I first attempted making Sichuan dry-fried green beans 5 years ago while living in Beijing. Night after night I would have these delicious crispy green beans at Sichuan restaurants alongside dishes like mapo tofu and kung pao chicken, and finally decided I needed to try making them on my own. The results of my first [...]
Tag Archives | Sichuan
Mapo Tofu
Many of you loved the easy mapo tofu recipe I first posted in March 2008. Since then, I’ve taught the dish many times in cooking classes, which allowed me to revise it here and streamlined the process. After all these years, it’s still a crowd-pleaser. Make it for one of those nights when you want [...]
Sichuan Eggplant
A few weeks ago I taught a Sichuan cooking class at ICE in Manhattan, and one of the many great recipes we did was a Sichuan eggplant recipe I first posted back in October 2008. And I thought, why not revisit Sichuan eggplant — also known as fish-fragrant eggplant — on this blog too? With an aromatic [...]
Red-Cooked Beef
Red-cooked beef is one of those dishes that is just made for the winter. This Chinese beef stew — made by simmering well-marbled beef in a combination of soy sauce, cinnamon, star anise, tangerine peel, and chilies — is as aromatic and delicious as it sounds. Plus, the bubbling action and warmth in the kitchen while you [...]
Sichuan-Style Chicken Noodle Soup
What a crazy two weeks. Here in the Northeast, many areas are still recovering from Hurricane Sandy. and now we’ve been hit with a Nor’easter. Right now it’s snowing and raining at the same time, which makes me want to just stay inside and make something extra-comforting, like chicken noodle soup. I first experimented with [...]
Vegetarian Dan Dan Noodles
Whenever I eat out at a Sichuan restaurant, one of my favorite dishes to order is dan dan noodles. It’s one of those quintessential Sichuan dishes, a very rustic and simple dish that’s also packed with flavor. Traditionally, the sauce for the noodles is made with ground pork or beef, cooked with a delicious blend [...]
Kung Pao Chicken
The last time I wrote about kung pao chicken was almost four years ago, in July of 2008. I was living in Beijing at the time, and kung pao chicken had been designated the official dish of the 2008 Summer Olympics. It was easy to prepare, more filling than a Clif Bar, and sports venues [...]
Braised Chicken with Chestnuts
For the past few days, ever since daylight savings, I’ve been thinking about winters back in Massachusetts. When I was younger, around this time of year, the old Jordan Marsh department store in Boston (now a Macy’s) would set up the “Enchanted Village”, an almost-over-the-top holiday wonderland that took up a whole floor of the [...]
