly-ground black pepper

1 tablespoon sugar, or to taste

1 teaspoon good rice vinegar, optional

Garnish:

3 to 6 tablespoons finely chopped Parma ham, prociutto, or other dry-cured ham

A few sprigs of green onion or cilantro

1. Heat the fat in a 4-quart pot and add the ginger. Slowly brown the ginger over medium heat and then add the ham. Stir the julienned ham around in the fat to release its fragrance, and then immediately pour in the rice wine, bring it to a boil, and then add the stock. Bring the stock to a full boil and then lower it to a simmer.

Use the best 'shrooms

2. While the stock is simmering away, clean the mushrooms. Cut them or tear them into pieces that are bite-sized: about ¼-inch wide for porcini, morels, and other thick mushrooms, or into separate “feathers” for maitake, oyster, and other stemmed mushrooms. If you are using rehydrated mushrooms, cut them into slightly smaller pieces since these will be chewier; strain their soaking liquid and add it to the stock.

3. Add all of these mushrooms to the stock. Simmer the soup for about 20 minutes, or until the thickest mushrooms are tender. Taste and adjust the seasoning with salt, pepper, and sugar. If you would like a slight edge to the flavors, stir in the rice vinegar just as you take the soup off of the heat; stir in the chopped ham, as well. Chop the green onions or cilantro and garnish the top. Serve immediately.


Tips

Bamboo pith fungus (zhusheng or "mushrooms") are only available dried. While most Chinese markets carry them, the best are found in dry-goods stores or herbal shops. 

Packaged bamboo pith fungus

Look for places that offer them loosely packed so that you can see each piece. Bags that are tightly stuffed will often only have nice ones on the outside, while the inside will be full of broken pieces that are of little use. The absolute best ones will be around 6 inches long, white, and still a bit supple.

To prepare bamboo pith fungus, soak them in warm water until soft. Trim off the hard bases and the frilly tops. Carefully rinse the webbed but fragile lengths clean of any debris, and then cut the crosswise into pieces.

Why eat these? They have a wonderful but subtle fragrance that permeates lightly seasoned soups like this. Their texture is also delightful: slightly crunchy with the feel of raw silk rubbing against the tongue. Highly recommended.

Zhejiang's ham and winter melon soup

We came home yesterday to a cold house and were hungry to boot. Nothing would have suited us better than a steaming bowl of soup, and in about 30 minutes that's what we had.

This is not a fancy soup - although it can easily be used as one if poured into pretty bowls or a nice tureen - but rather a balanced combination of just a few ingredients that play off of each other well, and most of these ingredients can be kept on hand for a very long time, making this a great go-to dish when time and money is tight.

About the only item that needs to be fresh is the slice of winter melon. These enormous squashes are available most of the year in Chinese markets, and you might even be able to snag a smallish whole winter melon that will keep for weeks, if not months, in a cool, dry area, like the garage, basement, or pantry.

Once it is sliced, though, winter melons deteriorate rapidly, and so these should be used up within a couple days of purchase. I discussed their selection a couple months ago, so just suffice it to say that you should steam any fresh, cut winter melon that you don't plan to use it right away, since that will extend its usability for a couple of more days.

This recipe calls for a slice of winter melon without any more details because Chinese markets just hack them up into irregular pieces, and you get what you get. So, cut up as much of that slice of winter melon as it takes to get about 2 cups of cubed melon, and keep the rest for something else. Or, just add more to the soup; it's your call.

Stir-fry the mushrooms and ham for flavor

Now we get to talk about the most exotic ingredient here: Chinese-style ham. This is nothing at all like what we think of as the ham that is served with eggs or at Easter dinner, since that is moist and cured in brine. 

Chinese hams are dry cured and very salty, and the closest thing this side of the Pacific would be country ham or Smithfield ham. In fact, true Chinese hams are as hard to find around here as talking frogs, so Chinese markets almost always will offer slices of these American substitutes in the meat department. (Be sure and keep any of this ham covered in plastic and stored in the refrigerator, and save any of the rind and bones that might come with the ham for soups such as this. Black mold might form on the skin and white mold on the meat after a few months, but these can usually be scrubbed off; just use your nose and common sense to determine whether any ham you've stored for a while should be eaten or given the heave-ho.)

Raw winter melon is an opaque white...

