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November 2024 POM: Super Sale on Zhongba Dark Soy Sauce + Spicy Chicken Braise/Hotpot

November 09, 2024

Spicy Chicken Braise served hotpot style

Braising Season

Greetings, Friends of The Mala Market!

Is your light soy sauce lonely? After our blow-out sale of Zhongba 360 Light Soy Sauce last month, we realized dark soy sauce should be next in line for the POM treatment since light and dark soy sauces are so frequently used together. So that's what we've done! Zhongba Dark Soy Sauce is on super sale for the month of November.

Like the light soy sauce, our dark soy sauce has a sell-by date of late June 2025 (but is good, in reality, far longer than that). Unlike all-natural Zhongba light soy sauces, Zhongba dark includes added sugar/sweetener (that's pretty much the definition of a dark soy sauce) and a preservative, so please read ingredients closely before purchasing. 

Dark soy sauce is in particularly heavy rotation in braising season, as it adds both depth of flavor and enticing mahogany color to braises and stews of all kinds. Keep reading for an incredible new Sichuan braised chicken recipe and a Yunnan oyster mushroom side dish that's perfect for the season. 
 

 Peace,
🌶 Taylor & Fongchong 🌶
 

P.S. We have a repeatedly delayed container shipment (and greatly increased shipping costs) due to the short dock workers' strike, companies' overcompensating orders, Yemeni rebels attacking ships in the Red Sea, ocean traffic being rerouted, containers piling up at certain ports, and rail congestion. So if you are in need of either young or aged Pixian doubanjiang, they should run the guantlet and arrive by the last week of November. Thanks for your patience! 

(We're trying not to panic about how much harder—and more expensive—importing things from China will be next year.)
 
Zhongba Dark Soy Sauce (Naturally Brewed)
Zhongba Dark Soy Sauce (Naturally Brewed)
$10.00
Zhongba, a heritage soy sauce brand from Sichuan, also produces a dark soy sauce. 

Normally $15, it is discounted by one-third and is only $10 as the November Product of the Month. 

An essential ingredient in the Chinese pantry, dark soy sauce is simply soy sauce that has been sweetened but still retains its salty-savoriness (unlike sweet soy sauce, which tastes mostly sweet). It is used frequently for its unparalleled coloring and flavoring properties, adding an umami boost and an appealing red-brown tint to meats, braises and sauces.

Dark soy sauce is used most famously in "hong shao" dishes such as red-braised pork belly but is added to many other braises as well, for example these beer-braised pork trotters. See our latest braise featuring chicken directly below.

Cantonese noodle sauces frequently feature the combo of light soy sauce, dark soy sauce and oyster sauce. A classic example is this version of Supreme Soy Sauce Chow Mein from our affiliate Made With Lau (the recipe links to grocery store sauces, but just think how superior it will taste with premium Zhongba soy sauces).

Additionally, we like Zhongba dark as the base of almost all of our grilling and roasting marinades. Just mix Zhongba dark soy sauce, light soy sauce, a bit of roasted sesame oil and minced garlic. Add a touch of black vinegar or fresh orange juice if you're feeling ambitious.

And though one wouldn't want to use most dark soy sauces as a dipping sauce, the tastiness of Zhongba dark may tempt you to do so (diluted with a bit of water). Maggie Zhu at Omnivore's Cookbook writes that "less commonly, dark soy sauce can be used in a dipping sauce, to add a nice brown color without adding too much extra volume. I like to add a touch of it to chinkiang or rice vinegar to make a dumpling dipping sauce – the savoriness and sweetness provide a bit of balance."
 
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Spicy Braised Chicken and Baby Taro

A Braise That Doubles as Hotpot

Xueci Cheng is back with this Spicy Braised Chicken With Taro. She based the recipe on a meal she had recently in Chengdu, and I'm going to quote her at length because it's so dang enlightening!

"Last winter while I was visiting Chengdu, some college friends and I gathered for a small reunion. The locals in our group were entrusted with finding a hidden gem restaurant—somewhere that hadn’t been hyped on social media or Chinese Yelp. We ended up at a humble eatery tucked deep in a residential block in the southern part of the city that specializes in just one dish: braised chicken with taro (yùér jī, 芋儿鸡). The restaurant accepts reservations only by phone, and you have to pre-order the amount of chicken in advance. In Sichuan’s fiercely competitive restaurant scene, this kind of exclusivity hinted that we were in for something special.

"Within minutes of our arrival a big stainless steel pot had been placed before us. It was filled with braised chicken pieces plus taro and bamboo shoots, all submerged in a luscious red broth. After we devoured the chicken, the pot was simmered again, this time with chicken gizzards, blood tofu and some vegetable sides. The chicken was tender, the taro buttery, the bamboo shoots crunchy—a deeply satisfying meal for a chilly winter night in Chengdu."

