Ingredients

• Flour 250 g
• Milk 130-140 ml
• Yeast 3g
• Sugar 30g
• Salt  1g
• If using water, 125 ml.
• If desired for use in the decorative flower ball, green onion, sesame oil, salt and ground pepper
• If desired for use in flavoring the mantou, black sesame powder or raisins to taste

Instructions

1. Warm milk until it reaches 40 degrees C (104 degrees F). Typically you can accomplish this by microwaving it for about 30 seconds.
2. Add yeast to the milk, stir a little and let it stand for 5 minutes.
3. Mix flour with sugar and salt. Pour in milk mixture, then mix and knead into a dough. At this stage, if desired, you can add black sesame powder to taste to make a batch of sesame-flavored mantou.
4. Let dough rise until it double sizes. This takes about an hour.
5. Knead the dough and gently roll it out to expel the air in the dough.
6. Shape the dough into a rectangle and spread water onto its surface. At this point, if you’d like to make a mantou with a sweet flavor, you can add raisins.
7. Roll the dough up into a long cylindrical snake, then cut off the head and tail of the dough snake to make the ends even. You can combine these and shape into a ball. Alternatively, if desired, the head and tail pieces can be set aside to form a decorative ball or flower shape as described (instructions below).
8. Cut the remaining dough cylinder into 6 equally-sized pieces.
9. Place all 7 pieces of dough onto the steamer rack of a rice cooker and let the dough rise again for 40-50 minutes.
10. Steam the buns in a steamer for 12 minutes or, if you don’t have a steamer, on a raised rack in a covered pot with a small amount of water at the bottom brought to boil.
11. Let the mantou rest for five minutes after the steaming process has finished.
12. Enjoy your soft and fluffy mantou now!

Decorative Mantou Centerpiece Instructions

1. Combine the head and tail of the dough snake and shape into another long cylindrical snake.
2. Roll out the snake horizontally to flatten it out.
3. Brush dough lightly with sesame oil, sprinkle ground black pepper, salt and chopped green onion down the center of the snake, then fold the snake in half.
4. Use a table knife to score, or cut slits, down the body of the snake as pictured.
5. Roll the snake from tail to head. This forms a decorative flower ball 花 捲

Pork pottage, known also as Rou-Geng, is a traditional Taiwanese delicacy that can often be found at Taiwanese night markets or daytime bazaars. Usually there are two versions of Rou-Geng: one that uses sweet potato powder and another that uses fish paste. In this recipe, we create Taiwanese pork pottage with sweet potato powder instead of fish paste, since sweet potato powder is an easier ingredient to find at American supermarkets.

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Ingredients

• 2 or 3 cups daikon cubes (1 cm size cubes)
• 1 ½ cup pork strips
• 5 or 6 pieces dried shiitake mushroom, soaked in water until soft, then cut into strips
• 6 cups water (or 1 can of chicken broth + 4 cups of water)
• 1 Tbsp. soy sauce
• ¼ tsp. sesame oil
• ½ cup sweet potato powder
• Some chopped cilantro
• Tapioca water (3 Tbsp. tapioca powder + ¾ cup water)

Ingredients For Soup Seasoning

• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 4 or 5 tsp. black vinegar, to taste
• ½ tsp white ground pepper
• ½ tsp salt (or ¼ tsp salt if using chicken broth)
• 1 ½ tsp sugar
• 2 tsp barbecue sauce
• ¼ cup fried shallot

Instructions

1. Marinate pork strips with 1 Tbsp. of soy sauce and ¼ tsp of sesame oil for 30 minutes. Add sweet potato powder to coat around pork strips.
2. Place daikon cubes, mushroom strips and water into a pot, and cook over medium-high temperature until daikon turns soft. It takes about 10 minutes. Add soup seasonings into pot, and then pour in tapioca water, stir constantly while pouring.
3. Turn the heat to medium-low. Put pork strips into the pottage, cook until the pork strips float on the top and bring the soup to a boil.
4. Serve pottage with deep bowl and garnish with cilantro.

Tips

This recipe can made with other vegetables, such as bamboo strips or cabbage strips. You can also use fish paste to coat the pork strips instead of sweet potato powder. Some people like adding noodle to the pottage and then serving the dish as a meal.

This tender bone-in chicken dish, stewed in a pungent mixture of wine and black sesame oil, pays homage to one of the dishes commonly prepared for new mothers in Taiwan. It was once the custom for mothers to eat stewed chicken with sesame oil everyday for the first month after giving birth to a child. These days, many families still follow the tradition and serve this dish to new mothers, although perhaps not every day.

