Chinese American | Saveur

Soy Pickled Tomatoes with Silken Tofu

Hetty McKinnon — Tue, 11 Jul 2023 20:43:31 +0000

Photography by Hetty Lui McKinnon

This recipe is brought to you by SAVEUR Cookbook Club, a passionate community of food-loving readers from around the globe that features our favorite authors and recipes. Join us as we cook through a new book every two months, and share your food pics and vids on social media with the hashtags #SAVEURCookbookClub and #EatTheWorld.

When the days are hot and the cherry tomatoes prolific, there’s no reason to turn on the oven or stove. Instead, gather the juiciest specimens from the farmers market and make this luscious, satisfying dish adapted from author Hetty McKinnon’s newest cookbook, Tenderheart: A Cookbook About Vegetables and Unbreakable Family Bonds. Silken tofu is the perfect vehicle for juicy tomatoes that have been luxuriating in a garlicky bath of soy sauce and vinegar and spiced up with chile oil. Best of all it’s delicious served cold from the refrigerator, topped with a handful of fresh herbs. It’s delicious on it’s own, or served with rice. — Ellen Fort

Yield: 4

Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients

For the pickled tomatoes:

12 oz. cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
2 Tbsp. soy sauce or tamari
1 Tbsp. black or rice vinegar
1 Tbsp. chile oil
1 Tbsp. toasted sesame oil
½ tsp. sugar
1 garlic clove, finely grated

For the tofu:

2 lb. cold silken tofu, drained and patted dry on all sides with paper towels
1 Tbsp. white sesame seeds, toasted
4 shiso leaves, thinly sliced (optional)
2 scallions, tops and bottoms trimmed, thinly sliced
Cilantro leaves, for garnish

Instructions

Make the pickled tomatoes: In a medium bowl, stir together all the ingredients and set aside to marinate for 10–20 minutes. (Alternatively, cover and refrigerate for up to 12 hours; bring to room temperature before using.)
Meanwhile, make the tofu: Place the tofu onto a platter. Without cutting through to the bottom, slice the tofu in a crosshatch pattern at 1-inch intervals (this will help the sauce penetrate).
To serve, spoon the reserved tomatoes and their sauce over the tofu, then scatter with the scallion, cilantro, shiso (if using), and sesame seeds.

The post Soy Pickled Tomatoes with Silken Tofu appeared first on Saveur.

Crispy Battered Cod with Creamy Hoisin Tartar Sauce

Peter Som — Tue, 21 Mar 2023 15:40:04 +0000

Photography by Peter Som

Listed in my grandma’s recipe notebook as “Jow Crispy Fry Mix for Western Appetites Developed from a Secret Chinese Recipe,” the old-school mixture used to encase the fish in this Chinese battered cod recipe is wonderfully versatile. Use it to coat vegetables and virtually any kind of meat, seafood, or poultry.

Featured in, “For Me, Self-Care Means Deep Frying for One,” by Peter Som.

Yield: 4

Time: 30 minutes

Ingredients

For the sauce:

¾ cup mayonnaise
⅓ cup finely chopped dill pickles
1 Tbsp. finely chopped cilantro
1 Tbsp. hoisin sauce
1 Tbsp. grated onion
1 tsp. fish sauce
½ tsp. kosher salt
Pinch ground white pepper

For the fish:

½ cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup rice flour
¼ cup yellow corn flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. five-spice powder
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. sugar
1 cup cold club soda or seltzer
¼ cup cornstarch
Vegetable oil, for frying
1½–2 lb. cod fillets, divided into 4 pieces total
Flaky sea salt and ground white pepper
Coarsely chopped cilantro, for garnish
1 small red chile, very thinly sliced (optional)

Instructions

Make the sauce: In a small serving bowl, stir together the mayonnaise, pickles, cilantro, hoisin, onion, fish sauce, salt, and white pepper. Cover and refrigerate until ready to use.
Make the fish: In a large bowl, whisk together the all-purpose flour, rice flour, corn flour, baking powder, five-spice, salt, and sugar. Add the club soda and whisk until smooth.
To a large pot or Dutch oven set over medium-high heat and fitted with a deep-fry thermometer, add the oil to a depth of 1½ inches. While the oil heats, pat the fish dry with paper towels and season generously with salt and white pepper. In a shallow bowl, place the cornstarch, then add the fillets and turn to coat. When the temperature reads 350ºF, dredge half of the fillets in the batter, allowing any excess to drip back into the bowl. Gently lower into the oil and fry, turning halfway through cooking, until the batter is puffed and golden brown, 6–8 minutes total. Transfer to a rack set over a paper-towel-lined baking sheet and season with flaky salt and white pepper. Repeat with the remaining fish.
To serve, transfer the fish to a platter and garnish with the cilantro and sliced chile. Serve immediately with the tartar sauce on the side.

