Wontons in chile oil

Wontons appear all over southern China. In the United States, we most often see them served Guangdong-style, as shrimp and pork packets floating in a pork broth. Near the Yangtze, wontons are much larger and usually served in pale broths with shreds of omelet, laver seaweed (nori), and green onions.

This wonderful idea traveled west into the chile-laden embrace of Sichuan, where simple pork-filled packets are tossed in an addictively nose tingling sauce. Bright green rings of scallion ornament the top in this refined street food. I used to eat this on bamboo stools at the sides of busy alleys

This particular preparation from Sichuan is my favorite. It’s basically a street food, and I have very fond memories of eating it in busy alleys, sitting on a bamboo stool, watching the world bustle by, and luxuriating in the searing oil biting at my lips and tongue before the sweet porky juice popped out and doused the heat. I’d sweat and smile and order another bowl.

As in most Sichuanese dishes, the chile-laden sauce packs a punch, but here it is sensu­ously tempered by the juicy wonton filling. The sauce will also be slightly diluted by the water that clings to the soft wontons. So, serve extra chile oil or even more of the sauce on the side for those who want to sweat a bit.

The setup

This is an updated version of the recipe that can be found on page 298 of All Under Heaven. I love this recipe so much that I am always making it and fooling around with it, so here are some suggestions that will make your days much easier and much more filled with wontons, which is a great way to live your life.

Making the filling in a food processor really is the way to go here, and it also makes this dish incredibly easy.

Be sure to use 2 packages of wonton wrappers, which will give you a nice surplus of wontons to freeze.

Place the wontons on plastic wrap as you finish making them, as this is so much easier than a tea towel – it might not be traditional, but hey, I’m all about evolution. Be sure and mark up your book accordingly!

To freeze the wontons, freeze them as they are on the lined baking sheets, just be sure that they don’t touch each other. As soon as they are completely solid, transfer them to resealable freezer bags. You should toss these frozen wontons directly into the boiling water without defrosting them first.

 

Lots of seasoning... yay

Wontons in chile oil

Hóngyóu chăoshŏu  紅油炒手

Sichuan

Makes about 180 wontons and serves a whole lotta people

Filling:

2 inches | 5 cm fresh ginger, more or less

1½ cups | 360 ml unsalted chicken stock, divided into ½ cup | 120 ml and 1 cup | 240 ml

1½ pounds | 500 g ground pork, preferably around 30 percent fat cut of pork, chilled

Sea salt to taste

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

2 tablespoons light soy sauce

3 tablespoons mild rice wine

2 teaspoons sugar

3 green onions, white parts only, trimmed and finely minced

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Wonton wrappers:

2 (1 pound | 460 g) packages thin wonton wrappers

Flour for dusting

Sauce: (may be doubled)

3 tablespoons red chile oil with toasty bits, or to taste

3 tablespoons light soy sauce, or to taste

3 tablespoons toasted sesame oil, or to taste

2 cloves garlic, finely minced, optional

Sugar to taste

Garnish:

3 green onions, green parts only, trimmed and cut into thin rounds

Ground toasted Sichuan peppercorns

1. Cut the ginger into roughly ½-inch | 1-cm pieces, then whirl it in a food processor with ½ cup | 120 ml of the stock. Strain the liquid, squeezing out every last drop of ginger-flavored stock into a bowl before discarding the fibrous mass left behind.

 

Ready to go

2. Place the pork, ginger-flavored stock, salt, eggs, soy sauce, rice wine, sugar, the whites of the green onions, sesame oil, and the black pepper in a food processor fitted with a metal blade. Pulse in the remaining 1 cup | 240 ml stock in incre­ments so that the pork absorbs all of the liquid. It will be light and fluffy at this point. Chill the filling for an hour or longer, if you have the time, as this will firm it up and make it easier to wrap.

4. Before you start wrapping the wontons, place 2 baking sheets next to your work area, cover them with plastic wrap, and have a couple of extra towels on the side to cover the filled wontons. Place a couple of tablespoons of cool water in a small bowl next to the filling bowl, as well as a flat piece of wood or a small blunt knife. (You’ll use both to wrap the wontons; see the movie below.) If you are going to cook these right away, pour water (at least 8 cups | 2 liters) into a large pot and bring it to a boil just before you are ready to cook. Wrap the wontons as shown below:

6. Mix together the sauce ingredients, taste and adjust the seasoning as desired, and divide the sauce among as many bowls you wish; double the amount of sauce if you really enjoy spicy flavors.

