Red cooking, also called Chinese stewing, red stewing, red braising, or flavor potting, is a slow braising Chinese cooking technique that imparts a reddish-brown coloration to the prepared food. Red cooking likely originated in Jiangsu province.
There are two types of red cooking:
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Hongshao (): can be done in less than 20 minutes and usually does not require much water
-
Lu (): usually requires prolonged cooking of up to several hours and the items must be submerged in the cooking liquid.
Types
Soy sauce (usually a mix of light and dark soy sauce), fermented bean paste, red
fermented tofu and
rock sugar is commonly used to both flavor and impart a reddish-brown hue to the items being cooked. Food coloring is sometimes added for a more intense red coloration. Both
lu and
hongshao are forms of
stewing or
braising characterized by usage of soy sauce, Chinese
rice wine (
Shaoxing wine,
huangjiu etc.) and rock sugar. Whole spices (
star anise,
black cardamom (
caoguo), cassia or
fennel seeds) or five-spice powder are crucial elements in these dishes but are used in moderation so that their flavors do not overwhelm the main ingredients.
Red-cooked stews may be heavy in meat content or contain a variety of meats, vegetables, and boiled egg. Such dishes may be served hot or cold, and the sauce or stock is often reused as master stock.
See also
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Charmaine Solomon's Encyclopedia of Asian Food, Charmaine Solomon, 1998, Tuttle,
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Chinese Cooking for Dummies, Martin Yan, 2000, For Dummies,
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Martin Yan's Invitation to Chinese Cooking, Martin Yan, 2000, Bay Books,
-
Xiandai Hanyu Cidian (Modern Chinese Dictionary), Shang Wu Press, Beijing, 1996,
External links