The post Crispy Battered Cod with Creamy Hoisin Tartar Sauce appeared first on Saveur.

Cantonese White Cut Chicken with Ginger-Scallion Sauce

Peter Som — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 20:18:55 +0000

Photography by Peter Som

This comforting white cut chicken recipe comes from my Chinese grandmother’s spiral-bound notebook. Save the cooking liquid for another use—I like to boil it with carrots, celery, onion, and parsley to make a flavorful broth. Any leftover chicken is wonderful over rice, in salads, or turned into tacos or chicken salad.

Featured in: “In Defense of Boiled Chicken.”

Yield: 4

Time: 35 minutes

Ingredients

For the chicken:

2 Tbsp. fennel seeds
1 Tbsp. kosher salt
1½ tsp. sugar
5 whole cloves
2 star anise pods
1 chicken (4 lb.), cut into 8 pieces, breasts left bone in

For the sauce:

¼ cup plus 1 Tbsp. vegetable oil
2 tsp. finely grated fresh ginger
1 tsp. kosher salt
1 tsp. sesame oil
1 tsp. thinly sliced fresh red chile (optional)
3 scallions, trimmed and thinly sliced, plus more for garnish

Instructions

Make the chicken: To a large pot set over high heat, add 8 cups of water, the fennel seeds, salt, sugar, cloves, and star anise and bring to a boil. Add the chicken (covering with more water if needed to fully submerge the pieces) and return to a boil. Reduce the heat to maintain a strong simmer and cook until a thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh reads 165ºF and the chicken is fully cooked, 10–12 minutes. Meanwhile, fill a large bowl with ice water.
Using tongs, transfer the chicken to the ice water (discarding the aromatics) and set aside until cool, about 10 minutes.
Meanwhile, make the sauce: In a serving bowl, whisk together the vegetable oil, ginger, salt, sesame oil, chile, and scallions.
To serve, cut the chicken breasts off the bone into 1-inch slices. Transfer to a platter along with the remaining chicken pieces. Sprinkle with scallions and accompany with the sauce. (White cut chicken may be served cold or at room temperature.)

The post Cantonese White Cut Chicken with Ginger-Scallion Sauce appeared first on Saveur.

How To Make General Tso’s Chicken

Kat Craddock — Tue, 30 Apr 2019 17:57:22 +0000

Get the recipe for General Tso’s Chicken » Jenny Huang

According to The Museum of Food and Drink in Brooklyn, New York, there are nearly 50,000 Chinese-American restaurants in the U.S. While the menu of course varies from restaurant to restaurant—the vast majority of these establishments are independently owned businesses, after all—there’s one dish you can almost always expect to find: General Tso’s chicken.

Get seasonal recipes, methods and techniques sent right to your inbox—sign up here to receive Saveur newsletters. And don’t forget to follow us on Instagram at @SaveurMag.

The dish as most Americans know it today was invented by a Hunanese chef named Peng Chang-kuei in the 1950s. Fuchsia Dunlop, the English-language authority on Chinese cuisine, chronicled the chef’s story in her excellent Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook. Peng worked as an official chef for the Nationalist government, and after the Chinese Civil War ended in 1949, defected with his employers to Taiwan. It was there that he created the original version of the now-famous chicken dish and named it after a Hunanese general, Tso Tsung-t’ang (or Zuo Zongtang), who was best-known for putting down a rebellion in the western desert region of Xinjiang in the 19th century.

This early iteration of General Tso’s chicken was very much true to Hunan cuisine. Peng described its flavors in Dunlop’s book as “typically Hunanese—heavy, sour, hot, and salty.” The dish had none of its current characteristic sweetness until the 1970s, when Peng began serving a Westernized version at his eponymous restaurant Peng’s in New York City. “The original General Tso’s chicken was Hunanese in taste and made without sugar,” Peng explained, “but when I began cooking for non-Hunanese people in the United States, I altered the recipe.”

The chile-laced sweet-and-sour sauce that resulted helped put General Tso’s chicken on the map. In her review of Peng’s for the New York Times, restaurant critic Mimi Sheraton lauded the dish as “a stir-fried masterpiece, sizzling hot both in flavor and temperature.” General Tso’s chicken soon became a trend at fancy Chinese restaurants before evolving into an everyday staple on Chinese takeout menus across the country. The dish not only planted a flag in the American culinary landscape, but it also had an enormous impact on the Chinese diaspora in the U.S. As Andrea Cherng, the chief marketing officer for Panda Express, told NBC , Americanized Chinese recipes like General Tso’s “are the reasons why Chinese immigrant families in the U.S. were able to provide for their families.” The final twist in General Tso’s journey is that the Westernized version of the dish has even traveled back to its home country in recent years, popping up on menus at upscale restaurants like Hong Kong’s Mott 32.

