# Chinese Food



## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

While we are talking about it in the Japanese thread, fav Chinese?


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

I know Dim Sum is primarily Cantonese, but there is a lot of other Cantonese food that's not Dim Sum, and you tend to see dedicated Dim Sum restaurants, at least here in the US

Probably like Hunanese the best - good use of spices, not as over the top as some Sichuan (but love mala as well)


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

My town has no authentic Chinese restaurants. It's just the American-ized greasy buffet slop, so I don't eat there. My preference is for the better quality Vietnamese restaurant. I like their rice noodle dishes and won ton soup which is a hundred times better than that awful yellow crap they give you at Chinese take outs.


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## Art Rock (Nov 28, 2009)

I have visited China over a dozen times over the past 22 years - I have found no Chinese food in the Western countries even close in quality to what you get in China itself. My favourite cuisine is Shanghainese, which is not too spicy, not too bland.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

starthrower said:


> My town has no authentic Chinese restaurants. It's just the American-ized greasy buffet slop


Should have added American Buffet Chinese, which is a whole other netherworld of crap

But its easy to be snobbish about American Chinese food, but it can be done well and is one of these great American immigrant stories, dating back to 19th century Cantonese who came over

Dont think you can even find Chop Suey anywhere these days. Remember my (anglo) midwestern mother making it from a supermarket kit growing up in the 70s and 80s








https://www.historytoday.com/archive/historians-cookbook/history-chop-suey


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

I like Hakka the most I think. There is a Hakka restaurant near my home. My dad would serve the 'North American Chinese Food' in his restaurant before (ie. the chicken balls, chop suey and stuff). I've heard him refer it to other Chinese people as 'duping the White Man' in Chinese.


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

We did have a great Chinese restaurant less than a mile from my house but they closed up about 15 years ago. I don't know about snobbish but it seems like most people go for the low quality fast food instead eating a good meal. Thankfully we have a new middle eastern place across town and their food is really good.


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

I like it all. We live in a rural area, almost two hours from Nashville, Tennessee which the closest thing to a city. But amazingly enough there is a decent Chinese take-out about 20 minutes from out front door. Whenever my wife goes to Walmart (which she is doing this afternoon) she'll stop and pick up our regular order:

Large Hot & Sour Soup
Green Beans or Broccoli in Garlic Sauce
Veggie Spring Rolls or Fried Rice

If I want to splurge I ask her to also get some Shrimp Lo Mein.

She's coming back with this stuff in about an hour.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Huh, as a Chinese myself I think I know what authentic Chinese food is like. I would like to say more than 90% of the Chinese food you can have in America or even more are not authentic or does not represent Chinese cuisine comprehensively, because those food are American-ized and those aren't are mainly Cantonese Cuisine which is so distinct with other parts of China, such as where I am from. When I browse through this post, I was absolutely confused by what chicken ball, Chop Suey and Shrimp Lo Mein are. According to the pronunciation of Chop Suey, I firstly thought it meant boiling water... Also, "orange chicken" is what I always use to mock on my Chinese American classmates, because they love that thing. According to many of them, the orange chicken signifies the cultural fusion between Chinese and American cultures, but to be honest this crap is 100% American and if you feed a Chinese with orange chicken I guarantee you will make him nauseous.

I had been to many places in China, including Guangdong, which was antiquelly called Canton, and I do not find any correlation between the Chinese food I ate in America with any of those native Chinese dishes. Also, Cantonese food is quite different with Northern Chinese food. In my hometown Dim Sum look like these:







