- [June] If you're interested
in cooking more Chinese food or just adding more Chinese
flavors into your cooking but you don't know where
to start, you're in luck. Today, I'm gonna be showing you some of my favorite
Chinese pantry staples. Everything from spices to condiments to ingredients and
toppings and even snacks. I'm gonna show you what they look like, we're gonna taste them a little bit, and then we're gonna cook with them. This is all to say that
if you're intimidated, please don't be, just treat them like you
would treat any other spices, condiments, ingredients,
toppings, and snacks. They are food. You can put them literally anywhere. The most important thing obviously is to figure out what they taste like so that you know what you
would want to use them in. So that's exactly where we're gonna do. First up, we got the spices. Just the disclaimer, these
are only my favorites and my various common go-to's. There are way too many spices in the entire Chinese cuisine, which is very varied and diverse for me to cover them all today and most of which I don't
even know yet, guys, so baby steps, make it
digestible for yourself. Take it easy, it's just food. For our first spice, Sichuan peppercorns. There's the green ones and
there are the red ones. Same plant, just picked at
different stages of ripeness. The green ones I love
especially because they're nice, citrusy, floral and fresh tasting, almost a little bit acidic, but not quite. Very flavorful as are the red ones, but these just make them pop. The red Sichuan peppercorns are a little bit more cloaked in flavor. They're not as forward and they're a little bit
like mysterious grandma. They're slightly more smokey
and a little bit warming kind of like all spice and cloves. Sichuan peppercorns are
featured prominently in Southern cuisine, especially in the province of Sichuan. Their place of origin, however, does not limit where they can go into. You can find these spices used prominently in my Sichuan flavored fish
fragrant eggplant recipe or in Taiwanese popcorn chicken. And you can also just basically use them as black pepper substitutes or just to pump up that
mysterious intrigue in any other dishes. Anything from vegetable
stir fry or fried eggs, just put them on, a little bit of spike. Sichuan peppercorns are featured
prominently in Mala cuisine which is numbing spice. So these not only have flavor, they also have a very tingly sensation that affects your tongue,
lips and just make it feel like a 3D into 4D eating experience. Go beyond your current dimensions. I would not recommend ever
chewing on one of these whole. It will basically paralyze your mouth for a very short period of time, which if you're after that
sensation, you go for it, girl. Toast them over medium heat until they just barely start to smoke and you can smell that
nice toasty fragrance start to come off of the pan. Let it cool and then smash it. If you've got some time, I highly recommend you sort through them. Take out the twigs, take
out the little black seeds. Those are very crunchy, not very tasty. The outer hole is delicious and fragrant. The inner one, not so much. Shiny little black kernels in the middle have quite a nice smoky
dirt-like taste to them, but if you you want that pure Sichuan peppercorn
floralness, discard. I like to put it in a little jar, put a little bit of salt,
but a little of MSG, we'll get to that later, and just smash it until
it's a nice ground powder. Nice and nutty, plus a
little bit of floral. Very savory smelling and delicious on anything you want to
season your food with. Next up, white pepper. Did you know that white
pepper is the same plant as black pepper and green
pepper, but not the same plant as Sichuan peppercorns. Black pepper is the cooked
but unripe dried fruit of the plant. White pepper on the other
hand is the ripe fruit seeds of the plant. Wild black pepper is a little bit toasty and spicy and very, very fragrant. White pepper is a little
bit hard to pinpoint, but it has a slightly more floral and also musty smell to it. I love to use it in soups and stir fries along with Sichuan peppercorn
sometimes, but it's great for wicking away that gaminess in meats, which is why I feature it prominently in some braised pork belly
or some roasted duck. It also goes fantastically well in that Taiwanese popcorn chicken as well as crispy pan noodles. Next up, five spice powder. You might've heard of this guy before. Now depending on which brand major five spice powder spice mix, there might be a different formula. Every house, every family
has a slightly different mix. So it's not a set amount of spices nor is it a set bracket of spices. Different spices and
different number of spices can all be five spice powder. This particular variation
has cinnamon, fennel seed, star anise, ginger and cloves. I like to mix five spice powder