Curious to better understand the dish, we decided to skip delivery and make it from scratch. Here’s what to keep in mind when cooking this classic comfort food at home.

Boneless, skinless chicken thighs are tossed with a mixture of cornstarch, egg, and soy sauce that’s somewhere between a marinade and a batter. Jenny Huang

Start with a Flavorful Marinade

A thin cornstarch-and-egg mixture seasoned with soy sauce serves as both a quick marinade and a batter. Let the chicken (I prefer boneless, skinless dark meat) soak at room temperature until all the pieces are infused with flavor, about 15 minutes.

For the best texture, go for a thin coating of batter. Jenny Huang

Lightly Batter Your Chicken

Using wooden chopsticks, lift the chicken from the bowl of marinade, shaking gently to remove any excess. The thin coating that remains will allow the chicken to fry up nice and crispy. Too much batter gives the meat an unappealing doughy and dense texture when it’s returned to the sauce.

A quick turn in the skillet or wok is a must for ginger and garlic. Jenny Huang

Stir-Fry Your Aromatics

Frying ginger and garlic softens their flavors and infuses your cooking oil with their fragrance—but they don’t need long. The natural sugars in garlic in particular burn quickly, so do not walk away from the stove; 15 to 30 seconds should do the trick.

Keeping the chiles whole makes for a pretty presentation (and makes it easy for picky eaters to take out!). Jenny Huang

Use Dried Chiles

Mott 32 uses dried facing-heaven chiles, which are popular in both Sichuan and Hunan cooking, to give its General Tso’s chicken a spicy kick. The Chinese peppers have a powerful heat and a musky-nutty-tannic flavor that is enhanced by toasting.

They can be tricky to find here in the U.S.—check your local Asian markets or order them online. Tianjin chiles have a similar heat level and are easier to source. If you can’t track down either, don’t be discouraged; readily-available dried cayenne chiles are a near substitute.

If you are sensitive to heat but don’t want to skimp on the chile flavor, tone down the spice level by snipping the stems off the chiles, and shaking out and discarding the seeds before using. Either way, toast the chiles gently with the aromatics and take care not to burn them—they should be no darker than a rich, reddish tobacco brown.

Tomato paste is whisked into the chicken-stock base. Jenny Huang

Make a Well-Balanced Sauce

Two ingredients are key to this umami-rich, chicken stock-based General Tso’s sauce: tomato paste and Shaoxing wine. The addition of tomato paste may not be authentic, but it lends depth, acidity, and sweetness. It also tints the sauce that familiar red hue without relying on artificial coloring. Just don’t go overboard; the concentrated paste packs a lot of tomato-y flavor and can easily overpower the other ingredients.

Dark and complex, Shaoxing wine is made from rice in China’s Zhejiang province, where it is both consumed as a beverage and used as a cooking wine. It’s easy to find in Asian markets or online, but in a pinch, you can approximate its savory-astringent notes with an equal amount of manzanilla sherry.

Apricot jam is the surprising sweetener and thickener here. Jenny Huang

Thicken the Sauce

A couple spoonfuls of apricot jam, while by no means traditional, serve as the sweetener in this General Tso’s sauce. It also adds a welcome dose of acidity, while the pectin, the natural fruit compound that causes jams and jellies to set, acts as a gentle thickener, boosting the body of the sauce. This allows you to go easy on the cornstarch, which tends to get gloopy when used in excess.

When the chicken is heated through and has that telltale glossy sheen, add a touch of sesame oil.

Add a Finishing Touch

A drizzle of toasted sesame oil enhances the nuttiness of the wine in the sauce and balances the acidity of the tomato paste and apricot jam. Sprinkle with sliced scallions for color and freshness, then serve with bowls of steamed white rice.

Yield: serves 4

Time: 55 minutes

1½ lb. boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 2-inch pieces
⅓ cup plus 1 Tbsp. cornstarch, divided
1 large egg, lightly beaten
¼ cup soy sauce, divided
½ cup low-sodium chicken stock
1 Tbsp. rice vinegar
1 Tbsp. Shaoxing wine or sherry
2 Tbsp. apricot jam
1 Tbsp. tomato paste
2 Tbsp. canola or peanut oil, plus more for frying
1 Tbsp. grated ginger
1 tsp. grated garlic
¼ cup dried Tianjin or cayenne chiles
Toasted sesame oil, for serving (optional)
Thinly sliced scallions, for serving
Steamed jasmine rice, for serving

