Two-Sides-Brown: Pan-Fried Noodle Pancake

This recipe is not often found on the typical American Chinese restaurants, and that is a shame, because it is a delicious dish, filled with textural and flavor contrasts. I used to eat it at the Chinese restaurant where I worked, and I loved watching the chefs cook the pancakes; they used a large wok […]

Noodle Shop Secret for Springy Noodles: Pre-Steaming

If you have ever eaten good wheat-based soup noodles or pan-fried noodles at a Chinese restaurant or noodle shop, one thing that you cannot help but notice is the texture of them. In soup, they are always springy, flavorful and firm, never mushy or overcooked, and when they are pan fried, they are toothsome on […]

Homemade Hunan Salted Chilies

Back when Fuchsia Dunlop’s Hunan cookbook, Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook came out, I wanted to make a jar of salted chilies as per her directions so that I could use them to get an authentic Hunanese flavor in my recipes. This condiment, which is easily made at home (a good thing, because it isn’t available in […]

Chinese Wheat Noodles 101

Italy and China have been metaphorically duking it out over which country is the birthplace to the ubiquitous noodle. Archaeologists can confidently say that noodles as a foodstuff originated in China; recently a noodle excavated inside an overturned pot near the Yellow River was carbon-dated to approximately 4,000 years ago. That is an old noodle, […]

An Introduction To Chinese Noodles

There is nothing more delicious, comforting, appetizing and filling than a bowl of well-prepared noodles, whether one is dining in the East or the West. Noodles are a favorite food among people of all ages, and nearly every culture where grain is consumed has created some sort of noodle to beguile the senses and fill […]