Easy Chinese Recipe for Pork Dumpling Soup

You'll find a couple of local dishes in Bee Yinn Low's Easy Chinese Recipes (Tuttle Publishing, $24.95). This is because Low lives in Irvine and eats Chinese food all over California as well as in Asia. The L.A.-area recipes are shrimp and yellow chive dumplings, modeled on a dish at Dumpling 10053 in El Monte. The other is pork dumpling soup, which Low says she researched by eating "countless servings" at Sam Woo.

Born into a Chinese family in Penang, Malaysia, Low puts a lifetime of experience into judging Chinese food, and she is harsh when necessary. "The orange chicken served in the United States often looks like a gloppy mess," she writes. Egg drop soup is as bad or worse. "To be brutally honest--I have never tasted a really decent egg drop soup in the Chinese restaurants here in the United States." They are "goopy" and "MSG-laden," she complains.

You can, of course, learn to make "decent" egg drop soup (copied from a restaurant in Shanghai) and excellent orange chicken from her book. The theme is "easy," but Low offers an intriguing range of Chinese food, not just pared-down, simple dishes for beginners. It's subtitled "Family Favorites from Dim Sum to Kung Pao."

If you hang out in the San Gabriel Valley, you've probably eaten plenty of clams with black bean sauce, honey walnut shrimp, salt and pepper squid, pot stickers, Yangzhou fried rice and boba tea.

With Low's book, you can make these and also produce your own chili oil, Sichuan peppercorn oil, Chinese BBQ sauce and even dumpling wrappers. Low herself took the photos that accompany each dish.

Low jumped from a business career to food, launching the popular blog RasaMalaysia.com. Although she talks about eating in such places as Shanghai and Beijing, she is by no means Asia-centric. A hole-in-the-wall in Salt Lake City produces her favorite beef chow fun.

PORK DUMPLING SOUP
From Easy Chinese Recipes

Makes 12 to 20 dumplings

Dumplings
1 small wood ear mushroom
6 ounces ground pork
4 ounces shelled and deveined raw shrimp, cut into small pieces
2 peeled fresh or canned water chestnuts, minced
1 tablespoon finely chopped green onion
1 1/2 teaspoons oil
1 teaspoon Chinese rice wine or sherry
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil
3/4 teaspoon chicken bouillon powder
1/2 teaspoon fish sauce
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 dashes white pepper
1 pack store-bought siu kow or wonton wrappers
4 cups water

Soup
1 3/4 cups homemade chicken stock or 1 (14-ounce) can store-bought chicken broth
1 cup water
3 dashes white pepper
Salt
1 green onion, trimmed and cut into small rounds

1. To make the filling, soak the wood ear mushroom in warm water for about 15 minutes. Cut it into thin strips. Combine the wood ear mushroom, pork, shrimp, water chestnuts, green onion, oil, rice wine, sesame oil, chicken powder, fish sauce, salt and pepper. Chill for 30 minutes.

2. To assemble the dumplings, place a wrapper on your palm and and spoon on about 1 tablespoon filling. Do not overfill. Dip your index finger into a small bowl of water and circle around the outer edges of the wrapper. Fold the wrapper over and press the edges with your thumb and index finger to ensure that the dumpling is sealed tightly and there is no leakage.

3. Repeat for the remaining wrappers and filling.

4. Place the dumplings on a floured surface or baking sheet. Cover them with a damp kitchen towel to prevent drying. Bring the 4 cups water to a boil in a pot. Gently transfer the wrapped dumplings to the boiling water and boil until they float to the top, about 2 to 3 minutes. If necessary, boil in more than 1 batch.

5. Remove the dumplings with a slotted spoon, drain the excess water, and cover them to prevent drying.

6. Make the soup by bringing the chicken broth and 1 cup water to a boil in a pot. Add the white pepper and salt to taste.

7. Place 3 to 4 dumplings in each soup bowl, add some of the soup to the bowl and garnish with green onion rounds. Serve immediately.

Chinese Palace Cuisine

Palace, vegetarian, and medicinal dishes are categorized a special cuisine.
Palace cuisine originated from the imperial kitchens, where dishes for emperors and empresses were cooked. Palace dishes are made from carefully selected ingredients and cooked with great care. Different dishes are made for different seasons. Cutting methods are exquisite. Diners eat according to traditional procedures.
Vegetarian cuisine: Vegetarian cuisine became popular in the Song Dynasty (960-1279) and developed further in the Ming and Qing(1368-1911) dynasties. Three divisions of vegetarian cuisine—temple, palace, and folk- appeared during that time.
Made of green vegetables, fruits, edible fungi, and bean products, and cooked in vegetable oil, vegetarian dishes are tasty, nourishing, and highly digestible, and they help the body resist cancer. They are cooked in various ways, and some taste like meat. Famous dishes include "chicken", mushrooms and gluten, "meat" braised in soy sauce and spices, "ham" with mixed vegetables, hot and sour spices, "fish" with Chinese toon, "shrimp," and dried "meat" strips.
Muslim dishes became popular at the time when Islam spread to China, inheriting the cooking tradition of the nomadic peoples in ancient north-western and north-eastern China. The most representative dishes include instant-boiled mutton, fried rice with mutton, dumplings with filling of mutton, cakes braised with mutton, and beef-entrails soup.

