FFlavorlavor & Fortune D edicated T o T he A rt A nd S cience O f C hinese C uisine GOJI BERRIES; TIBETAN BUTTER TEA; MILK IN THE CHINESE CULINARY; HUNAN AND THEIR FOODS; MORE ABOUT SOUPS AND CONGEES; BOOK AND RESTAURANT REVIEWS. AND MORE Summer 2017 V olume 24(3) $6.95 US/ $9.95 Elsewhere 2 F lavor & F ortune Fall 2017 FFlavorlavor & Fortune Volume 24, Number 3 Fall 2017 Food For Thought ........................................................................2 About the publisher; Table of Contents; Dear Reader Letters to the Editor ....................................................................5 Persimmon cakes; Animals in the zodiac; Confucius on knowledge; Bubble Tea and cooking IRVING BEILIN CHANG: A MEMORIAL (1923 - 2017) .............6 HUNAN: PROVINCE AND FOODS ................................................7 GOJI BERRIES: ONCE CALLED WOLFBERRIES ................................11 FOOD TIPS FROM A BLOGGER .......................................................13 by Rachel Stintson MILK: AND THE CHINESE CULINARY ..........................................14 DAI MINORITY: FESTIVALS AND FOOD ......................................16 ON OUR BOOKSHELVES ..................................................................18 China The Cookbook by Kei Lum Chan and Diora Fong Chan Dumpling Galaxy, The by Helen You Eating Asian American by Robert Ji-Song Ku, Martin F. Manalansan IV, and Anita Msannur Fresh Off the Boat by Eddie Huang Food in Shanghai by Chen Xiande and Chen Zhuyi Most Popular Quick and Easy Chinese Recipes by Lili Weng TIBETAN BUTTER TEA .....................................................................22 FIN FISH: ANCIENT AND CURRENT .............................................24 ON MANY MENUS ..........................................................................30 SOUPS AND CONGEE: FUJIANESE AND OTHER .........................32 THREE ASIAN CUISINES: COMPARISONS ....................................36 THANKS TO OUR DONORS, SPONSORS, AND SUPPORTERS ...38 RENEWAL FORM ..............................................................................39 RECIPE INDEX AND SUBSCRIPTION INFORMATION ................40 All pictures are from the files or camera of the editor except those by other authors whose pictures can be from their own camera and/or files The cover picture is a glass of ‘bubble’ tea, also known as ‘boba’ tea. Articles ending with a (JMN) are by the editor. Fall 2017 F lavor & F ortune 3 Flavor & Fortune Editor-in-chief: Jacqueline M. Newman Dear Reader: China Correspondent Wang Xi This third volume of our twenty-fourth year is but one issue away from beginning our twenty-fifth year; and that is a milestone for us, for sure. Business Manager We appreciate all kind words expressed in recent phone calls to the editor Charles Tang of Flavor and Fortune, which is to our knowledge, the only English-language ■■■ Chinese food magazine published and printed in the US. Flavor & Fortune In this issue, be sure to read the article about the Hunan Province and is published quarterly its foods. Information requested often. Also check out the one about goji by the Institute for the Advancement of the berries, once known as wolfberries. They are popular indeed, and very Science and Art of high in Vitamin C, one of fruit’s best sources of this needed vitamin. Chinese Cuisine: dba: ISACC, Several who visited Beijing asked about the origins of milk and milk dishes and holds the copyright thereto; in China’s culinary. Yogurt appears on many street corners in lovely glass all rights reserved. or ceramic containers in this capital city and in others further north. It is usually made from cow’s milk or yak milk; and one can be substituted for Their ISSN is: 1078-5361 the other. Take a look and enjoy the recipes using milk in this issue and and others found in the recipe index listings on the magazine’s website. We subscription, apologize for no detailed nor specific answers to the myriad of questions membership. information, one reader posed; forty pages in each quarterly issue are controlling. For and forms, those pleased with items about minority folk, enjoy and learn from the can be found on page 39 Subscriptions item about the Dai; and know that will detail the Li minority population in are for four issues future issues and others. and must be postpaid as: $25.00 in the US, $45.00 in Canada, and Check out the items about Tibetan Butter Tea and the one with more about $60.00 in all other countries Soups and many Congees many are of Min origins. All should appreciate the article about Fin Fish, all minorities love these swimmers; and delight INDIVIDUAL ISSUES reading about the books reviewed in this issue. More of all of the above also postpaid are $12.00 each in US, will appear in future issues including an article about