7. To cook the wontons, drop them in small handfuls into the boiling water while stirring with a wooden spoon. As soon as the water returns to a boil, pour in about 1 cup | 240 ml cold water. Bring the pot to a boil again and pour in another cup | 240 ml of cold water. When the pot boils a third time, the wontons should be floating gracefully.

8. Use a Chinese spider or slotted spoon to gently remove the wontons into the prepared bowls, draining off as much of the water as you can. Toss them lightly in the sauce and sprinkle with the chopped green onions and the ground toasted Sichuan peppercorns to taste. Serve immediately.

Summer on a plate: celtuce tops with sesame

This is just about as close to a summer salad as China gets, and it's one of my favorite recipes from Chengdu. 

The two basic things you need to aim for here in this dish are absolute freshness in the vegetable and nuttiness in the sauce. So, ideally, the day that you plan to serve this is the day that you buy your celtuce. That morning, bring the whole celtuce or celtuce tops home, trim and slice them up as directed, and rinse well before soaking them a couple of hours in ice water, as this will help to crisp them up even more.

Not everyone has the luxury of shopping when it’s best for the vegetables, so if circumstances force you to buy the celtuce a day ahead of time, rinse the vegetables in cold water, shake them dry, wrap them in a tea towel, place the towel in a plastic bag, and refrigerate. Then, trim and slice them as needed before soaking them in the two cold baths of saltwater and ice water to clean them thoroughly and restore their juiciness.

That second point I mentioned was nuttiness, and to achieve that, the sauce calls for three kinds of toasted sesame: paste, oil, and a seed garnish. Together these will supply you with a nice range of warm flavors.

Fresh celtuce heads

However, not all sesame pastes are made alike. If you don’t use either homemade or a good store-bought sesame paste, the flavor might be a bit off. The same thing goes with toasted sesame oil: as always, aim for the absolute best. Korean and Japanese brands are often excellent, and I always buy mine in large (56 ounce/1656 ml) cans because this is a staple in my kitchen.

But that doesn’t mean that only serious Chinese chefs need to be this persnickety about their ingredients. Even if you are just an occasional East Asian cook, buy only pure sesame oil. Look at the ingredient list, which should tell you that it is 100% sesame oil with no fillers, like cottonseed oil and the like. (Kadoya is my go-to brand, but others are available in Asian supermarkets and online.)

As for the sesame seeds, try to get them in bulk bins, where you can smell and taste them for freshness, and then toast them yourself, which will only take a few minutes. You can even go from there to making your own sesame paste. And that will change your world because the flavor is unparalleled.

I get the big tins

If your store-bought sesame paste or sesame oil lacks oompf, substitute a bit of good peanut or almond butter to ramp up the flavors. Or, you can use all peanut or almond butter here (in fact, any good nut butter would do as long as it’s toasty), if you prefer.

One thing that you must pay attention to when you make this is the emulsification of the dressing ingredients. Just as with a good handmade mayonnaise, you need to whip in air while incorporating the ingredients. Ice water is gradually introduced, too, which will lighten the sauce both visually and texturally.

This is actually the secret to making great sesame sauce, because if you leave out the ice water, the texture stays thick and viscous, but the slow addition of ice water smooths out the sticky paste and makes it thin enough to drizzle over the celtuce, while remaining thick enough to cling to the leaves. Finally, the two oils are beaten in and make the dressing stable. This step is not at all hard, but it will make this dish absolutely superb.

Do note that this will make twice the amount needed, but it stores well for a couple of days in the refrigerator and can be used for another round of celtuce or as a new-fangled salad dressing or for cold noodles Sichuan style.

Celtuce tastes very much like romaine lettuce, so if you don’t have access to celtuce, that’s your substitute. Try to use the hearts of the lettuce, as they will be tenderer and milder, as well as easier to serve and eat.

The genuine Chinese vegetable has other attributes, though, that make it well worth seeking it out. For one thing, it’s beautiful. For another thing, it’s crunchy beyond belief. The brilliant jade of the stems also makes them visually tantalizing. Those stems add another layer of texture and flavor to the leaves, so that your tongue and teeth have even more to play with as you ravage your way across the plate.

I have absolutely no control when faced with a perfect plate of celtuce tips with sesame dressing. And I’m sure you’ll feel the same way.

