Ta da!
This is my duck.
It's the first duck I've ever cooked in my life. It's a Cantonese roast duck and it was delicious.
What is the difference between Cantonese roast duck and Peking duck? Aha, good question. My duck instructor, who incidentally has taught the Cantonese Roast Duck class 40 times in 33 years of teaching at Towngas, was emphatic:
Peking duck is all about the skin. Cantonese duck meat is more delicious.
With Peking duck, they carefully extract the organs through a small hole to keep the skin intact. Then, they blow up the duck like a balloon, which separates the skin from the flesh and makes it roast more crisply. Obviously, this is done with an air pump in most restaurants, but I have to include this crazy photo -- courtesy of a Web site called The Labyrinth -- showing a (Japanese?) chef blowing up a duck with his mouth.
With a Peking duck, the skin is the main event. You cut gorgeous little rounds of crispy skin and fat with just a sliver of meat attached, and wrap it up in a fresh flour pancake with hoisin sauce, spring onion, and cucumber. There are many variations on the condiments, actually (and check out the amazing chopstick technique in the video too!).Since a Cantonese roast duck is not inflated, the chef can get inside and season it thoroughly so that the flesh is delectable. In preparing our ducks, we first dried out the body cavity with paper towels, then gave it a splash of Mei Kwei Lu Chiew, which is a brand of "baiju" or white liquor, which is made from sorghum and flavored with rose. Then we rubbed the inside of the duck with salt, sugar, and five-spice powder, and tossed in star anise, sliced ginger, and crushed shallots.
The importance of this seasoning cannot be under-estimated. The aroma of the shallots and anise and duck fat are mind-bending; and the flavor infuses to the meat so it is absolutely delectable.
But the skin of the Cantonese duck is exquisite as well: delicately crispy, with more of the fat melted away, so your teeth get just a little playful resistance and then they sink into the rich, flavorful meat.
With both the Peking and the Cantonese ducks an absolutely essential step in preparation is drying. This is really different than any roasting of chickens I have done in Western recipes. It's not just giving the bird a wipe-down with paper towels. Grace Young describes the ideal approach in The Wisdom of the Chinese Kitchen:
"The most challenging procedure is 'drying' the duck for three hours in a room that is cool and breezy. Never make this on a hot day or in a room that is well heated, or you will run the risk of spoiling the duck. Traditional Chinese cooks feel that air-drying is essential; the drier the duck, the better it will absorb the flavors of the marinade and produce a skin that is crisp."
(p. 180)
Well, in my class, we were bad. We cheated. After seasoning the inside of the duck, we sewed it up with a metal skewer (you pierce the skin on the same side of the flesh instead of back-and-forth to achieve a tighter seal). Then we took the duck by its broken neck and held all 3.5 lbs of him over a wok with boiling water and ladeled the water over him to contract his skin. Then we prepared a glaze of maltose, vinegar, coloring, and water and evenly basted him with it.
I don't know if the duck was a he or a she, but since it had the head on, I began to feel some affinity. His roasted head below...
Anyway, we then put the duck in the oven at the lowest possible temperature, with clothes pins under his "armpits" so even that part of the duck would be nice and crispy. Next we used another clothes pin to "cheat the oven" into thinking that the door was closed so it would run its fan with the door open. So the oven got dry and warm, but the moisture could still escape. Once this was done, we put in the duck on a roasting rack and turned four times at 10-15 minute intervals. Here's what mine looked like after drying:
Before trying to teach myself about Chinese cooking, I was never aware of the critical importance of managing moisture in cooking. Here's another example from Grace Young:
"When preparing stir-fry vegetables, the vegetables should be washed several hours before the meal, so that they will have time to air-dry before stir-frying. Do not be alarmed if the vegetables appear slightly limp by the time they are cooked. This is preferable to wet vegetables. If the vegetables are wet, they will not stir-fry in the pan but will instead immediately begin steaming."
(p. xvii)
When I took a stir-fried noodles class, we boiled the noodles first, then dried them with a kitchen towel before stir-frying.
On the other end of the spectrum, I once defrosted beef in a hurry for a Yan-kit So recipe for Tangerine Beef. Since the beef was so wet from the defrosting, I unwisely omitted the two tablespoons of water from the marinade, in the process achieving a remarkably tough and dry result. If you read my first post about Towngas you will see that meat soaks up water, so it is important to always include it in marinades so the meat will be juicy.