Xueci goes on to explain that "the dish is a staple of jiānghú cài (江湖菜), a genre of Chongqing-style Sichuan cuisine. This culinary trend, which emerged in the 1980s, blends country-style cooking with hotpot traditions. Known for its bold mala flavors and heavy use of aromatics, jianghu cai often features fresh ingredients like freshwater fish, rabbit and chicken, which are typically served in large plates or pots, sometimes over a flame, hotpot-style. One famous example is fiery Chongqing Geleshan lazi ji (歌乐山辣子鸡). This style remains a cornerstone of Sichuan and Chongqing's culinary identity, and its popularity and influence have spread all across China."

 
Gold Stainless Steel Hot Pot
Gold Stainless Steel Hot Pot
$120.00
"While most Chinese food fans are familiar with Sichuan’s classic spicy hotpot, the region has many alternative pots to offer, such as dry pot (gān guō, 干锅) and soup pot (tāng guō, 汤锅)," as Xueci explains in her recipe notes.

Unlike hotpot, which is often served in a two-compartment, yin-yang pot that can accommodate two different broths, dry pot and soup pot are generally served in one deep bowl such as this gorgeous gold stainless steel pot. 

When I made Xueci's braised chicken with taro, a soup pot, I served it hotpot-style in this pot, as you can see in the photo at top. Firstly, I cannot tell you how good it is! It's like mala hotpot, but less spicy and less oily and with the meat already cooked. I made the braise with 4 cups of water (don't skip the buttery taro if you can find it), which made enough soup to gradually add napa cabbage, celtuce, shiitake mushrooms, daikon radish and rehydrated tofu skin as we ate it like a mini hotpot over a flame.

You can also serve Hainan Coconut Chicken Hotpot or Guizhou Hot and Sour Tomato Hotpot this way. See our Deep Dive on Making Chinese Hotpot and Drypot for more ideas and recipes. 
 
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Stir-Fried Oyster Mushrooms With Sichuan Pepper Oil

Yunnan Mala Mushrooms

Our managing editor, Georgia Freedman, says now is the time to make like a Yunnan cook and stir-fry the freshest oyster mushrooms you can find in a homemade Sichuan pepper oil. 

"There are lots of ways to enjoy mushroom season in Yunnan," she writes. "There are even a handful of dedicated mushroom restaurants in Kunming that offer feasts incorporating a range of species—including the trickier varieties that can be poisonous if not cooked correctly. But by far the most common way to eat mushrooms is stir-fried with a handful of sliced chilies (fresh or dried) and some garlic. Order stir-fried mushrooms in pretty much any small restaurant, and this is probably what you’ll end up with. It’s an easy dish for the cooks to put out, and the simple preparation lets the fungi’s natural flavors shine.

"Occasionally you’ll also find a fun twist on the basic format, like this recipe for oyster mushrooms with Sichuan pepper oil (huājiāo yóu chǎo pínggū; 花椒油炒平菇) that I stumbled onto at a spot in [a small town in] Diqing Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture, the northernmost part of Yunnan, which sits on the edge of the Tibetan Plateau, just below the Tibetan Autonomous Region (and just west of Sichuan)."

Georgia also provides a bonus recipe for making red Sichuan pepper oil from da hong pao or Tribute Sichuan pepper. Unlike our Yaomazi rattan pepper oil, which is made from just-picked, fresh green Sichuan pepper, this red version is made with dried red hua jiao for a milder, earthier flavor that doesn't overwhelm the delicate mushrooms. 
 
NYT Magazine on Sichuan Pepper

The Secrets of Sichuan Pepper

Did you guys see this fascinating piece by the brilliant Ligaya Mishan in the New York Times's T Magazine? In a long and far-ranging thought piece, she tries to understand why so many people (especially, I would add, you Mala Market people) have recently embraced Sichuan pepper, and what exactly we hua jiao lovers get from the pins-and-needles sensation a premium version delivers. 

In one section she compares black pepper, chili pepper and Sichuan pepper, noting how they are three completely unrelated plants despite all being called pepper. 

She cites sources explaining that "in Middle Chinese, [Sichuan pepper] was called tsjew, which later — independent of linguistic developments in the West — gave rise to the terms “hu jiao” for black pepper, which had arrived in China by the third century, and “la jiao” or “fan jiao” for chile, which arrived in the 16th. Both “hu jiao” and “fan jiao” are linguistic variations on “barbarian pepper,” emphasizing their foreign origins, while Sichuan pepper was newly designated hua jiao, “flower pepper,” to distinguish it from these interlopers. So in China, too, a relationship was presumed among these three distinct spices."

Read the piece for more such insights on the numbing spice. You'll find us and some of our restaurant customers quoted and included, and you'll definitely learn something! 
 
Sichuan Pepper Sampler (Szechuan Peppercorns)
Sichuan Pepper Sampler (Szechuan Peppercorns)
$29.00
Want to turn someone else on to the "life-affirming properties of Sichuan pepper"? This collection of three distinctly different hua jiao varieties makes a fabulous hostess gift, Christmas gift, Hanukkah gift or just-because gift. 
 
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