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Ingredients

• One whole chicken
• 10 slices of ginger
• ¼ cup (4 Tbsp) black sesame oil
• 1 Tbsp black sesame oil
• 1 cup rice wine
• 2 cups water
• 1 Tbsp sugar

Instructions

1. Clean the chicken and cut into large pieces approximately two inches in size. (If you’re new to meat preparation, you can refer to this great video by Martin Yan for a demonstration on how to quickly slice up a chicken into pieces.)
2. Heat ¼ cup of black sesame oil under medium temperature in a pot or wok. Add ginger and sauté until the ginger turns dry and fragrant.
3. Add chicken pieces to the pot and cook until the meat turn pale, then add wine, water and sugar. Cook and bring to a boil, then reduce heat to low and cook for 40 minutes.
4. Finally, add a single tablespoon of black sesame oil before serving.
5. You may serve this with thin noodles. Add more water and rice wine to increase the quantity of soup.

Tips

Salt is not needed for this recipe and is in fact not recommended, adding salt may result in a bitter taste. If you really must add salt, add it at the end of cooking. Some people may prefer to use wine only instead of a mixture of wine and water for cooking.  An all-wine approach yields a delicious, strong-flavored result, but the alcohol may render the dish unsuitable for children to consume.

This dish brings together two of the island’s most popular offerings: mango fruit and fresh seafood in the form of wok-seared shrimp. The mango is such a staple of Taiwanese cuisine that even the Taiwanese government’s official website lauds it as the “most loved and sought-after fruit in the sweltering days of mid-summer.”

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Ingredients

• One large mango, cut into into cubes or small chunks
• 8 to 10 large shrimp, peeled and deveined, cut into 3 sections
• 2 medium size zucchini, cut into chunks of the same size as the mango pieces
• ¼ cup green onion, diced
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp white pepper
• Pinch of sugar

Instructions

1. Marinate shrimp with some salt, cooking wine, and sesame oil, then add 1/8 teaspoons of corn starch and mix.
2. Heat 2 tablespoons of cooking oil in the wok or frying pan, and first sauté the diced green onion until it is fragrant. Then add shrimp and stir-fry for about one minute. Remove the shrimp from the pan and set aside.
3. In the same pan, add and heat one more tablespoon of cooking oil, then stir fry zucchinis for about two minutes and add mango, seasonings and reserved shrimp, continuing to cook for one more minute. This recipe makes 5-6 servings.

Tips

Mango should ideally be ripe, but not too soft. If you discover that your particular mango is excessively sweet, you can eliminate the sugar from the recipe to help balance the flavor. Salt can also be reduced in this dish, if desired. The fruit will enhance the flavor of the food.

Taiwanese fried chicken is a crisp, spicy and juicy meat that is featured in restaurants as well as sold at street food stalls all around Taiwan.  The island’s unique take on Colonel Sanders has recently come into the spotlight in the United States as Asian-American street food vendors, including popular Bian Dang in New York City, have added it to their menus. Each chef may bring his or her own combination of Asian spices to this dish; this version is spiced with white pepper, sesame oil and black vinegar.

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Ingredients:

• One piece of boneless chicken breast, cut into large strips
• ½ cup all purpose flour
• 2 tbsp corn starch or tapioca starch
• ½ tsp baking powder
• 1/3 cup water

Ingredients for the marinade:

• 2 tsp soy sauce
• 1 tsp black vinegar
• ¼ tsp white ground pepper
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• ½ tsp sugar
• 1 tsp cooking wine

Instructions:

1. Add marinade to the chicken strips and let the chicken marinate for 20 minutes.
2. Add flour, starch, baking powder and water into chicken. Mix well and coated chicken strips with batter.
3. Prepare a pot for frying and heat two cups of cooking oil in the pot over medium heat.
4. Use a fork to place all the chicken strips one by one into the heated oil, frying each side for two minutes, then turning each chicken piece over until both sides are a golden brown.
5. Place all of the fried chicken pieces on a plate lined with paper towels.
6. Serve chicken piping hot.

Some helpful tips

Serve this dish with chili sauce, or sprinkle some pepper on the chicken and serve. It also tastes great alone without additional spices. Boneless chicken leg can be substituted in lieu of chicken breast. Don’t discard the frying oil, as it can be re-used for other cooking within a short period of time.

Much as beef stew is the comfort food of Americans and Europeans, beef stew noodle soup is the comfort food of the Taiwanese. Though variations on the dish may be found throughout China, Taiwan’s take on beef noodle soup is unique: beef is braised slowly for hours and cooked in chili bean paste sauce.

12/7/2012 – We’ve recently updated this recipe, originally published Jan. 3, 2011, to answer some questions from reader Emie Lee. Thanks Emie for following the blog and sending in your questions!

