I've always loved spicy food, but lately I've had a positive craving for it.

Combined with a recent trip to the giant Kam Man food market in Quincy, it was clearly time to break out Fuchsia Dunlop's Land of Plenty and cook up some Sichuan food. If you like Sichuan food and you don't own this book, buy it. Now. Because the recipes are delicious, the pictures good enough to eat, and it contains s a wealth of info on cooking techniques, ingredients, and the culture of Sichuan.

As I mentioned in the Sichuan-style chicken and noodles entry that I wrote back in May, there are two very good Sichuan restaurants in the Boston suburbs, and each of them does several things superlatively. So for this batch of home cooked Sichuan, I was going to try two of the dishes that Sichuan Gourmet, in Billerica does really well--Dan Dan Noodles and Ma Po Tofu.

Now,nobody does these two dishes better than Sichuan Gourmet, but Dunlop's version is pretty darn close. One note though--homemade Chinese style stock really makes the Ma Po Tofu. With commercial stock, it's really easy to oversalt, and you miss the depth of flavor that a great homemade stock provides. But if you really aren't feeling up to stock making, be sure to use low or no salt stock.





Dan Dan Noodles
The recipe is from Fuschia Dunlop's Land of Plenty, New York, W.W. Norton & Company, 2001.

For the sauce:

1 tbsp lard or peanut oil
4 tbsp Tianjin preserved vegetable or ya cai, minced

Heat the oil in a wok and stirfry the preserved vegetable unitl fragrant. Put into a small bowl with the rest of the sauce ingredients:

2-3 tbsp chili oil (to taste)
1 1/2 tbsp light soy
1/2 tbsp dark soy
1 1/2 tsp Chinkiang vinegar
1 - 1 1/2 tsp ground toasted sichuan pepper (or to taste)
The green parts of 3 scallions, sliced thin

Mix the sauce together and set aside.

For the meat:

1 tbsp oil
4 oz minced pork
1 tsp Shaoxing wine or dry sherry
2 tsp light soy
salt to taste

Heat up the wok and add another tablespoon of oil. Stir fry the meat, seasoning with the wine, soy, and salt, until it is cooked through. Set aside.

For the noodles:

12 oz fresh Chinese noodles

Cook the noodles according to package directions, then drain them well.

To serve:

1-2 tsp ground toasted Sichuan Pepper

Place a few spoons full of the sauce and meat at the bottom of a bowl. Top with the noodles, then sprinlke with some of the Sichuan pepper. Your guests stir to coat the noodles with the sauce and evenly distribute the meat.

If you want to try some other recipes from Dunlop's book (including the Ma Po Tofu pictured at the top of this entry), see the page on the English version of Land of Plenty, Sichuan Cookery. Penguin, the UK publisher, provides a short interview and four recipes from the book.