Instructions

In a medium bowl, add the chicken, ⅓ cup cornstarch, egg, and 2 tablespoons soy sauce. Toss well to coat, then set aside to marinate at room temperature for 15 minutes.
In a small bowl, add the chicken stock, remaining 1 tablespoon cornstarch, vinegar, wine, apricot jam, tomato paste, remaining 2 tablespoons soy sauce, and ½ cup cold water. Whisk to combine.
Line a large plate or baking sheet with paper towels and set by the stove. In a wok or large, deep skillet fitted with a deep-fry thermometer, add enough canola oil to reach 3 inches up the sides of the wok. Preheat the oil to 375°F over medium-high heat. Working in batches, use your hands or a slotted spoon to lift the prepared chicken from the marinade, shake off any excess, and add to the oil. Cook, stirring occasionally, until crispy and cooked through, about 4 minutes per batch. Using tongs or a heat-resistant slotted spoon, transfer the chicken to the prepared plate. Repeat this process with the remaining chicken.
Discard the frying oil. Return the wok to high heat and add 2 tablespoons canola oil. When the oil is hot, swirl to coat the bottom and sides, then add the ginger and garlic. Stir-fry until the aromatics are fragrant but not yet browned, about 20 seconds, then stir in the chiles and cook until they begin to soften, plump, and turn a deep tobacco-brown color, 15–20 seconds more. Keeping your head away from the area above the stove, add the chicken stock mixture (it will sizzle and steam up violently). Bring to a boil, then adjust the heat to maintain a strong simmer. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce is thickened and glossy, 7–10 minutes. Return the chicken to the wok, stirring well to coat. Continue cooking until the chicken is heated through, about 2 minutes more. Remove the wok from the heat, then transfer the chicken to a serving platter. Drizzle with sesame oil (if using), top with scallions, and serve with rice.

The post How To Make General Tso’s Chicken appeared first on Saveur.

Pop’s Asian-American Grilling Sauce

Organic — Mon, 18 Mar 2019 22:31:22 +0000

Recalling the backyard exploits of a Chinese-American grill master. Todd Coleman

This robust sauce, adapted from a recipe by James Liping Woo, father of writer Mei Chin, adds a balanced sweet and pungent heat as a marinade or baste for all sorts of meats and vegetables. This recipe first appeared in our June/July 2013 issue along with Mei Chin’s article Home Fire.

Yield: makes About 1 1/2 Cups

1 cup ketchup
1 cup roughly chopped cilantro
¹⁄₂ cup honey
¹⁄₃ cup sake
¹⁄₃ cup soy sauce
¹⁄₄ cup fermented bean curd
¹⁄₄ cup fish sauce
¹⁄₄ cup oyster sauce
¹⁄₄ cup sesame oil
3 tbsp. sriracha hot sauce
6 cloves garlic, peeled
2 small red Thai chiles, stemmed
1 (2") piece ginger, peeled and thinly sliced

Instructions

Purée all ingredients in a food processor until smooth.

The post Pop’s Asian-American Grilling Sauce appeared first on Saveur.

Crab Rangoon

Organic — Fri, 18 Apr 2008 04:00:00 +0000

An adaptation of the fried wonton, crab rangoon is one of the most enduringly popular appetizers at the posh Polynesian restaurant chain Trader Vic's. Get the recipe for Crab Rangoon ». Matt Taylor-Gross

An adaptation of the fried wonton, crab rangoon is one of the most enduringly popular appetizers at the posh Polynesian restaurant chain Trader Vic’s.

Yield: makes 12 Wontons

5 oz. picked backfin crabmeat
4 oz. cream cheese, room temperature
1 scallion, thinly sliced
1 clove garlic, finely chopped
1 tsp. Worcestershire sauce
¹⁄₂ tbsp. toasted sesame oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
12 wonton wrappers
Peanut oil, for frying

Instructions

In a medium bowl, mix together crabmeat, cream cheese, scallions, garlic, worcestershire sauce, and sesame oil until the ingredients are well combined. Season to taste with salt and pepper; set aside.
Heat 2″ of oil in a 4-quart saucepan over medium heat. Meanwhile, place 1 wonton wrapper on a cutting board with one corner pointing toward you. Drop 1 1⁄2 tsp. of the crab filling in center of wrapper. With a dab of water, moisten both edges of wonton skin; then pull the corner toward you, folding it over the filling so that it forms a triangle. Gently flatten the edges around the filling with your fingers to expel any air pockets and press to seal. Repeat process with remaining skins and filling. (For a step-by-step guide, Click Here.)
When the oil registers 325° on a deep-fry thermometer, lower small batches of the wontons into the pan and deep-fry until golden, turning after 2–3 minutes so that they brown evenly on both sides. With a wire strainer, transfer to a paper towel–lined plate. Serve with tomato-based chili sauce and Chinese hot mustard.

The post Crab Rangoon appeared first on Saveur.