Silky and delicious

Celtuce tips with sesame dressing

Májiàng yóumàicài  麻醬油麥菜

Sichuan

Serves 4 as an appetizer

  

Celtuce:

1 head celtuce (around 6 ounces/150 g) that should be mainly composed of young leaves, along with tender stem tips

Ice water and ice cubes, as needed

2 teaspoons sea salt

Dressing:

4 tablespoons toasted sesame paste, well stirred

2 teaspoons powdered sugar

1 tablespoon soy sauce

2 tablespoons pale rice vinegar

2 tablespoons ice water

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

1½ teaspoons chile oil, or to taste

½ teaspoon toasted sesame seeds

 

Celtuce head cut up

1. Rinse the celtuce leaves thoroughly and trim off any tough or damaged parts. Cut the heads lengthwise into sixths or eighths so that you are left with long, thin, easily manageable wedges, and then cut the heads crosswise to make pieces about 3 inches/8 cm long. Set a serving platter in the refrigerator to chill.

2. At least 3 hours before serving, dissolve the salt in about a cup of cold water, toss the celtuce with this, and add more ice water to cover. Soak the celtuce in this saltwater bath for 15 to 30 minutes to cleanse it and reduce any lingering bitterness, then rinse and shake it dry. Finally, soak the celtuce in ice water to cover for at least 2 hours; toss in a good handful of ice cubes to make the leaves super crisp.

3. To make the dressing, use a whisk to beat together the sesame paste, powdered sugar, and soy sauce in a small work bowl until they are very smooth and creamy. Beat in the vinegar until it is smooth, and then slowly beat in the ice water in small dribbles as if you were making mayonnaise by hand, as this will give you the ethereally silky texture this sauce requires. Finally, beat in the sesame oil and chile oil until the dressing is once more smooth and very light. Taste and adjust the seasoning as desired.

4. Once you have the dressing ready, drain the celtuce and use a salad spinner to remove any remaining water, or else wrap the leaves in a dry tea towel. Arrange the leaves attractively on the chilled platter. Drizzle the dressing over the celtuce leaves, and then sprinkle the sesame seeds on the dressing; you can reserve some of the dressing, if you like, and offer it on the side. Serve immediately.

 

Bolting head of celtuce

Tip:

When choosing celtuce leaves, select heads that are stiff with undamaged leaves and freshly cut stems. These are often sold in sealed bags, so you sometimes have to wing it. Even so, try to feel around the middle of the heads to ensure that there are no flowering stems. If the celtuce has started to bolt, it will not be as sweet, and you’ll have fewer leaves since most of the plant’s energy will have been directed toward setting blossoms.

Toasted sesame paste

Májiàng 麻醬

Makes about ¾ cup (160 g)

Unlike the Middle East, which prefers its sesame paste raw, Chinese people like it toasted so that the full flavor of the seeds comes to the forefront. You can buy sesame paste in any Chinese market, but unless you get the right brand, you’ll most likely find it mixed with cottonseed oil or sugar or other unnec­essary ingredients.

Plain but delicious sesame paste

1 cup (140 g) toasted sesame seeds

5 tablespoons or so toasted sesame oil

Sea salt, optional

1. Use a small food processor or a good-quality blender. Pour in the seeds and add a few tablespoons of the oil.

2. Puree the seeds on high, gradually adding the rest of the oil until you have a relatively smooth paste. Season the sesame paste with salt, if you plan to use it like peanut butter, but for Chinese recipes it is best to leave it unsalted. Store the paste in a covered jar in the refrigerator.

Cold spicy sweet tart nutty noodles from Sichuan

When the weather starts to heat up, I begin looking forward to making this super easy dish from the delicious province of Sichuan in central China. 

A land of muggy summers, Sichuan is the place where chili lovers make themselves sweat even more by consuming fiery foods. 

This might seem counter-intuitive, but it's all in tune with the thinking of traditional Chinese medicine, since this releases the pent-up heat in the body through perspiration, and so you feel cooler than before.

One such dish is called simply Cold Noodles and is nothing more than cooked, chilled noodles piled on top of blanched bean sprouts, topped with lots of veggies and either pressed bean curd or poached chicken strips, and then ornamented with lots of the spicy sauce known as "strange flavor" in Chinese.

It's all about balance

I don't know the origin of this name. Perhaps it is because it is an amalgam of every almost type of flavor there is: sweet, salty, sour, spicy, and nutty. You could throw some bitter in there and make it a home run, I guess, but I like it just the way it is.

This is another recipe that is open to interpretation, messing around, experimenting with. There really is no bad way to make cold noodles if you use good ingredients and make sure everything goes well with each other.

