Our Refreshed and Improved Website

The style of our site hasn't changed much, but the product pages have. When we launched the store a decade ago with fewer than 10 products, the only design option for our abundance of educational information about them was big blocks of overwhelming text. With that design, if you wanted just one piece of information it was hard to find. Now, of course, websites are much more flexible, which has allowed us to keep—and even add to—the educational component of our mission but display all that info in a much more streamlined design.  

The reason it took us so long to update the site is because we did it ourselves rather than have AI write it for us. We just felt that our heritage and artisan products, many of them handmade, deserve an equally thoughtful and handmade online home. Plus, most of our information comes directly from the makers, so while Claude is super helpful it is not the expert here. 

Here are the benefits to YOU:

1. In the top menu, use the drop-down menu labeled SHOP to go to category pages for All Products, Spices, Sauces, Pantry Collections, etc.  
2. Use the SEARCH field in top menu to search by exact word or phrase.
3. NEW: Use the SORT feature at the top of each category page (below the menu bar) to sort the page using various filters, such as alphabetically or by price. Most useful for the legions of you gluten-avoidant people: You can sort any category page to show only GLUTEN FREE products. Would you like to see the products sorted another way not offered? Let us know.

We hope it's useful! The site is still a work in progress, so bear with us as we complete it, and do let us know if there's any other functionality you'd like to see. 
 

Legit Shanghai Scallion Noodles

When I assigned this recipe for Shanghai scallion oil noodles, it was just because I love them, not because I thought such a simple dish had much of a story to tell. But I was wrong! Leave it to Zoe Yang to find the interesting backstory on any dish from her ancestral home region. 

Here's just the beginning of what she found:

"Walk into a noodle shop (miàn guǎn, 面馆) on any street corner in China, and you’ll know where you are. Dan dan noodles (dàndànmiàn, 担担面) orient the traveler in Chengdu, hot dry noodles (règānmiàn, 热干面) in Wuhan, fried sauce noodles (zhájiàngmiàn, 炸酱面) in Beijing. In Shanghai, the local shops sling scallion oil noodles (cōngyóu bànmiàn, 葱油拌面).

"Scallion oil noodles, like the other aforementioned iconic noodle dishes, are a type of dry mixed noodle (bànmiàn, 拌面) that harken back to a shared origin as street foods sold by vendors carrying shoulder poles (whence the name dan dan mian, which means, literally, “bearing burden noodles”). Traditionally comprising just a handful of flavoring ingredients and no substantial quantities of vegetables or meat to speak of, these were the cheap and cheerful breakfasts and lunches of the working class. 

"A common trait of these different styles of banmian is that they rely on powerful fermented sauces (jiàngs, 酱) for flavor. In Shanghainese cooking, also known as benbang cooking (běnbāng cài, 本帮菜), the starring jiang is soy sauce, particularly dark soy sauce. In English, we would describe benbang cai as dark, unctuous, glossy, balanced on a knife’s edge between sweet and savory. In Chinese, the tidy phrase 浓油赤酱 (nóngyóu chìjiàng) captures it: “thick oil, red sauce.” 

"Scallion oil noodles, which have five—and only five—critical ingredients (scallions, fat, soy sauce, Shaoxing wine and sugar), are a straightforward expression of this style. The soy sauce, wine and sugar are the benbang flavor backbone, and the soul of the dish comes from infusing fistfuls of fresh scallions in oil or fat until the aroma fills the entire room like a luxury candle."
 

End-of-Summer Okra

For some of us, it's still the end of summer and there's still okra in the garden. If you're so lucky, or can access good candidates at the market, this recipe from Yunnan Province is a wonderful new way to use them, as our blog editor, Georgia Freedman, shows us:

"When I first moved to Kunming, I was surprised to see okra in markets and in the cold cases at local eateries. I had always associated this African and South Asian vegetable with places like India, Nigeria and the American South, and I’d certainly never seen it while studying in Beijing or on Chinese-American restaurant menus. But the preparations offered in Kunming looked far more appealing than the dishes I was used to: In small alleyways, I tried okra pods threaded onto skewers for shao kao and was thrilled to find that the grill’s quick, hot cooking scorched them and made them flavorful without cooking them so long that they developed their classically slimy texture....The best preparation, however (to my mind, at least) was the simplest of all: stir-fried okra and pressed tofu (qiūkuí chǎo dòufugān,  秋葵炒豆腐干). 

"This stir-fried dish also comes from Dai cooking traditions, and I learned of it at the delightful restaurant across the street from our apartment, Yingjiang Dai Flavor Restaurant (盈江傣味园), where families gathered around low bamboo tables spilled across the sidewalk to enjoy dishes like lime-flavored “ghost chicken,” stir-fried banana flowers and pineapple sticky rice. It may be the least complicated dish on their menu, but it’s perfect in its simplicity: Cutting the okra into thin, star-like pieces and stir-frying them quickly leaves them tender but still almost crisp, without the gooey texture they get when cooked for more than a couple minutes. Moreover, because you’re not biting into a whole pod, any sliminess that the pieces do have doesn’t register. The little pieces of firm pressed flavored tofu (dòufugān, 豆腐干) add a complementary texture and flavor that rounds out the dish."
 

Beginning-of-Fall Hot Pot

While some of us are still at the end of summer, others are firmly in the beginning of fall. And that means the beginning of hot pot season! 

Our Liu Po (Six Grandmas) hot pot soup base is back in stock, just in time! 

To get you in the mood, check out this mesmerizing new video—extraordinary in both content and cinematography—from Saint Cavish. It's a tour of Chongqing's massive hot pot restaurant scene and industry, including a factory where a base like the one we sell is made. (Though to be clear, the fat used in ours is roasted rapeseed oil, Chengdu-style; the beef-tallow base used in Chongqing hot pot is an illegal import to the U.S.)

Just one fun fact from it: There are more hot pot restaurants in Chongqing—40,000—than the total number of restaurants in New York City!

Chris St. Cavish was actually the source of some of Zoe's Shanghai noodle knowledge for her recipe. He's a longtime Shanghai resident who is deep into the research and writing of a book on Chinese noodles. (We cannot wait for that one!)

Support Saint Cavish on Patreon and get the addresses to all the places they visit in their videos. We'll be using the addresses next year in Chongqing—because we'll never go to China again without a stop in Chongqing. It's that great.