Mongol-Chinese in $15.00 each in Canada, the US, a growing population. $20.00 each everywhere else. Enjoy upcoming articles about kiwi. The Chinese bitter melon, and about Payment only accepted as: turtles and snails, either reviled or loved. They will be in upcoming issues; 1) US dollar bank checks lots more, too. or 2) US dollar traveler checks, Many thanks for the kudos coming our way; they are heartwarming. So or 3) Canadian postal money orders are many other nice comments, and your growing number of culinary requests; and thanks for the ‘in advance’ wishes for my upcoming 85th with all checks made year. We appreciate them all! payable to: ISACC, mailed to: FLAVOR AND FORTUNE The Editor, @ 3 Jefferson Ferry Drive S. Setauket NY 11720 Mail everything to the above address, or e-mail: [email protected] or send them via the web at www.flavorandfortune.com 4 F lavor & F ortune Fall 2017 Letters to the Editor Harley says: to a designated spot on the other shore That legend said You need to know ‘shi zi bing’ are persimmon cakes the cat and the rat were good friends at that time, both the from the city of Xian. A recipe for them and more worst swimmers, so they jumped on the back of the ox. The is at: www.travelchinaguide.com/tour/food/chinese- rat was crafty and pushed the cat into the river before they cooking/persimmon-cake.htm got to the other side. When the ox got there, the rat jumped off and ran to the designated spot and cleverly claimed first place. The rabbit told the Emperor he thought he would win because he jumped from stone to stone. The pig who came in last told the emperor he stopped to eat as he was hungry, also exhausted after his difficult swim. Sid asks: You once said the main meat Chinese eat is pork, do you know how much each person eats a year? Sid: We recently read that Chinese each eat eighty- seven pounds of pork every year. Also learned half the pork consumed in the world is eaten by Chinese people. RhoNa of Los ANGeLES: Heard that Confucius told what knowledge really was. Harley: Thank you for this information. This Where is that quote? Also, which cooking methods magazine’s readers and I appreciate it because as you did he think were Yin and which were Yang? know, only one recipe for this fruit did cross our desk RhoNa: What he said that we think you mean has before. We have been to Xian three times, always in nothing to do with food. We think you mean what he either late spring or summer. We have never seen nor said about ‘real knowledge’ was that ‘real knowledge is to tasted them. Truthfully, we did not even know they know the extent of one’s ignorance.’ As to your second existed. In addition, we never saw a recipe for them question about culinary qualities, we found nothing that in the thousands of Chinese cookbooks in English we Confucius said about that. He did say lots about cutting donated to Stony Brook University’s Special Collections. food. Cooking techniques with yin qualities include We hope to eat them in Xian if we go when they are in boiling, steaming, and poaching, those with yang ones season. Until then, we will try to make them next Fall include deep-frying, roasting, and stir-frying. or Winter. Be advised that we research and write all articles, including this one, more than six months before publication: they are not in season now. from Jai Lee in Taiwan: We live south in Taiwan and From sue-Lu in Idaho: in the countryside. I have Do the Chinese eat any of the animals that are in never seen boba tea, can you their zodiac; and when did they start naming them? tell us about it. SUE-LU: The Chinese eat them all except for the dragon Jai Lee: You may know which is a mythical animal. You can read about the twelve this boba tea as bubble tea, Chinese Han zodiac animals, and find recipes for every one so named for the usually black but the above mythical one, that is for the rat, ox, tiger, cassava bubbles; that sink to rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, sheep, monkey, rooster, dog, its bottom. There are a few and the pig that some call a boar. After a twelve year cycle, companies making theirs in these twelve years begin again with the rat, and the Chinese assorted colors, though as of believe that a complete cycle is five of the twelve years, or the moment we have no color sixty years all together. Many Chinese minority populations picture of them. This hot or cold have the same and/or other animals in their zodiac. The tea can be had in many flavors, legend we read said these years began before measuring and with or without milk in it. time many centuries ago, and that the Jade Emperor Now very popular in the US, decided on a race to name these years with all animals in it was first was popularized in his kingdom invited to his birthday party. He decreed that your country in the 1980s.