And this is what I eat since when I was a child. But Cantonese Dim Sums are really different. I can't tell whether those Cantonese cuisine are native, because I am not from there. But some of my classmates from that place said no. Anyway, I always keep away from American Chinese food because they are so bad that I don't want them to change my opinions on Chinese food, which is definitely splendid and much more delicate than western food.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Let me also talk about my view on American cuisines.:lol: I am not a fan of American food at all. I have no reason to hate them, but comparatively, they are much worse than what I can get in China. I am trying to be objective here. What you eat in America is way more simple than Chinese food--I can never understand why Western countries are so abundant in food but their lunch could be as simple as a sandwich, basically two slices of bread with some meat and vegetable in it. The basic nutritional requirements for Chinese primary schoolers include three or four meals with rice, and, sometimes, a soup. Once I travelld to Las Vegas (imagine what kind of place it is) and what I got for my lunch was a box of vegetable with a few slices of turkey and a small bottle of sauce. Those vegetable are so bitter than they taste like grass to me. The turkey tasted, though I never had a chance to, like wood. That lunch box was offered by a very good hotel, but I had that meal like I was a horse eating grass. 

Although Western food isn't perfect, I do not complain too much about them. Westerners enjoy them, so at least they are not that bad. I have adopted what is routinely served in school cafeteria, but many Asian (including Japan, Korean and Singaporean) classmates had to order deliveries to sustain their metabolisms... 

Something else I've also noticed that seemed to be weird for me is that Westerners don't drink warm water, even in winter. Once, one of my mother's friend who married to an American fed their children with warm water, and her American husband believed this to be child maltreatment and wanted to report his wife to police... ?!?!?! :lol:


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## starthrower (Dec 11, 2010)

I drink warm water but only in coffee and tea.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

That is the point. Chinese people drink warm water no matter in what case.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

KevinW said:


> Huh, as a Chinese myself I think I know what authentic Chinese food is like. I would like to say more than 90% of the Chinese food you can have in America or even more are not authentic or does not represent Chinese cuisine comprehensively, because those food are American-ized and those aren't are mainly Cantonese Cuisine which is so distinct with other parts of China, such as where I am from.


Not authentic? I will have you know the place by me serves an authentic chicken dish invented by a very famous Chinese general named Tso

seriously, in major cities with a large enough Chinese population you can get real, non-Americanized dishes (going here on what Chinese who have come over from the mainland say, as I have not been to China). Most of it is Sichuan and Hunanese as I think its easier to transport. No orange chicken here


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

KevinW said:


> That is the point. Chinese people drink warm water no matter in what case.


Yes, but they don't have access to Wikipedia.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Bwv 1080 said:


> Not authentic? I will have you know the place by me serves an authentic chicken dish invented by a very famous Chinese general named Tso
> 
> seriously, in major cities with a large enough Chinese population you can get real, non-Americanized dishes (going here on what Chinese who have come over from the mainland say, as I have not been to China). Most of it is Sichuan and Hunanese as I think its easier to transport. No orange chicken here


:lol:General Tso's chicken is 100% fake. But it is ok as long as Americans enjoy it, because for Americans, what tastes the best is the best.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

KevinW said:


> That is the point. Chinese people drink warm water no matter in what case.


Aside from during winter in Northern parts of the country, would they have had any choice prior to the past 10-15 years?


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## SanAntone (May 10, 2020)

Next you'll tell me Pad Thai is American ....


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

I think people all drink warm water except for very hot summer. Personally, I get sick for drinking cold water.


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## Phil loves classical (Feb 8, 2017)

KevinW said:


> That is the point. Chinese people drink warm water no matter in what case.


My sister ordered milk when we went to China. The servers seemed confused, as everyone normally drinks tea. Eventually they brought her some warmed milk, since they couldn't imagine anyone drinking it cold.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

I would say good things about chinese food is only when they are cheap, healthy, tasty, ethical, this is why I choosed Dim Sum, easy to make, no much luxurious materials, acessible, that is kind of food culture for me. The simplicity elaborates the best parts of nature. There are other kinds of such tasty simplicity in many countries as well like： italian spegatti, japanese toriyaki, yakisoba. When people think chinese food is second class, that is when I praise it over the others，the accessibility means a lot in food culture. 