with a little bit of salt as a dipping salt, but you can
put it in whatever you want. I hope you're seeing a common theme here, which is these are spices
and they can go anywhere. Five spice also goes great in meat dishes, Taiwanese popcorn chicken yet again, and that pork belly braise, try it. Last but not least on this very small list
of mine today, MSG. Now if those three little
make you very scared for no good reason, you should know that I've already made a video
and written a whole thing about MSG and why you need
to give it a second chance. It looks like little salt granules and it really can function just like salt. Monosodium glutamate is another sodium just like NaCL AKA table salt which is sodium chloride. Growing up, my mom and grandma actually didn't use very much MSG. However, MSG can be found all over the little tiny noodle stalls and street vendor foods and delicious street
snacks all over China, all over Southeast Asia. And maybe it's time for the U.S to hop on this train of delicious MSG. You'll find it in a lot of bagged snacks, you'll find it in a lot of fast food and it's there for a reason because it tastes wonderful. On any given week night, if I feel like I'm lacking
a little bit of vegetables in my diet, I'll put some
oil in my cast iron skillet over medium high heat, and
I'll toast up some garlic, ginger, onions, cabbage,
carrots, what have you, and I'll stir fry it up with
all of these delicious spices. A little bit of Sichuan peppercorn, a little bit of white pepper, a little bit of salt,
maybe a little bit of MSG and even a pinch of five spice if I feel like I want it there today and today, I do. No real set amounts, just a
pinch here, a pinch there, taste it as you go, fix it as you'd like, everyone's taste is a little bit different and that's perfectly perfect. It's nice, it's simple. It's got a little bit of char
and a little bit of seasoning and it really makes that vegetable shine plus super fast, guys, super fast. All right then, are we ready to level up? Condiments, here we come. If you've had any sort of Asian or Asian fusion food before,
you've probably had soy sauce. Soy sauce has a lot of
naturally occurring MSG and it is, needless to say, delicious. It also adds a fantastic
dark caramel color to a lot of your foods, which might just be the
most appetizing thing for your eyes to look at
before your mouth digs in. The stuff that you might be
more commonly used to seeing is pretty light. As you can see, it's basically just like
dark Coke that's flat. The aged darker, thicker soy sauce though, that's a different one. It smells smokier, almost a
little bit like barbecue sauce. There's hints of fire and burning rubber but in a delectable way. You can see right away that it has a much more viscous texture. It's thicker at least trail on your bowl and it is basically like
a more syrupy version of your normal soy sauce. You have the salty, now you
must have the acidity, vinegar. Chinese black vinegar is
a go-to in my household. It is delicious in dumpling dipping sauces among many, many other uses. This is the vinegar that I grew up with living with my mom and my grandparents. Like most vinegars, it punches
you right through your nose and shoots into your
eyeballs when you sniff it, but there's a very nice aged
quality to this one too. I've heard Chinese black vinegar compared to balsamic vinegar but it is not nearly as
sweet as balsamic can be. If I had to describe this
taste, I would say it's a baby between balsamic, Apple
cider and rice wine vinegar. Rice wine vinegar is more
popular in Japanese cuisine than it is in Chinese cuisine,
but I love it nonetheless. It's got a fresher, frutier,
brighter character to it than the black vinegar and they actually work
fantastically well together. The next guests are the brown sauces. We got hoisin sauce and
we got oyster sauce. Both of these sauces are very popular in Southern Chinese cuisine
like Cantonese cuisine. They have a very sweet
and salty vibe going on. Hoisin is a little bit sweeter than oyster and oyster is
a lot saltier than hoisin. Oyster sauce has actual
oyster extracts in there and hoisin sauce, which literally means (speaking foreign language) which literally means seafood sauce actually has no seafood in there. This one is vegan, the sweet
and umami punch of these, you might be very familiar with because they're very well versed in Chinese-American cuisine. So that take out, that broccoli and beef probably has one or both of these in it. As you can see, this
bottle is mostly empty and that's because I like to use it in a lot of stir fry to give
it that sweet and salty vibe. It makes my general tso's chickpeas taste fantastically savory and if you want that
recipe, we'll link it below. All the other recipes that I mentioned will also be linked below as well. My last condiment must
have is toasted Sesame oil. Delicious, nutty, fragrant,