The most famous of the Chinese versions are the Jinhua hams of Zhejiang and Yunnan's Xuanwei hams. But, since you are probably not going to see them any time soon around here, we'll just settle for our local country hams and still consider ourselves lucky, for these have a divine smoky flavor and nice saltiness. The following is a recipe that hails from the East China province of Zhejiang, which is of course home to all of that lovely Jinhua ham and so often features this local delicacy in its remarkable dishes.

This soup is a classic and does justice to a good piece of ham since it doesn't have to jostle with other flavors for supremacy. It is a clear, even cheerful soup that you can serve with pride to guests as well as family. And if you want to turn this into a main dish, just toss a skein or two of cellophane (mung bean) noodles into the pot and let them simmer until just barely soft.

I have added fresh shiitake mushrooms to the traditional recipe for two reasons: they increase the richness of the broth by adding another level of meaty flavor, and the cooked slices have an untuous, almost fatty texture that really complements the soft winter melon and harder ham.  Use dried mushrooms or even another variety of fresh mushroom if that is what you have in your kitchen. This recipe can be easily multiplied for more people or to make extra for another day.

... and when done is a translucent pale yellow

As usual, I made this soup in my trusty old sand pot, which is an unglazed clay casserole. This is one of my favorite utensils for cooking in because it looks downright gorgeous, it is very versatile, and it saves me the hassle of washing out a wok and a serving bowl by doubling as both. You can find good sand pots in many Chinese grocery and hardware stores. Get a size that fits your household (a small to medium one for one or two people, a big one for more family members), and check it all over for chips or cracks. The store should offer to fill it with water before they ring it up so that you can be assured that there are no cracks. (These are almost never returnable, so be sure to ask for this test.) Scrub the pot carefully, both inside and out, when you get home with a mild soap and a brush, and then rinse it carefully. Dry it in a warm place (a turned off oven is good) so that it doesn't mold, and then store it in a dry place.

Never soak this pot in the sink or wash it in the dishwasher. Just wash it gently and dry it off. If the pot cracks, chances are that whatever you are cooking will seal up the crack on its own, and you will be no the wiser. That is another reason why you should never soak it or trust it to the dishwasher. My old sand pot has a crack that runs almost all the way across the diameter, and so far so good. Just keep an eye on it, and if it looks like it might crumble, just toss it in the garbage with only slightly a heavy heart (or use it as a flower pot if you are really cheap), since they are inexpensive and you can easily find yourself another one.

Chinese ham and winter melon soup 
Huotui donggua tang  火腿冬瓜湯  
Zhejiang

Serves 6 to 8 as part of a multicourse meal

1-inch finger of ginger
2 tablespoons vegetable or peanut oil
4 fresh shiitake mushrooms
A small piece of country ham (see above), about 1 inch by 2 inches
Any skin or bones from your country ham
A slice of fresh winter melon
¼ cup Shaoxing rice wine
4 cups boiling filtered water
Freshly ground black pepper
Cilantro for garnish

1. Cut the unpeeled ginger into very thin slices. Clean the mushrooms, remove the stems, and cut the caps into thick slices. Rinse off the ham, skin, and bones, pat them dry, and trim the ham into very thin slices. Peel and seed the winter melon, and then cut it into 1-inch cubes; you should have around 2 cups, but just about any amount close to that will do.

Zhejiang's finest

2. Heat the oil in a sand pot or wok over medium-high heat and add the ginger. Fry the ginger until it turns brown and toasty, at which point it will have flavored the oil. 

3. Add the mushrooms and ham (and any skin and bones from the ham you might have) to the oil and stir-fry until the mushrooms are browned on the edges. Toss in the winter melon and stir-fry it quickly for a few seconds before pouring the rice wine over everything. 

4. Let the wine bubble for about 10 seconds, and then add the boiling water. Bring the soup to a boil, cover, and lower the heat to medium-low so that you have a nice simmer going. 

5. At this point the winter melon will be a white opaque hue, but when it is done, it will turn translucent and slightly yellow; don't cook it much more past this point, as then it will lose its texture and turn mushy. Check it after around 15 minutes and then every 5 minutes after that, removing the soup from the heat as soon as the winter melon is cooked to a perfect state of doneness.

6. Fish out the bones and skin; I like to remove as much of the ham as possible from the bone at this point at return it to the soup since the meat is so nice and soft that this can be done with a chopstick. Grind the fresh pepper over the soup and sprinkle it with chopped cilantro for color and a zippy bit of freshness. Serve the soup boiling hot.