Ingredients:

• 3-4 lbs of beef shank. In Chinese supermarkets, they sell beef shanks in whole pieces. This recipe calls for 2 medium-sized pieces.
• Package of noodles, either thin or thick depending on your preference
• 1 medium-sized white onion, cut into chunks
• 1 large tomato, cut into chunks
• 8 -10 cloves garlic, peeled
• 6 slices ginger
• 6 Tbs. chili bean sauce or bean sauce (not spicy)*
• ½ cup soy sauce
• ½ cup cooking wine
• 3 star anise pieces
• 3 Tbs. cooking oil
• Water to cover the meat

Instructions:

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil.
2. Place 2 whole pieces of beef shank into the hot water, then cook for 3 minutes. Remove beef from the pot, rinse the pieces in water, and then cut the beef into large chunks.
3. Heat oil in a wok, adding ginger and garlic first, then stir frying for about 2 minutes. Then add onion to the wok along with bean sauce, and stir fry for another 3 minutes.
4. Continue to stir fry, adding tomato and beef chunks until the meat turns white. Then add soy sauce, cooking wine and star anise. Either use the same wok or transfer to a larger pot with accompanying lid.
5. Add water to cover the meat and cook for about 4 to 5 hours over the low heat until beef is tender. The liquid in the beef stew will be condensed when it is done.
6. Cook noodles as indicated on the package instructions. Add beef stew soup into the noodle, as well as either hot water or soup stock to taste.
7. Garnish the beef noodle soup with fresh cilantro or green onion and serve.

*If you prefer strong flavoring when it comes to beef noodle soup, increase the quantity of chili bean sauce in the recipe.

What kind of chili bean sauce or bean sauce do you recommend? A picture of the packaging would help a lot.

Here is a picture of the type of sauce I use:

When cooking the meat for 4-5 hours, do you use a slow cooker or just a normal pot?  If it’s a slow cooker, what brand or kind would you recommend?

Use a regular pot to stew the meat. A slow cooker will be fine too, but a slow cooker will retain the liquid. By contrast, a regular pot will allow the soup to condense, which enhances the flavor of meat.

In this recipe, tender pieces of king trumpet mushroom and bean curd are cooked slowly in a tangy, sweet-savory sauce and served with mango.

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Ingredients

Generally

• 2 bags king trumpet mushroom, washed and with the root part cut out
• ¾-1 lb fresh bean curd sheets
• 1 cup of Mango slice
• 2 Tbsp of gogi seeds (optional)

For the stew sauce:

• 3 slices ginger
• ¾ cup soy sauce
• 1 Tbsp black vinegar
• 1 Tbsp sesame oil
• 2 Tbsp sugar
• ½ tsp white pepper
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• ½ cup mirin (sweet rice wine for cooking)
• 5 cups water

For the seasoning:

• 1 tsp lemon juice or white vinegar
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• Pinch of salt
• 1 green onion stalk, shredded

Instructions

1. Cook the ingredients listed under the stew sauce section until the contents of the pot have come to a boil. Add the bean curd sheets first then and stew for 20 minutes over medium-low heat. Then allow the bean curd sheets to soak in the sauce for an additional 15 minutes.
2. Remove bean curd sheets from the pot. Add the julienned trumpet mushroom pieces to the stew sauce and stew for 12 to 15 minutes. Then let the mushroom soak in the sauce for an additional 15 minutes. You can store mushroom in a container with this sauce to help it retain its flavor. [Note: Both bean curd sheets and mushroom are now ready to be used in a variety of dishes or reserved for later use. You can use these items to create many different dishes. Slice them and eat them, or mix with other vegetables and/or fruit.]
3. At this point, you are ready to use the bean curd and mushroom to create the mango vegetable dish. Slice 2 to 3 mushroom stalks and cut two pieces of bean curd sheets into large strips. Place both of these items in a large bowl, add the ingredients listed under the seasoning section and mix gently.
4. Finally, mix in the mango slices and garnish with gogi seeds. Serve immediately or store in the refrigerator and serve later.

Note

The components of this recipe can be used to create many other kinds of dishes.  For example, stewed bean curd sheets and mushroom can be served separately. Stewed mushroom has been compared in flavor to vegetarian abalone.  If you have leftover cooked ingredients, these can be stored in the refrigerator for later use.

What do bean curd sheets look like, and where can I buy them?

Bean curd sheets are generally available in Asian grocery stores and in some health food stores. Here is a photo of bean curd sheets:

Steamed bean curd rolls are a uniquely Taiwanese take on the ubiquitous Japanese sushi roll.