and absolutely divine as a finishing oil. Do not cook with this oil if you're gonna be doing
it over a long time over high heat. Because it's already toasted,
its smoke point is very low meaning if you toast it too much more, you will burn it and
your food will be bitter. A lot of people have
questions about Shaoxing wine. So in my experience, and I can't speak for all
Chinese people here obviously, I don't actually like to use Shaoxing wine in my cooking. This particular brand is
also not a very good brand of Shaoxing wine, but it is
also the most available one that I see around me in my supermarkets. If you can get your hands on
better quality Shaoxing wine, you might have a better
experience with it. But to me, this flavor
tastes a little bit accurate and a little bit bitter,
and it's just not worth it. Not gonna discourage you
from trying it of course, but if you can't get your hands on it, you can substitute some
cherry wine for cooking or you can just do what I do and substitute in some rice wine vinegar. As with all things, it's
dependent on personal taste, it's just not hitting it for
me, but it might for you. It's often used to marinate meats and other vegetables to
take out a little bit of the gaminess as well as
add some depth of flavor. Aaron actually really likes
to put a splash of this into his bone broths to lift that bony deliciously rich flavor up a little bit to a higher heavenly level. All right, are we ready
to see these in play? I think so. We love rice, but we also love noodles and as a noodle household, these condiments come in so handy when you want to make
some stir fried noods. You can use any kind of noodles, you can even use pasta if you want. I love to use some wheat noodles. These are fresh wheat noodles. They're gonna be perfect for the job. I like to boil my noodles
until just al dente, lift them out and then set them aside. Then in my cast iron skillet, I go in with a little bit of
oil, garlic, what have you, and then I pop in a
little bit of fish balls. What are fish balls you ask, fish balls. Now these are actually Korean fish balls, which I love because they
come in these multi-packs with different varieties of fish balls. Some of them are fried, some
of them have wonky shapes. Some of them have herbs embedded in them, and they're all delicious. Fish balls are basically fish paste cut together with some starch and spices including MSG most of the
time and they are delectable. You can often find them
in the freezer aisle or in the refrigerated
aisle next to eggs and tofu. If you want your fish
balls to be a little bit more bite sized, cut them
in half or even in quarters. That way you open up more surface area for that flavor to soak into them. They're spongy, they're
great at absorbing flavors and if you're tired of
tofu and you're pescatarian but you also want to
eat just less land meat, these are perfect. At this point, I go in with my condiments: Hoisin, oyster, soy sauce,
vinegars, whatever you want. And if you have leftover
veggies, pop those in too. (upbeat music) Keep stirring, wait for the fish balls to turn a little bit golden and then pour your noodles into that pan and wait for everything to coat. Taste and season accordingly after that. (upbeat music continues) You can see that the soy
sauce added amazing color. Since we got our noodles,
we need some toppings to upgrade us. Chili crisp, chili oil,
our hot chili sauce is a must have in our pantry especially if you're a spice lover. Lao Gan Ma is a very traditional brand that came out of mainland China. It's red, it's fiery, it's
toasty, but it's not too spicy. And if you get this one, it has toasted little cubes of tofu as well as peanuts and chili. And would you look at
that, there's MSG in there. Gorgeous color will make
your food look fantastic in addition to making
your food taste fantastic. You ready, oh yeah. There you go, mix it up. Each noodle is now coated
in fatty spicy righteousness and then you just get a little good bite. - [Aaron] I'll just be eating behind you. You thought I was joking? - [June] That's so good. I think it's time for my
favorite portion of this episode. In order to jazz up your meals like we just did with the chili oil, you can have a variety of
other things to have on hand to put into every single little dish. My favorites, century eggs,
salted duck eggs, pork floss, and some zha cai AKA pickled veggies. Century eggs or thousand-year
eggs are also a misnomer. In Chinese, they are called pidan and it roughly translates into
rubber eggs or leather eggs. And that's because when they are cured in this ash clay mixture, the outside of the eggs start to turn into this very rubbery consistency. They also change color, turn translucent, and the yolk becomes super
creamy and sulfuric in taste. They often only take a