I'm just starting to be aware of the importance of managing moisture and heat in cooking... But I have a feeling that these are critical skills. Literature about Chinese food often talks about "awakening" the ingredients with heat, so I will write more about that as I learn more...
It wasn't until moving to Hong Kong that I realized what a culinary prude I was.
We Westerners are so skittish and squeamish about what we put in our mouths.
If it's too soft we don't like it. If it's slippery we don't like it. If it's too chewy we don't like it. If it's smelly we don't like it (except cheese, of course). If it's...ambiguous...we don't like it.
Ambiguous? Yes, a dish that doesn't fit squarely into the categories "savory" or "sweet." For example, mooncakes. Most people would probably say that mooncakes are a "sweet" dish. They have a thin skin of sweet pastry covering a dense lump of lotus seed paste, which is smooth and bland and quite sugary.
But on the inside is a salty, crumbly, dense, slightly sulfuric duck's egg, baked right into the middle. For Westerners, this just jumbles our entire gastronomic mental framework. We have no place in our realm of reference experiences in which to relate to this alien thing: the mooncake.
My friend J-- from Guanzhou gave me my first mooncake. It was a foggy, grey October day in San Francisco and we were bundled up in fleece jackets after a long walk at Fort Funston. Driving back through the Sunset District she told me to stop because she wanted to buy me a mooncake. We brought it back to my house and made a pot of tea on my beautiful old gas stove...
My first bite of mooncake was pleasant enough. I've got a sweet tooth, so I generally like anything sugary, regardless of how strange. It had that kind of flat sweetness I also associate with some Italian cookies. Just sweet and that's all. But I found the glue-y denseness of the mooncake intriguing. Then I hit a piece of the duck's egg...Oh boy. I had this very strange sensation of biting into something that tasted...biological...like it came from my own body. Since I'm already being gross here, I'll say that the closest reference experience I could muster was eating my own boogers as a little kid. (Now, I know you're going to all run out and buy mooncakes!)
This kind of threw me for a loop... Damn, it, I am an adventurous eater! But man, that salted duck's egg freaked me out.
That was maybe four years ago. When we visited Hong Kong last September, I found myself thrust into a barrage of mooncake advertising in anticipation of the Mid-Autumn Festival. The amount of commercial riffing on the concept of "mooncake" is incredible. There are snowy mooncakes, green tea mooncakes, Haagen-Daaz ice cream mooncakes, Starbucks mooncakes, even butt-shaped mooncakes from the GOD store (check out the blog Red Cook for a rundown).
I have certainly partaken of these blasphemous mooncakes -- I can't resist a sweet hockey-puck-shaped treat -- but I continue to contemplate the traditional mooncake with lotus seed paste and duck egg. Gradually, as I have eaten a few slices here and there, I have begun to accept the proposition: a thin, sweet oily skin that gives way to one's teeth just so, an assertive dense shot of glue-y sugar, a mind-bendingly-weird morsel of crumbly egg. And just when it starts to overwhelm, you take a nice sip of hot Chinese tea -- which washes the dense material out of your mouth, its bitterness neutralizing the sweet and salty flavors, its spicy/herbal aroma refreshing your senses.
The entire experience is a workout for your senses and your mind. Now I'm finding that I crave it...
Which is why, having developed this complex relationship with mooncakes, I enthusiastically signed up for a mooncake-making class at Towngas Cooking Centre (they're going to have to pay me commission here soon). I wanted to get to know the mooncake better. I wanted to understand what makes a mooncake a good one or a bad one.It turns out that mooncakes are quite simple in terms of of ingredients.They contain:
While the ingredients are simple, the process for making mooncakes is very specific, and small errors (or God forbid, improvisations), result in big disappointment. I'll show you what I mean...
Here are the steps for making mooncakes:Mark your calendar -- I'm serious! In total, a home cook will need two weeks to one month to achieve excellent final results. The Mid-Autumn Festival is held on the 15th day of the eighth month of the Chinese calendar. In 2010, that turns out to be Sept 22nd. If you wait too long, you won't get the right consistency syrup and your mooncakes won't be glossy from the oils soaking out.
