At Home with Chinese Cuisine (3 page)
Read At Home with Chinese Cuisine Online
Authors: T P Hong
Food tasting is about one’s conscious act and ability to appreciate the flavour of the dish. For the Chinese, there is an age-old mnemonic rhyme for what flavour consists of: It consists of the colours, the aroma, the blending of tastes, the sound, the texture, and the presentation of the food. One is expected to consider all these elements in a properly prepared dish.
Similar to wine tasting, a lifetime experience of eating does not guarantee that one knows how to appreciate the flavour of the dish. To build on the basis of the individual’s natural sensory sensitivities – and to a certain extent, genetic coding – that influence his or her sensory preferences, it is also a nurtured enjoyment from learning and experience. There are many different ways to learn to appreciate the flavour of food. Learning how to prepare food properly is a step in the right direction.
Over the years, I have learned from encounters with top chefs in cooking demonstrations. I observed that many top chefs are living proof that one can be an excellent chef without being equipped with much scientific knowledge. Chefs rely on practice and experience to be at the top of their profession. Many of us also learn to appreciate haut cuisine without knowing much about food science. In recent years, science in cooking has given me insights to conceptualise, to explain, and to verify the cooking practices with which I have been familiar. When what I take for granted is subject to scientific scrutiny, the jigsaw puzzle of when, which, where, how, why, and why not comes together. The knowledge gained moves me forward on the learning curve to become a more confident cook.
Scientific analysis relating to flavour is an interdisciplinary collaboration. It involves not only our sensory perceptions from colours, aromas, tastes, texture, sound, and temperature, which belong to the sphere of natural science, but it also touches on the social science subjects of physiology, psychology, cognitive psychology, sociology, anthropology, economics, and more. It is the interaction of all the perceptions, sensory and otherwise, that give us the pleasure of dining. Topics of gastronomy always have a global dimension, and I have relied on many of the findings and observations from research conducted in the West for verification and the substantiation of Chinese culinary practices. During the course of my research, I have been intrigued by their relevance and modernity in the exploration of flavour in the twenty-first century.
For the Chinese, there is an intrinsic association between colours and health (please see detailed discussion in Chapter 6), especially when it comes to the colour of natural ingredients such as fruits and vegetables. The evidence-based nutritional benefits of incorporating fruits and vegetables in our diet have been well established. The vitamins, minerals, and dietary fibres they contain are the main source of nutrition for us. We are being encouraged to not only increase the quantity we eat but also the variety of choice based on their colours, especially in the so-called rainbow diet of eating green, red, orange, yellow, purple, blue, and white.
The pigments and chemical compounds in the natural, plant-based ingredients give them colour; these colour pigments are called phytochemicals. Take broccoli and carrots as examples. Broccoli is coloured by a natural pigment called chlorophyll, and carrots are coloured by carotenoids. Both chemical compounds are examples of photosynthesis pigments that absorb light energy for plant growth. These pigments also contain antioxidant properties.
Substantial research has been conducted during the last few decades in exploring the antioxidant properties of phytochemicals and their health benefits to humans. We now know that antioxidants can protect our cells from damage caused by free radicals. Free radicals are generated from our normal metabolic process and external sources such as the exposure to pollution, industrial chemicals, or smoking; they are atoms or groups of atoms with an odd or unhinged electron. When the electrons become unhinged, these free radicals roam the body in an effort to achieve stability, and in order to do so, they attach themselves to the nearby molecules to obtain another electron, wreaking havoc and causing cellular damage in the process. Antioxidants can give electrons to free radicals and neutralise them. When we have a diet rich in a wide range of colours from fruits and vegetables, we might slow or reduce the risk of suffering from chronic diseases such as cancer, cardiovascular diseases, and age-related diseases caused by free radicals.
Our first visual contact with food is through their colours. The colours influence our perception of their freshness when raw, and their palatability when served. They can stimulate or suppress our appetite. The association between the colour of the food and its aroma, taste, sound, texture, presentation, and nourishing quality is often a subject of discussion around the dining table in the Chinese household. When a simple, stir-fried cucumber dish is presented invitingly green, crunchy to bite, and neatly cut to size, we automatically think that most of the nutrients are retained in the cooking process and that the dish is bound to be of good flavour. A dish of over-cooked, brown-coloured leafy vegetable will be remarked as unfit for consumption. Colour loss indicates the loss of nutrients, and there will be little flavour.
For a pleasingly colourful dish, mixing ingredients with contrasting colours gives vivacity to the dish. The colour of the dish can also be obtained by the cooking method deployed, such as deep-frying with batter to give the food a golden colour. Condiments play a role in adding colours to the dish as well. By adding a small quantity of dark soy sauce in the marinade, it gives the stir-fried beef a red-brown hue that is pleasing to the eyes. Fermented black beans can also be added to take advantage of their black colour, which contrasts beautifully with red chilli and the greenness of the bell pepper in a stir-fry dish with beef. And the final touch of garnishing the dish is a way to add the vividness of its colour.