In private my own cooking is also distilled from other ways of chinese cookings: I add very few soysauce, never coloring the food`s natural colors into darker shades; use some spices like black pepper powder, anise powder, but no curry, coloring the food is always my taboo; my dishes are always naturally colored, never to be darkened by any sauce, spices, whenever I use spices, always limit to the amount that would not color up the dish`s natural colors(including the soup). Within my directory, chinese food is simple to prepare, healthy, ethical, of course, the seasoning with oil and salt are also well balanced and healthy.

Now you can imagine my version, truly, not as delicious as the mainstream chinese food, but healthy and simple.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

This guy is a god, have made this recipe a few times now
Although I use boneless, skinless thighs which are easy to get in US supermarkets
And no way do I have any real wok skills, but use a cast iron wok on a decent gas stove





Also Chinese chef knives are the best


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Phil loves classical said:


> My sister ordered milk when we went to China. The servers seemed confused, as everyone normally drinks tea. Eventually they brought her some warmed milk, since they couldn't imagine anyone drinking it cold.


Do you know that un-sterilized milk can cause deadly Crohn`s disease, there are many young sufferers of this diseases recently, the main reason is drinking unsanitary milk which is not even cooked well. Boil all milk before drinking, anywhere you are. There is a kind of bacterium called Mycobacterium avium subspecies paratuberculosis (MAP) that is considered to cause Crohn`s disease, but they can be effectively killed if the milk is cooked in 100 celsus.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Phil loves classical said:


> My sister ordered milk when we went to China. The servers seemed confused, as everyone normally drinks tea. Eventually they brought her some warmed milk, since they couldn't imagine anyone drinking it cold.


Haha yeah almost no drink served in Chinese restaurants in China is cold. Cold drinks cause people sick in China. Also, no doubt the waitor felt weird when you ordered milk, because that is just not a drink for a dinner.

Also, it seems like you have some correlations with China. I am just curious--can you talk about it a little bit if you don't mind?


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Bwv 1080 said:


> This guy is a god, have made this recipe a few times now
> Although I use boneless, skinless thighs which are easy to get in US supermarkets
> And no way do I have any real wok skills, but use a cast iron wok on a decent gas stove
> 
> ...


Hahaha! I had an interesting family story with 菜刀(Chef Knife). Once my grandmother accidentally locked her brother in the kitchen. At last he ended up using the Chef Knife to chop out a hole on the door of the kitchen and got out of it! :lol:


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

> Chef Knife)


Weird name for chinese chef knife, I would call it as chopper knife, that kind of knife was designed for chopping hard bones of pork and other kinds of meat.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Ariasexta said:


> Weird name for chinese chef knife, I would call it as chopper knife, that kind of knife was designed for chopping hard bones of pork and other kinds of meat.


We use that for vegetables as well. Chef knife in Chinese is literally Vegetable Knife in contrast to "meat knife".


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

KevinW said:


> We use that for vegetables as well. Chef knife in Chinese is literally Vegetable Knife in contrast to "meat knife".


Chinese character "菜" actually means dishes that serve beside rice, in chinese concept of meal, for chinese people rice is the main food, like western bread and the meats and vegetables are considered as enrichment servings. So we have a concept of "主食"/main food, literally, it mainly refers to the rice as the main role of the whole meal. The character "菜" therefore mainly refers to any kind of dish that is served beside the rice. Many chinese words and characters do not have strict definitions they seem to do.


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## KevinW (Nov 21, 2021)

Lol I do know that 菜 means dishes but you can't literally put dishes and knife together saying "dishes knife". That kinda doesn't make sense.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

KevinW said:


> Lol I do know that 菜 means dishes but you can't literally put dishes and knife together saying "dishes knife". That kinda doesn't make sense.


Chinese language does not share the same logical system of the west, but, you are right, "菜刀" could mean wrong, but take it in the sense of "dishware", it just works like that.