few months to preserve and ferment like this and cure into this very acquired taste, but if you do acquire this
taste, man is it good. I highly recommend that
after you peel these, you rinse them. Salted duck eggs are also preserved, but they're less scary looking. They are basically duck eggs
that have been preserved in a lot of salt and curing agents to turn into this spread of sorts. Although both century
eggs and salted duck eggs are made from duck eggs, you can see that this
one does not go through the same curing process
because it is still white and yellow yoked on the inside. Unlike century eggs, salted
duck eggs are extremely salty almost like a pickle so I wouldn't recommend
eating these on their own, but you certainly can
eat these on their own. The yolks on these are so rich and creamy that they taste a little
bit like brie to me. You often find these two egg
products put on top of congee as a little bit of a flavor
and texture supplement. To make congee, it's super
simple, it's a breakfast staple, rice, water, boil it. Keep adding water if you need to until the whole mixture
turns creamy and thick. Put it into a bowl, top
with your toppings, voila. Other common congee
toppings include pork floss and zha cai which are pickled veggies and you can have mustard
tubers or radishes or very many different kinds of pickles and they're all very salty. Some are spicy, some are
sweet, all delicious. I think when it comes to
pickles, pretty self-explanatory. You have some sort of
vegetables chopped up, preserved in sugar,
salt, and what have you. And they're delicious of condiments, but I know you're wondering: June, what exactly is pork floss? That, my friends, is pork floss. I can best describe it as pork that's been seasoned
with sugar, salt, MSG, and other spices, then
dehydrated and pulled into little tiny strands that basically become very
flaky, flaky little hairs. This is very dangerous
for me to have on hand but I love to have it on hand
when I want to treat myself, it goes on absolutely everything. If you like beef jerky, I
think you're gonna like this. Imagine you took beef
jerky and then shredded it so that you could use it as a
seasoning instead of a snack. The century eggs have this
very fascinating texture where the whites that
have turned translucent is kind of bouncy, but the center is super
creamy and butter-like. The salted duck egg
can go on congee, rice, it can go into your toast. Basically, anything that you want to smear some really salty eggy rich
goodness, you can do that. It pairs super well with the
pork floss and the congee and all the pickles just
lends such a nice crunch to that very mushy creamy
texture of the congee itself. Alternatively, you can also
whip up a very quick vinegarette of sort and pour it over your century eggs for a very fast delicious rich egg salad. In a small bowl, combine together a little bit of black
vinegar, toasted Sesame oil, some soy sauce, a little
bit of your chili crisp, maybe a little MSG for the
extra pump, and then go in with a grated garlic clove. Whisk it all together, put it
over your cut century eggs, dazzle them with a little
bit of Sesame seeds or scallions and voila,
that's it, easy peasy. I think it's undeniable that
century eggs are delicious. It's just whether or not
you're up to the challenge of loving it. If I don't have time and I
want to whip up a quick meal, one thing that I really like to do is crack a couple of eggs, stir them together until
they're nice and mixed, pour them into a oiled skillet
and then make an omelet with all of these little
toppings tucked inside. Roll it up, slice it
into cute little bites. (jazz music) Eat it, be merry. That's a little bit spicy,
a little bit savory, and a little bit meaty. For me personally, a day is not a good day until
you've had some dank snacks. If you're making a trip to your Chinese or Asian grocery store and you
happen to see these snacks, please grab them, give them a try. First up, Want Want rice crackers. These are delicious, coated
in MSG and savory spices. Very savory, but also very
gentle and very addictive. Second up, any packaged peanuts. The spices on these, unbelievable. Third and finally, pineapple cakes. If you like short breads and
you love jammy fruity things, you're gonna love these. They're basically very
buttery short breads that are enveloping a jammy
sticky, gooey fruity center. It's hard to pick a
flavor out of all of these but I think this one might be it. Thank you guys so much
for joining me today. I hope you enjoyed learning what my favorite Chinese condiments are. I hope you try out some
of these ingredients and I hope you try out
some of these snacks. I hope you let me know, did you like them? Be sure to let us know down below which of your favorites I missed out on and let us know which ones
I should try next time I go to my store. Thank you so much for tuning
in, I'll see you next time.
