334953 Tue Oct 17 21:45:05 -0700 2006 27 31 Home Cooking 0 1953022 I just made F. Dunlop's Traditional Dan Dan Noodles. I was hoping for a taste similar to the old Sam Lok restaurant in San Francisco's downtown chinatown. Instead, it was quite different. And, even though I reduced the soy sauce by about 1/2, it was too salty. What has been your experience? Fuschia offers a second Dan Dan Noodle recipe, called Xie Laoban's Dan Dan Noodles. The recipe calls for ground beef, instead of ground pork. Is this correct? Do chowhounds prefer one Dan Dan Noodle version over the other? Tue Oct 17 21:45:05 -0700 2006 10025 elise h 1 1953201 I have been trying the EXACT same thing! I've been trying to replicate Sam Lok's dan dan noodles with those two recipes in Land of Plenty. Sam Lok's is heavier on both the sesame paste and the chili oil than either of Dunlop's recipes. Also, I think Sam Lok puts a lot of cilantro in the ground pork, which Dunlop doesn't. I haven't gotten it close by any means, either, but I haven't been back to Sam Lok since I started to try to make it at home. We should join forces! Tue Oct 17 22:54:58 -0700 2006 1953022 10032 david kaplan 1 1954054 Have you tried using light soy sauce? (the one with the green cap) Just as much flavor with less saltiness. Mrs Chiang, who I idolize, uses 2T soy sauce per serving, plus Szechuan and red peppers, and massive amounts of garlic for her dan dan noodles Wed Oct 18 06:03:32 -0700 2006 1953022 12297 crowsonguy 1 1954467 I've made both recipes from Dunlap's cookbook, and found that both were delicious...but I do use low-sodium soy. Interesting that you should mention dan-dan noodles; I recently had dan-dan at Grand Sichuan International on 9th Avenue in Manhattan, and the dish was nothing more than noodles afloat in chili oil...so disappointing! Can you describe the Sam Lok noodles to me? There are no chinese restos offering dan-dan noodles in my corner of the deeper-than-deep south. Wed Oct 18 14:47:16 -0700 2006 1953022 12023 Hungry Celeste 2 1957816 elise h, Melanie Wong, and I dissected the dan dan mien yesterday at Sam Lok (a.k.a. Z&Y, 655 Jackson near Kearny in SF). First, the description. There is a deep pool of chili oil at the bottom of the bowl. On top of the thick noodles is a schmear of thick dark Chinese sesame paste. On top of that is a pile of ground pork cooked with Szechuan pepper and what we thought were fermented soybeans. On top of all that are finely chopped preserved yellow vegetable, peanuts, and scallon greens. Relating this to the recipes in Dunlop's book: 1. Fuchsia Dunlop has one beef version and one pork version. 2. There is no cilantro, contrary to my earlier hunch. 3. Fuchsia Dunlop neglects to mention that Tianjin picked vegetable in the earthenware pot needs to be rinsed to get all the salt off. We surmised that that omitted instruction contribued to elise h's salty at-home rendition. The vegetable the Sam Lok version was not salty. 4. No traces of ginger or garlic, neither of which Dunlop uses, either. But the fermented beans in the meat aren't part of either of Dunlop's recipes. 5. Sam Lok uses much more chili oil and ground Szechuan pepper than either of Dunlop's recipes. So much for the research. We tossed it all together, which was a many-minutes gentle activity, given the thick sesame paste and my fear of getting chili oil all over my shirt. The noodles were slick from all the chili oil, a bit creamy from the sesame paste, gritty from the vegetable, peanuts, and ground pepper, and nubbly from the ground pork. Consensus was that it was very good, though perhaps too much sesame paste. In previous visits, I've had it with even more sesame paste and much less chili oil, which I've liked much less. Too much sesame paste quickly overwhelms the taste and the texture. I think Melanie pointed out that the Taiwanese version of dan dan mien doesn't use sesame paste, which is a key difference from Sam Lok's Szechuan version. I'm going back today for more. Thu Oct 19 17:46:26 -0700 2006 1954467 10032 david kaplan 3 1957893 elise bought some sesame paste yesterday with me in Chinatown, maybe the next iteration will be out soon. Correction - Taiwanese interpretation's of dan dan mian use lots of sesame paste and/or peanuts. Thu Oct 19 18:08:02 -0700 2006 1957816 10039 Melanie Wong 4 1957912 Thanks for the correction. Would you say that Sam Lok's amount of sesame paste is typical for Taiwanese interpretations, or are Taiwanese interpretations even more sesame-y than Sam Lok's? Sam Lok's, btw, was more sesame-y than