Ingredients

• 1 lb fresh bean curd sheets
• 5 or 6 pieces dried shiitake mushroom, soaked in water until soft
• 1 egg, beaten
• ½ tsp salt
• ½ tsp white ground pepper
• 1 tsp sesame oil
• Pinch of sugar
• 4 pieces of roasted seaweed sheets

Instructions

1. Tear bean curd sheets into strips and add the mushroom, which you have soaked and cut into strips.  Place bean curd strips and mushroom strips into a large bowl. Add egg, salt, ground pepper, sesame oil and sugar into the bowl and mix gently.
2. Place one seaweed sheet on a flat surface to serve as wrapper. Put one-fourth (1/4) of the mixture on one end of seaweed sheet, so that it covers 1/3 of the sheet. Roll the seaweed sheet up as if you were rolling a sushi roll. Repeat with the rest of the mixture. You should be able to make a total of 4 rolls.
3. Wrap each roll in Saran premium wrap and use a steamer to steam the rolls on high heat for approximately 10 minutes.
4. Let rolls cool down, remove the Saran wrap and slice the rolls into half-inch (1 cm) thick pieces. Decorate with green vegetables if desired. Drizzle lightly with sesame oil and serve.

Tips

To enhance flavor, you can sauté mushroom strips with some of the cooking oil first. This dish can be made ahead and served in either cold or hot.

What is bean curd sheet?

Bean curd sheet, known also as tofu skin, is food product made from soybeans. When soy milk is boiled in an open pan, a film or skin forms on the liquid surface and is then dried into yellowish sheets. You can learn more about tofu skin here.

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Ingredients

Sauce:

• 8 cloves garlic, peeled
• ½ medium size white onion
• 1 cup roasted peanuts
• 4 Tbsp. sugar
• 4 Tbsp. sesame oil
• 1/3 cup white vinegar
• ½ cup soy sauce
• ½ cup cold water

Noodles, Toppings:

• 1 lb dry noodles
• 2 cups thin strips cucumber
• 2 sheets of cooked egg cut into thin strips. (See our recipe for Taiwanese spring rolls for a tutorial.)
• 2 cups bean sprouts, immerse into boiling water for a few seconds
• 2 cups cooked chicken strips, or ham strips
• 1 cup shredded carrots
• 1 cup cilantro, coarsely chopped
• Chili oil – optional

Instructions

1. Place the sauce ingredients into a blender. Blend the items into a smooth mixture and pour into a serving bowl or container.
2. Cook noodles as directed on the package. Place the cooked noodles in a large serving bowl and add some sesame or olive oil to prevent noodles from sticking together. Let the cooked noodles cool to room temperature.
3. Arrange the topping ingredients on serving plates as desired.
4. To assemble the spicy cold noodles, place the noodles on a platter first, then place the items you want onto the noodle.
5. The final step: add sauce (about 5 tablespoons per plate) and a dash of chili oil, and the dish is ready to serve. Makes 6- 8 servings.

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• 1 lb bean sprouts
• 1 lb cabbage, cut into strips
• 2 square pieces of baked bean curd, cut into thin, fine strips
• 1/2 lb snow peas, cut into strips
• 1 carrot stick, shredded
• 3 green onion stalks, shredded
• 1 cup cooked barbecue pork, sliced. Alternatively, you can use cooked pork strips
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup peanut powder mixed with 1/8 cup sugar
• seaweed powder (optional)
• 1 bag of spring roll wrappers [LINK]
• Salt
• Sweet chili sauce

Instructions

1. Beat eggs in a bowl and add salt to taste.
2. Heat oil in a skillet or wok and pour in half the egg mixture. Allow the contents of the skillet to cook over medium heat into a single, golden-brown, thin sheet of egg, turning over to ensure that both sides are cooked. Repeat once again with the remainder of the egg mixture. Cut the two sheets of cooked egg into thin strips.
3. Stir fry the following items for the filling separately and place into dishes: the bean sprouts, cabbage, snow peas with carrots, and baked bean curd. Add salt as desired for flavor.
4. Arrange the ingredients, including the stir-fried items, barbecue pork, peanut powder, chili sauce and egg strips, as well as optional items such as shredded green onions and seaweed powder, on a table for easy access and preparation.
5. Place a spring roll wrapper on a large, flat plate as shown in the photo below. Layer the items in the following order: dry ingredients first (such as peanut powder or egg strips), followed by the pork, the stir-fried vegetables, and finally some of the dried ingredients once again as desired. This will prevent the moisture from causing the spring roll wrapper to break.
6. Use the chili sauce to lightly moisten the edges of the wrapper and wrap the spring roll as indicated below.
7. Makes 6-8 servings.

Where To Buy Spring Roll Wrappers

You can find these in the frozen department at Asian grocery stores or order online.