At home, our first encounter with the aroma of cooking is in the kitchen. High cooking temperatures cause volatile aroma molecules of the ingredients to be airborne and fill the rooms with their presence; it tells us whether the food is done and whether the cooking temperature is adequate. There was the story of a master chef who could tell what and how much seasonings and condiments have been added, whether the cooking temperature is adequate, and the ultimate second to switch off the heat solely relying on his sense of smell. Because of concerns about the cancer-causing effects of inhaling cooking fumes, hoods in the domestic kitchen are becoming more powerful with higher extraction rates, sucking up much of the cooking fumes along with the aroma from the cooking. Cooking aromas are therefore disappearing from our kitchen.
As I was reminded in wine-tasting classes, over 75 per cent of the information about a glass of wine can be obtained from the sense of smell. We were asked to breathe in bouquet, aromas, and odours from objects we encountered and file them in our memory banks. It is the same with food. As we smell the food, the initial olfactory stimuli come from its aroma molecules. They enter our nasal passage and reach the olfactory receptors in our nasal chamber. When we chew our food, the aroma molecules released from the chewing motion mix with our saliva and find their way from the back of our mouth into the nasal cavity, reaching the olfactory receptors in our nose. The olfactory receptors then send sensory signals to the brain for processing. Our appetite is aroused when the aromas are to our liking, and the encounter will then be registered in our memories.
Chefs often use herbs and spices to find ways to present a dish that smells appealing from the kitchen to the table. Their aroma molecules interact with molecules from accompanying ingredients, the heat, and the air, and they undergo a series of chemical reactions. Some aroma molecules are transformed into different chemicals and increase in complexity. An example is the SiChuan dish Shredded Pork with Fish Fragrance: it is the combination of garlic, ginger, spring onion, and pickled red chilli stir-fried in oil, with the additions of ShauXing rice wine and vinegar that produce the aroma and blended tastes reminiscent of those of a fish dish. Another interesting example is a vegetarian dish a friend in Beijing showed me. She stir-fried star anise in the hot oil first to release the aroma and then added pre-blanched celery. The dish smelt meaty. She said it was a popular dish when meat was rationed and one had to settle with the aroma instead.
Spices such as black pepper and cassia bark are native to southern China. Cinnamon, cloves, and ginger are not native to China but have been widely cultivated since ancient times; they are easily available and are used mostly in savoury dishes in China. The grocery store near my apartment in Beijing had them on display at a prominent spot facing the door. After passing them by for about a year, I decided to use them to make some spicy biscuits for a party with local friends. I combined black pepper, cinnamon, dried ginger powder with butter from France, light brown cane sugar and fresh walnuts from YunNan Province, and flour from XinJiang (officially Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region). Most of the guests approached the biscuits gingerly as I told them of the spices I used. They were intrigued by the story that the spices I used were relatively latecomers to the European kitchen cupboards; it was the crusaders who introduced them to Europe during the Middle Ages, around the twelfth century. They brought back these exotic produces they were introduced to from places they had travelled through, such as today’s Egypt, Iran, and Syria. These spices were carried across the Mediterranean Sea to Venice for further distribution in Europe. In Medieval and Renaissance Europe, spices were heavily used in cooking by those who could afford them. Back then, they were items of luxury and social status; nowadays they are common and inexpensive. In contrast with Chinese cooking habits of using them mostly in savoury dishes, the spices are often used in the West for sweet biscuits and festive recipes. What is in common between the different culinary cultures is people’s enjoyment of the aroma and its association with occasions and nostalgia.
When I started to collect materials for this book, I sent out a questionnaire to my friends in the UK, and I asked them whether they prepared Chinese food from scratch at home. The overwhelming answer was that Chinese cooking seemed to involve adding many different ingredients, herbs and spices, seasonings, and condiments into a dish. The seemingly complicated task of mixing and blending them all together is a deterrent to cooking Chinese food from scratch.
Sourness, sweetness, bitterness, pungency, and saltiness have been the five basic tastes in Chinese food preparation since the Shang Dynasty (16th–11th
century BC). According to the ancient script
LuShiChunQiu,
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they were identified by YiYin, a well-known gourmand and prime minister in the Shang Dynasty. The translation of “pungency” from ancient scripts was often mistaken to mean “hotness”, such as in chilli hotness. It is reasonable to assert that Mr. Yi definitely did not have chilli peppers in mind, because chilli pepper was only brought to China in the Ming Dynasty (14th—17th century). In all probability, it was what was available in his time, such as ginger and mustard, that he had in mind. Following the official recognition of umami as one of the basic tastes in 1985, coupled with recent research that have identified separate receptors on our tongue to detect (chilli) hotness, the Chinese now have seven tastes for the mixing and blending of tastes in food preparation.
The seven tastes are like primary palettes for water-colour painting, and the cook is the artist. A dish can have one single taste with varying degrees of strength. There are also countless permutations of blended tastes with which to play. The variety and quantity of seasonings and condiments, as well as the sequence and the timing of application (before, during, or after the cooking), can make subtle differences between a good and an excellent dish.
According to the Chinese cooking technique, when vinegar is added in the marinade, sauce, or at the very beginning of the cooking process, it is described as cooking with invisible vinegar for its acidity and to tenderise the ingredients. Adding vinegar during the cooking over a high heat is described as vinegar with an attitude; it is for removing any unpleasant odour in the main ingredients without leaving behind much taste of acidity. More vinegar can be added at the very end of the cooking process along the rim before plating for its aroma. When the vinegar is added to the food after plating, it is described as vinegar with visibility for its full flavour. One therefore needs to choose vinegar with the matching quality and variety for maximum impact.