Szechuan pork duet

Two easy and complementary Lao Sze Chuan-type dishes can be made with an almost completely overlapping ingredient list, and with only two inexpensive fresh ingredients: ground pork and a bunch of scallions. Everything else can be purchased months in advance as part of your stock-up, and pulled from the pantry and fridge when needed. My pork duet for the evening is Szechuan pork wontons and Ma Po Do Fu (Tofu).



ingredient list for serving two

Fresh ingredients

9 oz (about .6 lb) ground pork, not too lean
1 bunch scallions
fresh ginger (if not using jarred)
fresh garlic (if not using jarred)

Larder ingredients (brands I used)

black bean and garlic paste (Lee Kum Kee)
mushroom dark soy (Lee Kum Kee)
light soy (Mitsukan)
rice wine vinegar (Mitsukan)
sesame oil (Dynasty)
jarred minced ginger (Trader Joe's)
minced or pre-peeled garlic (Whole Foods)
14-16 oz soft tofu in water (Whole Foods)
wonton wrappers (Nasoya)
mixed peppercorns (Williams Sonoma)
Szechuan peppercorns (under the table Tony Hu)
Sriracha Thai hot sauce
vegetable stock (Whole Foods)
corn starch
peanut oil
powdered ginger
sea salt
turbinado sugar

Notes

Start to finish, this is about 35 minutes of work with ingredients assembled, and requires a skillet or wok, a steamer (I use a bamboo steamer nestled in a enameled iron pot), two bowls, and a cutting board. I like McCormick Pepper Medley Grinder in addition to Williams Sonoma 5 Pepper Blend, as both contain allspice and pink and green peppercorns. Neither really contains true Szechuan peppercorns, which are not actually pepper and offers numbness (ma) instead of heat (la). This is a different ma than the one in Ma Po Do Fu, which means "old pockmarked lady's bean curd" (for the pits in the tofu or an apocryphal story about the original purveyor), the ma there coming from mazi, pit.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sichuan_pepper

My source is LSC, which included a packet in a takeout order when I shared my enthusiasm for the spice. You can try this or look around at your local Asian grocer. Remember to use the crushed husk and not the seed itself, which is very bitter and brings an unpleasant intensity to the numbness. The two dishes almost ready on the stove:



Process

1. Pour water off tofu block, towel it dry. Cut in half lengthwise and crosswise, and cut each quarter in half lengthwise and crosswise, into bite-sized cubes. Let cubes rest in a towel-lined bowl while readying other ingredients; it's nice to have them fairly dry by showtime. With cutting board free, slice rooty bottoms of scallions and rub between fingers to remove slimy outer skin. Slice very greenest tops of scallions into thin rings and reserve for garnish. Sliver middle section of scallions lengthwise. Cut last bit of green and white bottoms into rings for tofu.

2. take about two thirds of the pork (about 6 oz) and place in a second bowl. Drizzle with dark soy (tbsp), a drop of sesame oil, a tsp of minced ginger, an extra dusting of powdered ginger, a pinch of salt, a pinch of sugar, and liberal crackings of peppercorn blend. Add slivered portion of scallions. Mix with two spoons or hands until distributed, sticky, and not very moist.

3. boil 2 cups water under bamboo steamer, and heat 1 tbsp (or more, if you're going for LSC-style oil pools) peanut oil in skillet or wok.

4. put remaining unseasoned pork (about 3 oz) in hot skillet with minced garlic, pinch salt, cracked pepper, and let render over medium heat, shaking occasionally, about 5 minutes. It can get quite crisp; no problem.

5. while pork is cooking down, quickly make wontons on cutting board by filling each wrapper with about 1 tsp of seasoned pork, wetting edges, and drawing up in a little purse. You should be able to get 16-20 wontons from 6 oz pork, just right for two steamer batches of 8-10:



6. when pork is crisp, remove with slotted spoon or spatula to paper towel.

7. to rendered pork fat and oil in skillet, add sliced ring portion of scallions (except for reserved garnish rings), 2-3 tsp of fermented black bean garlic paste, 1-5 shakes sriracha for color and heat, and 1-2 rounded tsp of minced ginger.