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## Kiki (Aug 15, 2018)

Took this video back in 2010.
"Drunken shrimps", a crowd-pleasing Cantonese show dish.
Put the shrimps in a high alcohol % spirit for some time to get them drunk.
Then light up the spirit and stir fry!
Do the same for shredded chilli peppers.
Mix them up.
Voilà!


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

We don't have any authentic Chinese cuisine outlets around here - for the Real McCoy I'd probably have to go to Birmingham (erm...no thanks...), unless there is a good place in Worcester which I don't know about. I suspect most standard 'Chinese' restaurants and takeaways sell little more than Hong Kong's version of junk food - I occasionally indulge but right now just thinking of the excessive MSG and/or sugar levels is making my throat dry.


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## Kiki (Aug 15, 2018)

The question "Where is the cheese?" reminded me of this - there is a dish in Cantonese cuisine called "deep fried milk". Since there is "deep fried Mars bar", why not milk, right? Furthermore, I remember eating "deep fried ice cream" when I was a kid as well! Yum!


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

How MSG Got A Bad Rap: Flawed Science And Xenophobia

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-msg-got-a-bad-rap-flawed-science-and-xenophobia/


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## elgar's ghost (Aug 8, 2010)

Bwv 1080 said:


> How MSG Got A Bad Rap: Flawed Science And Xenophobia
> 
> https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-msg-got-a-bad-rap-flawed-science-and-xenophobia/


Interesting article. Perhaps I should have just said salt in my original post, then - if salt is still to blame. Strange, but if I have curry, chili or anything else 'exotic' I never get that eventual dryness in the throat like I do with Chinese food.


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## Flamme (Dec 30, 2012)

I didnt go to chinese restaurant for a decade but I still have an excellent taste in my mouth of honey sauce pineapple chicken and other stuff from that night.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

elgars ghost said:


> Interesting article. Perhaps I should have just said salt in my original post, then - if salt is still to blame. Strange, but if I have curry, chili or anything else 'exotic' I never get that eventual dryness in the throat like I do with Chinese food.


Chinese food culture needs to be modernized yet, most chinese foods in common families and restaurants still maintain the recklessness in pursue of tastes at the cost of health. For example, ordinary chinese soysauce are *heavily *salted but due to the effect of the amino acids, people can not feel the real saltiness. Most chinese restaurants adds excessive soysauce in order to color up also rise some aromas, but it is very unhealthy. But we have some brands that offer soysauce with cut salt content, I have been using this kind of soysauce for 10 years already. Therefore, if anyone use chinese soysauce, be careful not to use too much, just not to visibly coloring up will be the ideal amount to a single dish. Also, new type of soysauce with cut salt content is recommended.

Also most chinese people still use 味精/monosodium glutamate and aroma added monosodium glutamate called "鸡精" to accentuate the tastes, however, these agents are also a kind of processed salt, long term ingestion of these additions aggravate the healthy problems caused by the excess of ordinary salt already. To say it blatantly, ordinary chinese restaurants probably will not be quite healthy due to the reckless ways of rising the aromas and tastes with too much salt of various types. Home usage of any kind of monosodium glutamate is also NOT recommended, my home never use them.

Most cut salt soysauce will tell clear on their tags or labels, like "30% less salt"(my own bottle) or "less salt" like this: The below is a japanese maker, japanese soysauce is a bit different in taste than chinese ones, but as long as you can find the cut salt product, any country will be OK. The percentage down I only have seen 30% so far, not sure if there is 50% or others, not sure what are the percentages of the most "less salt" products.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Bwv 1080 said:


> How MSG Got A Bad Rap: Flawed Science And Xenophobia
> 
> https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-msg-got-a-bad-rap-flawed-science-and-xenophobia/


I replied to Elgar ghost before reading your link, this article made me angry, I have seen with my own eyes in a Shanghai noodle restaurant, they put 1kg MSG into 50 litre of soup. But then I still ate there, that was 15 years ago I did not know about the harm of MSG then.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Whats up with all these "affirmative" hypocrisy toward asian cultures? MSG to be harmful to be racist, and then calling faults of asian people as exotiqueness.

