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I have noticed that the flavor of chinese food is in sauce they use. Maybe true of all cooking, I don't know for sure because I am still an amateur. But I would like to have my own chinese sauce for vegetable dishes etc. Does anyone make their own? If you buy it bottled in a chinese grocery store what king do you buy? What should a person look for? I know that there are recipes on the internet and I tried one and it was o.k. but I would like some input.
Ar you talking about soy sauce? Sweet and sour sauce? Go to the Asian section of your local supermarket and buy half a dozen bottles of LaChoy or Kikkoman sauces and start experimenting. Eventually you'll figure out what you like.
Nickerman, I do make many of my own Asian sauces, but what it takes is a few months of collecting the authentic ingredients. This takes research, Ebay and imports from the Asian world.
Now that I have all of those exotic ingredients, I am always able to make a small amount of those sauces when in need.
But know that (although shipping from China on Ebay is usually free) you will spend money to have an ingredient that you won't use all the time, you will have to research each sauce, gather those ingredients, and then wait. Most are shelf-stable...either fermented already or dry.
I guess what I'm saying here, is unless you really, really love Asian food, the effort will not be worth it. We love Asian cooking, so to us it was well worth the small investment.
If you are new to cooking, I would suggest you just buy as the Poster above me mentioned, already-made. They are
perfectly mixed and authentic.
I like very spicy Asian food. If you'd like to see/create some real Sichuan recipes (she even lists sauces you can make) try
this lady:
edit: Have you ever looked into cooking class style cookbooks? I love the e-books available at Amazon.
Super cheap-sometimes free. You can download them via Kindle, or even a free program Kindle has, that can be used on a desktop/laptop---which I use.
They teach technique and break everything down to it's smallest, so even a beginner can learn. When I first started learning to cook, I asked my wife first, (great cook) and then as I got further into it I looked up books and classes so I could further my education into the palate.
Last edited by TerraDown; 04-20-2017 at 12:48 PM..
You can approximate some Asian condiments with ingredients like ginger, rice vinegar, plum jam, etc. But there are a lot of sauces used in Asian cooking that you may or may not be able to readily source the appropriate ingredients to make.
I regularly cook Asian food at home and stock all or most of the essentials.
Then all you have to do is follow a recipe either from a blog, web site or cookbook and after a while you can create your own by experimenting. These are some of ingredients I keep in the cupboard or refrigerator. I actually keep this stiff and not making it up.
Regular Soy Sauce
Dark Soy Sauce
Rice Wine Vinegar
Cooking wine or sherry
Gochugang (Korean Chili Paste)
Doenjang (Korean Soybean Paste)
Doubanjang (Sichuan Broadbean Paste)
Hoisin Sauce
Oyster Sauce
Fish Sauce
Sichuan Peppercorns
Chili Bean Paste w/Garlic
Sesame Paste
Korean Red Pepper Flakes
Fermented Black Beans
Dry peppers such as Arbol Peppers
Sesame Oil
Corn Starch
Chicken Stock
And then I buy fresh when I plan to cook Asian
Garlic
Ginger
Scallions
These are more or less the staples when I cook Chinese or Korean.
Then your dish will call for whatever proteins, vegetables, tofu, noodles, wraps etc. which you also buy when you need.
It takes a little time to learn but like I said, after a while you will get the hang of it. I do know this, the food I cook is superior in quality to most or all of the Chinese food I get in restaurants. Not only that, I know exactly what is going into the dishes.
Our big box supermarket stock most of this stuff but we also have an Asian market which fills in the rest.
I think most of us do a variety, make some ourselves and purchase some sauces. I don't have a favorite brand, I just shop at the Asian market and decide what I want or if I want to make my own. I do keep some ingredients on hand all the time like, soy sauce, ginger, sesame oil and Asian hot sauce for starters.
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