Think beer and honey -- The first step is to create a syrup that goes into the dough covering the cake. The syrup is made with two types of sugar crystal, ostensibly for "stability." The final product should be the color of San Miguel beer and it should have roughly the consistency of honey. If it's not thick enough, your dough will have the wrong consistency and it will be impossible to cover the lotus paste balls.
Fingertips first -- Put your oil in a liquid measure, then add the syrup and lye water (if you put the syrup first, it will stick). Spread out your flour, make a well in the center, and pour the liquid in the middle. You'll notice that the oil and syrup won't mix. With your fingertips, work the flour into the oil part of the liquid until you can integrate it with the syrup. If you don't do this, you won't get a smooth and consistent dough.
Keep an eye on your eggs -- After carefully measuring your ingredients (135-140g of paste will fit into a mooncake mold), make a ball of paste, create an indentation, and then place your egg yolks inside, making sure not to leave any air bubbles. Then, make indentations at the top -- like a bowling ball -- so you know where the eggs are. Otherwise, you may wind up with top-bottom eggs instead of side-side eggs.
Keep the edges fat -- Measure 40g of dough for each single-yolk cake (experts can do it in 37g). Make a small pancake and slap it on the paste ball. Spread the dough out with the heel of your hand so that it covers the entire ball. As you're working, remember to keep the edges of the expanding pancake fat -- otherwise, you'll run out before you finish.
Don't use too much oil -- The next step is to put your balls into a mooncake press, put them on an oiled sheet, and then press down. You need to oil the press and the sheet first. If you are a bit overzealous, like I am, you will over-oil everything, which will result in your mooncakes sliding to the edge of the pan while they bake -- and then they will brown unevenly. Don't do this.
Don't use too much egg -- Mist the cakes with a spray-bottle of water and bake them in three rounds: 10-15 mins at 190C, 8-10 mins at 170C, 8-10 mins at 150C. After rounds 1 and 2, brush the tops gently with egg. This gives the mooncake color. If, however, you're overzealous like me, you will over-egg the delicate dough, muddying the shape. Don't do that, either.
Wait (don't refrigerate) -- After all of that, let your mooncakes cool completely. Then put them upside down in a tupperware container. Don't do this when they're hot or you will crush the design. Also, do not refrigerate at this point or you will cause the oils to congeal and they won't come to the surface. Give the mooncakes 3-5 days of sitting unrefrigerated to become nice and glossy. Then, they can be stored up to 2-3 weeks.
My mooncakes came out slightly lopsided and muddy-looking, but they were golden brown and delicious! Next year I'm sure they will be perfect ;-)
If you're still reading, you may also be interested to know that mooncakes have an interesting history... When China was ruled by Mongolians during the Yuan dynasty (13th & 14th century), leaders from the previous Song dynasty organized a rebellion, coordinating their attack by sending out messages hidden in mooncakes during the Moon Festival.
You know how rare it is to be longing for something and then to actually have the experience you've been longing for?
Well, I went to my first Chinese cooking class at Towngas Cooking Centre yesterday, and it was really like someone had answered my prayers. I was feeling all hallelujah afterward.
Towngas is the gas company in Hong Kong. At first I thought it was funny that they have a cooking school there. Funny because what, are they encouraging you to use more gas? But it's really just fantastic community relations, as far as I can tell.
The Cooking Centre is on the lower floor of a big shopping complex in Causeway Bay. There is a nice, round reception space when you walk in filled with all sorts of cooking goodies (enamel-coated woks, fancy blenders, cookbooks...).
The teaching space itself is awesome. It's a big, long room with a U-shaped bar at the center and perfect little workstations distributed throughout the rest of the space. Each workstation has two gas burners, a wok, a counter with cutting board and cleaver, and a seasonings setup (e.g., salt, sugar, soy sauces, oil, etc.). There is also a nice, broad wooden stool and plenty of drawers to store your things.
The teacher had an amplified headset and spoke rapid-fire, alternating between English and Cantonese, with an assistant standing by. She was incredibly fast. There were 20-25 students there on a Tues between 2-4:30pm, six of which were male! (In fact, two were wearing matching necklaces and looked like gangster tough guys.) Everyone else: Chinese tai tais, helpers, a few young couples cooking together. And me, the only cracker in the place. Everyone was interested and enthusiastic and friendly.