Some recommendations as to how to make yourself healthy chinese food:

To avoid:

1-There are various types of soysauces on the market, do not use "老抽" sauce, which is used for coloring but it is just a ordinary soysauce added with more caramel even more salt, extremely bad for health.

2-Avoid *all 蚝油/oyster sauces* on the market, oyster sauce was a luxury chinese ingredients(I do not know about other countries similar sauces), genuine oyster sauce is about 500-1000USD per 500 gram, therefore all market bottle oyster sauce products are *all fake *prepared with sugar, caramel, much salt, MSG, all many other industrial additions. Many rumors in china say it can be carcinogenic.

3-Avoid MSG, you do not need it to cook any food, MSG is an insult to asian food itself, there is no point in defending, as if without MSG asian food is flavorless. MSG now is also represented or repackaged into many other exotique asian sauces and condiments as well, like "鸡精"/chicken flavored MSG, fish sauce, almost all kinds of soysauces(including the cut salts)and many other asian hot sauces. You will always need to watch out and not to add too much of them while using multiple asian products. Sometimes, when you put in some soysauce and then other kinds of asian sauces, you are already adding in multiple times of MSG. For example, adding in fish sauce and soysauce, you already adding 2 potions of MSG. Ugly fact: asian cuisine is too reliant on MSG like people reliant on a corrupt authority. MSG is a curse to the chinese cuisine.

4-Avoid fish sauce, I have noticed some western people started to use this for asian food, also just a rebranding of MSG product. To me, this type pf sauce is essentially unnecessary.

5-Other brand exotique chinese mixed sauces most are heavily MSG-ed, you can use it but not to put it into a dish too much. Especially when using multiple asian sauces, you will need to control the amount of each sauce into the dish.

Recommended chinese ingredients:

1-The 5 spices, the most traditional chinese assortment of spices, good for roasting, and all kinds of pork, beef, mutton, chicken cookings.

2-Use cut salt soysauce products, just not over-coloring the food with it.

3-Rice wine, very good addition to cook some meat always.

4-Rice vinegar, giving you some definitive asian tastes, the best of the rice vinegar has some milky pale whiteness, it is hard to find even china recently, not sure about it in the west.

5-Sesame oil, good for cooking some soup, or for hotpot moments.

I believe chinese food can be better without than with MSG and other overtly salted sauces and ingredients. Accessibility=/=second or third rate, however, there is no guarantee that expensive chinese food can be more healthy.


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

Ariasexta said:


> I replied to Elgar ghost before reading your link, this article made me angry, I have seen with my own eyes in a Shanghai noodle restaurant, they put 1kg MSG into 50 litre of soup. But then I still ate there, that was 15 years ago I did not know about the harm of MSG then.


MSG is harmless in moderation, but like salt too much of anything is not good

My issue is that it seems the context of Chinese dishes is infrequent eating of meat - so when there is a meat dish it tends to use the richest, fattiest cuts like pork belly. Again, which is fine in moderation but not good to eat American-sized quantities. I have a red braised pork 红烧肉, but will use leaner pork shoulder


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## Bwv 1080 (Dec 31, 2018)

Ariasexta said:


> Whats up with all these "affirmative" hypocrisy toward asian cultures? MSG to be harmful to be racist, and then calling faults of asian people as exotiqueness.
> 
> Some recommendations as to how to make yourself healthy chinese food:
> 
> ...


Dark soy sauce has about 15% more salt than light, but the recipes I have seen only use a teaspoon or two

For essential ingredients, what about the darker Chinkiang vinegar? And then of course garlic, ginger & green onion then chiles and Sichuan peppercorns


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## Sonata (Aug 7, 2010)

None of the above. I’ll take Thai food instead.


