Chinese cooking covers many regional styles, but a handful of bottles turn up in almost every kitchen. With light soy sauce, oyster sauce, Shaoxing wine and sesame oil you can make most everyday stir-fries, and a black vinegar dip makes dumplings taste right.
If you only pick up three things today, make them light soy sauce, oyster sauce and Shaoxing wine. Everything below is sold in our stores (stock varies by store), and each item links to its product page.
Light soy sauce is the everyday one: thin, salty and used for seasoning. Add it to stir-fries, soups, marinades and dipping sauces. In most recipes, “soy sauce” means light soy.
Dark soy sauce is thicker, darker and less salty, with a hint of sweetness. It is used mainly for colour: a little gives braised pork, fried rice and noodles their rich brown colour.
A thick, savoury-sweet sauce. Spoon it over blanched greens such as pak choi with a little sesame oil, or add it to beef and vegetable stir-fries.
A Chinese rice wine for cooking. A splash in a marinade or a hot wok adds depth and fragrance to meat, seafood and dumpling fillings. It contains alcohol; dry sherry is the usual substitute.
Toasted sesame oil has a strong, nutty flavour, so it is used as a seasoning rather than for frying. Add a few drops at the end of cooking, or to dressings, dips and soups.
A spicy, salty paste of fermented broad beans and chilli, at the heart of Sichuan cooking. Fry a spoonful in oil until the oil turns red before adding other ingredients; it is the base of mapo tofu. It is salty, so taste before adding more soy sauce.
Spoon these over noodles, dumplings, rice and fried eggs. Chiu Chow chilli oil is full of garlic, chilli crisp adds crunch, and Lao Gan Ma black bean chilli oil is savoury from fermented black beans.
Vinegars: Chinkiang (Zhenjiang) black vinegar is dark, rich and malty: the classic dip for dumplings and the sour in hot and sour soup. Rice vinegar is lighter and sharper, for quick pickles, dressings and sweet and sour sauce.
Hoisin sauce: A thick, sweet and savoury sauce made with soybeans. Spread it on pancakes with crispy duck, brush it on pork before roasting, or add a spoonful to a stir-fry.
Sichuan peppercorns: Not hot like chilli, but tingly and numbing: the “ma” in mala. Toast them in a dry pan until fragrant, then grind.Mix 2 tablespoons of black vinegar with 1 tablespoon of light soy sauce, then add chilli oil to taste. Finely shredded fresh ginger or a little minced garlic makes it even better.
Put your new pantry to work with Chinese hot pot at home or dumplings and dim sum.
Everyone cooks together in one simmering pot in the middle of the table. In Sichuan and Chongqing the broth is numbing and spicy (málà); Cantonese hot pot (da bin lou) uses a clear, light broth.