8. when scallions are almost wilting, shake some cornstarch and pepper grinds on the mostly-dry tofu, and then add tofu to pan, cooking for an additional minute until sauce and scallions start to stick to tofu.

9. add up to one cup of vegetable stock (depending on how saucy you like your ma po) to the pan, reduce heat, and let simmer. I'm usually in a hurry and go with 1/2 cup stock to lower total cooking time (and have thicker, stickier ma po).

10. steam first batch of wontons for about 4 minutes, either on oiled parchment, or after prepping bamboo with a little sprayed or brushed oil.

11. when first wonton batch is ready, check skillet for sauce consistency and tofu doneness. Add sugar to taste. Start second wonton batch.

12. make wonton dipping sauce (optional, if you have chili oil on hand already and like your wontons Chengdu style, which is essentially coated with oil): in a dipping bowl, mix 2 parts light soy to 1 part dark soy. Add a generous splash rice wine vinegar, tiny drop sesame oil, drop of water, good amount of sugar, and minced and powdered ginger.

13. when second wonton batch is ready, check skillet. Sauce should be reduced, sweet, spicy, and quite rich. Turn in cooked pork, additional cornstarch (if not thick enough), and Szechuan peppercorn husks, and cook through for an additional minute. Off heat, add final touch of dark soy for salt and color.

Serve tofu and wontons together; tofu can be served over rice if there is extra sauce or interest in allaying numbness / heat. Spoon chili oil over wontons or offer dipping bowl at table.



Addition

If you have to have a crisp vegetable accompaniment, and have yu choy or baby bok choy on hand, after removing tofu from wok or skillet, sautee vegetable in residual oil and seasonings for two minutes. Add additional vegetable stock, cover, cook until tender. This deglazes and helps to clean the pan nicely.

If you have more friends dropping by, you can extend the dumpling filling quite a bit with finely diced cabbage and mushrooms, and increasing the dark soy and seasonings. This has the additional benefit of using all of your wrappers, which usually come in packages of 50.

You can also make this meal vicariously with no real ingredients by playing Cooking Mama Cook Off on the Nintendo Wii:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e9Bz8tn5J-k

Happy New Year, cooking, and stomach.

Wow that looks so beautiful!

How long did it take to cook it all?

Thanks, Liz! It's really easy since the steps for the two dishes can be carried out while the other is cooking (wrap dumplings while pork is cooking, cook sauce base while first batch of dumplings are steaming, etc.). I did this on Sunday night; I got all ingredients in place at about 6, watched 30 minutes of news, started actively cooking at 6:30, and was serving at 7:10. It's a lot of hands-on, but there is no marinating and no fussy pre-prep except for the draining of the tofu (the drier the better, as the sauce will permeate the cubes more).

Very nice! Maybe I'll make the Ma Po Do Fu this weekend. It'll give me an excuse to practice saying "Ma Po Do Fu" over and over again...

The wontons look great. I should really get a steamer. The tofu looks pretty good too, I have never had much luck making tofu taste good, then again, I haven't cooked with it that many times.

Santander wrote:Remember to use the crushed husk and not the seed itself, which is very bitter and brings an unpleasant intensity to the numbness.

Nice looking duet, Santander. I have made a similar recipe, but like mine on the wetter side. Your comment about the sichuan peppercorns was intriguing though. I think my recipe is more geared to western ingredients and uses a different spice source. But I might have a Spice House bag of the peppercorns sitting around somewhere. Did you actually have to separate the husks from the seed in preparing the dish? Or had that already been done to the supply you were given?

gastro gnome wrote:

Santander wrote:Remember to use the crushed husk and not the seed itself, which is very bitter and brings an unpleasant intensity to the numbness.

Nice looking duet, Santander. I have made a similar recipe, but like mine on the wetter side. Your comment about the sichuan peppercorns was intriguing though. I think my recipe is more geared to western ingredients and uses a different spice source. But I might have a Spice House bag of the peppercorns sitting around somewhere. Did you actually have to separate the husks from the seed in preparing the dish? Or had that already been done to the supply you were given?

Look at your bag. I think you will find that most of the husks and seeds have already seperated.