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## EdwardBast (Nov 25, 2013)

I cook my own version most days. Four veggies, a little chicken or sea food, rice, hoisin, oyster, chili-garlic, and soy sauces, and various spices are the usual ingredients. Nutritious and a half hour from start to table — which is why I do it.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Bwv 1080 said:


> Dark soy sauce has about 15% more salt than light, but the recipes I have seen only use a teaspoon or two
> 
> For essential ingredients, what about the darker Chinkiang vinegar? And then of course garlic, ginger & green onion then chiles and Sichuan peppercorns


Chinkiang vinegar is good for dumplings or wontons, but for noodles, rice vinegar is the best however, good rice vinegar is very hard to find, at least I can not find it in chinese supermarkets. But it would not hurt to mix available any sort of vinegar with Chinkiang vinegar for multi-purposes. Hand made dumplings will taste better if steam cooked first and put into prepared soup.As for more chinese tastes in homemake environment, just some more shallot, ginger, garlic, coriander and any sort of vege oil, if for Sichuan spicy taste, just some more red chili and anise powder things like that.

A spoonful of 老抽 is absolutely not recommended, unnecessary, its point is just the caramel and more MSG, nothing else. If you have added soysauce already, 老抽 is unnecessary. I always add soysauce to the dish just one minute before ready, not to cook with it for a long time to preserve its flavor. MSG will be definitely over-laced if you cook multiple dishes with asian market sauces, while you will still add some salt too, you really need to watch the level of MSG when cooking with asia products or eating in asian restaurants.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Hoisin sauce? first time to know it, my family is very conservative in terms of cooking, we never have had touched many traditional mainstream chinese sauces except for soysauce. Before knowing the harmfulness of MSG in 2012, we had been avoiding "老抽” as well, we disliked the coloring it gives to the food. Untill recent internet videos of chinese spouses cooking for international families, I did not realize most chinese people cook this way and many foreigners emulate too.

I am ethnic zhuang, what zhuang people cook is normally pork, chickens, duck, beef and mutton are also rarity but not forbidden. Zhuang ethnic cooking is very light compared to the rest of food cultures in China. Many of western people still do not realize that mainstream chinese cooking is still reckless, when modernized, some people will say unauthentic. This is a problem, so, what about paying some more attention to ethnic chinese dishes like tibetan, zhuang, uigur dishes and reinventing chinese food by mingling various cooking ways of ethnic food cultures. 

My way of reinventing the chinese cooking is not groundless after all: to get rid of MSG and its repackagings, set free the true essence of asian food is still a long way to go. I know the western fine dining has thoroughly developed knowledges about the spices, so after all, chinese food could be nothing more than a simplification of all sorts of global food cultures, and it is a great thing too. Humanity still have not really developed a food culture which is as accessible as it is healthy and civilized and universal. There is a good chance, once chinese food modernized, it can serve this purpose. 

The web-speed to TC from my location has slowed down again, been for 2 weeks already, 2 weeks ago it just suddenly sped up for one day and then slowed down again. Usually I have to wait for 5 minute to load the page so I have to post quick to see if the page works and then it is more easier to spell check when posted, "Advanced" posting is a hell to load. A personal problem developed from a sick internet speed.


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## Ariasexta (Jul 3, 2010)

Anyway, once you cook according to my recommendations, and find the taste so so, then, you know it is what I eat everyday and depend on the happiness of living. But no, you still can have some seafood, beef, mutton, partridge to add to the menu, and the tastes will greatly expand exponentially and you will be happy with that way of cooking. Just plate it like a chinese dish and make it look like a chinese meal, and they will taste like Ariasextan chinese food, and then you have reinvented chinese food for me and all other chinese people, I appreciate it.


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## FrankE (Jan 13, 2021)

I'll pass. Not for me.


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