In 1.5 hours, the teacher unraveled the mysteries of three basic Chinese dishes:
- Steamed Meat Cake with Dried Squid
- Stir-Fried Chicken with Green Pepper
- Thickened Beef Soup
To a Westerner, these probably don't sound terribly appetizing. What they are is the most basic version of dishes from which you can make endless variations. For me, perfect! These are building blocks.
"Have you noticed that when you eat a meat cake at a restaurant, it's juicy and delicious, but when you cook it at home it's dry and doesn't have much flavor?" Yes, I have. What's the secret? Water. You have to put water in *every* meat marinade. The meat absorbs water. If you add 1/8 tsp baking soda to 250g diced pork, it will make it softer and more absorbent. Those 250g of pork absorbed 5-6 tbls of water during the cooking demo. Also, you don't want to chop the pork too finely, otherwise, when you steam it, all of the juices will come out. The butcher can dice the pork for you. (Wow, really?)
Oh my gosh, so many fabulous tips answering all of these questions that come up when I cook Chinese food from cookbooks. Here are more:
- Ginger wine & cooking wines -- Ginger wine = ginger juice + cooking wine. There are three varieties cooking wine: white, shao hsing, and rose wine. White is for fish, shao hsing is sweeter like sherry and has many uses, rose is for roast meats. Ginger wine is used broadly in Chinese cooking to take the pungency out of things like steamed dried squid or to reduce the "bloody flavor" of bone-in chicken.
- Cleaver technique -- There's one basic knife for Chinese cooking: a monster cleaver. When you're shredding something, like a reconstituted mushroom, you should hold the opposite tip of the cleaver to keep it anchored. It gives you much more control.
- Soy sauceS -- Most Americans don't know there are two varieties: dark and light. You use both in Chinese cooking. Light is saltier. I think the "lightness" refers to the appearance. Light is more transparent and dark is opaque and a deeper color. In practice, light soy is the workhorse, goes in marinades, etc. Dark is used for color.
- Buying pork -- For the meat cakes, you want pork with 30% fat or "semi-fat pork." If you go to the butcher, you can ask for pork loin (10% fat) or pork belly (20% fat) or you can try "semi-fat" (never asked for anything like that in my life, but I'll give it a go).
- Sugar vs. salt -- If you have two pots in front of you and wonder which is which, remember that sugar is shinier.
- Triangles -- A common cut you'll see in stir-fries is a triangle. It's visually more interesting than plain old chunks. To make triangles, alternate the angle of your knife back and forth as you chop a strip of something. You can also cut your ginger into triangles too. (My diagrams below.)
- Chicken filets -- You can buy different types of chicken filets at frozen food stores in wet markets. One cut in particular has the drumstick and thigh meat removed from the bone in one piece. Much tastier than a chicken breast. But when you cut it, you should even out the thickness of the filet by cutting a flap into the thick part and folding out. It makes things cook more evenly.
- Oil in marinades -- Always add the oil at the very end, after you've let the meat soak in the other seasonings. Why? Otherwise the oil will coat the meat and prevent it from absorbing the other flavors. Aha!
- Sauces for stir-fries -- Stir-fries are quick (speak for yourself!), which is convenient, but the meat usually only marinates for 15-30 mins, which doesn't give it enough flavor. In addition to the marinade, you always make a little sauce to finish the dish that integrates everything. Add this bit by bit at the very end while tossing the wok so that it thickens. But finish quickly!
- Waterchestnut flour -- All these different flours get used in Chinese cooking. The most common are corn flour (the lightest), potato flour (more glutinous), and waterchestnut flour (4x as strong as corn flour). Waterchestnut flour gets used in a lot of thick soups because it is clear. But you must give it some time to dissolve because it has big grains.
- Salt on beef -- Don't do it! If you put salt on beef while cooking, it will make it hard.
- Meat soup -- Put the diced meat in a strainer and blanch briefly in boiling water while stirring with chopsticks, which will draw out the cloudy meat juice. There's enough flavor in the stock you're putting the meat into, so don't worry about losing the cloudy stuff. A thickened soup is ready when the ingredients float evenly rather than sinking to the bottom.
Oh boy, this is way too long. But I want these tips here for my records too.Anyway, after all of that, we went to our stations and cooked as fast as we could in the remaining 45 mins to produce the stir-fry and the beef cake. Then we ate some samples. I'd never used a wok before, but mine came out beautifully -- but of course, I forgot to take a picture. Argh! Next time...