Medicinal cuisine: Also called therapeutic food, medicinal cuisine is an important part of Chinese cooking. Master Chefs have developed many food therapies by combining cookery and traditional Chinese medicine. Famous medicinal dishes include lily and chicken soup, shrimp meat with pearl powder, tianfu carp, duck braised with soy sauce and orange peel, and steamed dumplings stuffed with minced meat and podia cocoas, a medicinal plant.
Other famous cuisine includes Confucian dishes, Tan's dishes and full formal banquet cuisine, combining Manchurian and Chinese delicacies (Manhan Quanxi).

Healthy Chinese Food

While it’s true that much of Chinese cuisine is rice and noodle-based (rice is prized throughout China), forgo these carbs and you can truly experience the diversity of flavors, textures and cooking techniques this regional fare has to offer.
Four regions are the primary sources of Chinese cooking styles: Beijing (Peking) in the north, the southern provinces of Guangdong (Canton), the eastern area of Nanjing (Shanghai) and Szechuan to the west. Each has its distinct style:
– From the north come homey noodle dishes and steamed buns, as well as the justly famous Peking duck. In general, northern-style cooking is considered bland but satisfyingly filling.

– Cantonese cooking is probably the most familiar of Chinese regional cuisines. It’s the style that familiarized us as children with such exotic dishes as wonton soup and barbecued spare ribs — different, but easy on the palate. This region is home to the stir-fry specialties that rely on fresh, not preserved, ingredients prepared quickly in little oil. Cantonese cooking is not spicy.
– From the east come Shanghai’s renowned fresh fish and seafood dishes paired with an abundance of fresh vegetables — in fact, vegetarians delight in the many meatless listings on Shanghai-style menus. Poultry, too, is a specialty from this area. Shanghai cooking tends to be slightly oilier than that of other regions.
– Go west to the Szechuan region and you’ll find fiery, spicy cuisine featuring hot chilies, peppercorns and aromatic garlic and ginger. Pork, poultry and soybeans are common elements of Szechuan cooking.
Know Your Menu
Typical dishes you’ll see on Chinese menus include lo mein, chow mein, chow fun, mai fun or lai fun. These dishes are all noodle-based, and also incorporate shrimp or other seafood, pork, chicken or beef. Opt for the sauteed or stir-fried proteins without the noodles. Egg rolls, an all-time favorite appetizer, are encased in dough wrappers, then deep fried. Peking duck is fine choice — just leave the pancakes that come with it on the side. The same applies to moo shu pork — help yourself to the filling, but pass on the pancakes. Be aware that the cubes of meat in sweet-and-sour pork are dipped in batter before deep-frying, then they’re slathered in sticky, sweetened sauce.
In addition to avoiding rice and noodle-based dishes, other high-carb ingredients you should be on the lookout for on Chinese menus are peas, onions, black beans, soybeans, oranges and corn.

Chinese Cuisine,Do You Like Them

Chinese cuisine is any of several styles originating in the regions of China, some of which have become highly popular in other parts of the world — from Asia to the Americas, Australia, Western Europe and Southern Africa. Where there are historical immigrant Chinese populations, the style of food has evolved – for example, American Chinese cuisine and Indian Chinese cuisine are prominent examples of Chinese cuisine that has been adapted to suit local palates. In recent years, connoisseurs of Chinese food have also sprouted in Eastern Europe and South Asia. The culinary Michelin Guide has also taken an interest in Chinese cuisine, establishing Hong Kong and Macao versions of its publication.

Flour and rice are the two main food staples in China. In general, rice is the major food source for people from rice farming areas in southern China. Rice is also used to produce beers, wines and vinegars. In wheat farming areas in Northern China, people largely rely on flour based foods such as noodles, breads, dumplings and steamed buns. Noodles are symbolic of long life and good health according to Chinese tradition.They come dry or fresh in a variety of sizes, shapes and textures and are often served in soups and fried as toppings. Tofu is another popular product often used as a meat or cheese substitute. It is a soy-based product which is highly nutritious, inexpensive and versatile. It has a high protein/fat ratio.