The classic ingredients here are -- in addition to the cold noodles -- blanched bean sprouts and shredded poached chicken. But even those are really subject to what you like and what you have in the fridge. 

Fresh mung bean sprouts

Here I've substituted baiye bean curd (like a softer pressed tofu) for the chicken to make a meatless version, and it was great. As for the veggies, just about anything is fine as long as it is refreshing and preferably slightly crunchy. If you can have some contrasting colors, so much the better.

Things like tomatoes wouldn't go very well in here because of their assertive flavor and soft texture. But shredded carrots, cucumbers, green onions, celery, sweet red peppers, and so forth get along quite well with the noodles and bean sprouts without overpowering all of the other flavors going on in the bowl.

Why blanched bean sprouts under the noodles? It may be hard to imagine just from the description, but they add a wonderful lightness to the noodles. Crisp and juicy, they mingle delightfully with the starchy yellow strands and add complexity and refreshment to each bite.

Assorted veggies and tofu

I've incorporated the Citrus Chili Oil with Black Beans in the previous post here, and it is amazing how much it adds to the flavors. The tiny bits of fermented black beans provide pungent, salty notes while the orange peel and ground chili tantalize the taste buds. Then, the sugar, vinegar, and soy sauce round out the nutty flavors of sesame oil and paste, while finely ground roasted Sichuan peppercorns tingle the nose.

Dishes like this make living in a hot, sweaty climate something worth enduring!

Cold noodles Sichuan style
Sichuan liangmian 四川涼麵
Sichuan cuisine
Serves 4 as a main dish

Noodles and toppings:
24 ounces (about 4 cups) | 700 g mung bean sprouts
Water, as needed
About 1 pound | 500 g fresh Chinese noodles of any kind
Around 1 cup | 125 g shredded poached chicken or julienned pressed bean curd
2 or 3 green onions, trimmed and shredded
2 Persian or other tender cucumbers and/or
1 carrot, shredded and/or half a sweet red pepper and/or 1 large stalk celery and/or
handful of blanched snow pea pods and/or any other vegetable you'd like here

Sauce:
10 to 12 tablespoons | 150 to 180 ml goop from the Citrus Chili Oil
6 to 8 tablespoons | 90 to 125 ml oil from the Citrus Chili Oil
4 tablespoons | 50 g sugar
4 tablespoons | 60 ml balsamic vinegar
6 tablespoons | 90 ml toasted sesame oil
2 tablespoons regular soy sauce
2 tablespoons toasted sesame paste or peanut butter
2 teaspoons toasted ground Sichuan peppercorns

1. Blanch the bean sprouts by putting them in a 2-quart saucepan, covering them with water, and bringing the pot to a boil. The sprouts are ready when they have lost that "beany" flavor but are still crispy; do not overcook them. Immediately dump the pot into a colander place in the sink and run cold water over the bean sprouts to stop them from cooking any further. Drain and shake the sprouts in the colander to get rid of most of the water. Divide the cook sprouts among 4 large noodle bowls.

Loosen the noodles before boiling

2. Fill the saucepan halfway with water and bring it to a boil. While it is heating up, open the noodles and run your fingers through them to break up the clump. (I dump them in a big bowl if they are particularly knotted up and work the clumps loose.) Add the noodles to the boiling water in small handfuls, and stir the noodles as you add them. Stir occasionally until the water comes to a boil again, and then lower the heat to medium. The noodles will cook quickly, and you should start tasting them as soon as they rise to the surface. When they have cooked through but are still chewy, dump the water and noodles into the colander place in the sink and run water over the noodles until they are cool. Shake them dry and divide the noodles among the 4 bowls.

3. Shred or finely julienned the rest of the toppings and arrange them on top of the noodles in a decorative manner.

4. Mix the sauce ingredients together until smooth. Taste and adjust the seasoning. Pour an equal amount over each bowl and serve. Let your diners toss the noodles themselves.

Tips

Rinse the boiled noodles

Fresh noodles taste best here, but dried can be substituted if you like. 

Buy bean sprouts no more than a day before you want to use them, as they spoil quickly. They keep best in a container covered with water and stored in the refrigerator.

Use other chili oils if you like; just make sure that they are fresh and very flavorful, as they make or break this dish.

If your sesame paste or peanut butter is hard, microwave it to make it smooth.

To make toasted ground Sichuan peppercorns, follow the directions for Toasted Sichuan Peppercorn and Salt, but don't use the salt; just toast the peppercorns, grind finely, and sift to remove any hard pieces.