one of Fuchsia Dunlop's versions; her other version omits sesame paste altogether. Thu Oct 19 18:13:31 -0700 2006 1957893 10032 david kaplan 5 1957939 Thanks to you all for such a detailed description! Now I'm looking forward to another try at the recipes. Thu Oct 19 18:19:56 -0700 2006 1957912 12023 Hungry Celeste 5 1957997 Sam Lok/Z & Y uses more sesame paste now (as in any) than I'd expect from a Sichuan-Sichuan place and less than a Taiwanese-Sichuan place. Here are some older threads with descriptions of how dan dan mian is presented in different areas. http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/18599 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/19103#62816 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/22536 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/33009#146944 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/18746 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/34996 http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/39773 We should go to New China Delight in Mountain View... Thu Oct 19 18:36:02 -0700 2006 1957912 10039 Melanie Wong 4 1965149 This thread of posts is fabulous. To me it's better than a Dick Francis mystery (but not a Tony Hillerman). There's good sleuthing, bum leads, clues, and, we hope, at the end the solving of the Mystery of the Dan Dan Noodles! I love these descriptions of what's missing and what shouldn't be in the dish. Thank you guys. Mon Oct 23 04:14:48 -0700 2006 1957893 10245 oakjoan 3 1958339 I make both of F.D.'s recipes, like em both a lot. I always rince the Tianjin picked vegetable in all recipes where I use it and increase the sichuan pepper to at least double what is called for in the recipe. I find that the amout of sichuan pepper called for in cookbooks is never enough to get the numbing taste, I suspect because of the USDA required heat treatment. I also increase the amounts of dried red pepper and home made chili oil cause I like an extreme burn! The only recipe that I have not found to be excellent in F.D.'s first book is the one for 'Boiled Beef Slices In a Fiery Sauce' on pages 226-228 of the American edition, which ends up with a tasty brown sauce but I was looking more for the water boiled beef and/or fish that I eat in local sichuan restaurants. If anyone has a better recipe for 'water boiled ______' fill in the protein of choice; I'd be grateful! Thu Oct 19 20:22:28 -0700 2006 1957816 10864 sel 4 1959817 I found that using significantly less corn starch than the recipe calls for resulted in the consistency I was expecting in the Boiled Beef Slices in Fiery Sauce. Probably half of what is called for. Good chicken broth/stock is essential, too. Fri Oct 20 13:34:25 -0700 2006 1958339 29343 GWRyan 3 3439076 In the pantry section of Revolutionary Chinese where she discusses the Tianjin pickled vegetable in the earthenware pot, F.D. says that you need to rinse it. I wonder if she says the same in the pantry section of Land of Plenty, too? Still, it would be nice to have a reminder to rinse the Tianjin pickled vegetables in the recipe itself. ~TDQ Wed Feb 27 03:52:54 -0800 2008 1957816 12005 The Dairy Queen 1 1959435 Sam Lok, aka Z & Y in San Francisco, has cilantro leaves as garnish, which adds nicely to the taste. Thanks for the deconstruction, guys! This is making me hungry. Fri Oct 20 04:32:51 -0700 2006 1953022 12297 crowsonguy 2 1965159 Here's a link to the lunch post on the SF Bay Area board. Mon Oct 23 04:23:35 -0700 2006 1959435 10039 Melanie Wong 1 1964339 I just finished making the second of the two Fuchsia Dunlop Dan Dan Noodles recipes, for the second time. The first recipe is inadmissable in our household, because it doesn't contain peanut or sesame. I'll have to try it out when my wife is on vacation. I do love this second ("Xie Laoban's Dan Dan Noodles") recipe from the Dunlop book (British Edition, if that matters). However, I love it even more with some changes from the first time I made it. Here's what I did: - I used 1 lb of fresh egg noodles in place of the 300g dried flour-only noodles specified in the recipe, and a 1 1/2 times recipe of sauce and meat. I did not use salt in the noodle cooking water. - I used fresh-roasted and ground Sichuan Pepper in the meat mixture in place of the specified whole peppers. When I used the whole peppers the last time, I wasn't too pleased with the crunchy whole peppers in the final result. With the peppers being ground, I was careful to not heat the oil too much before adding the spices, and I was also more restrained with the heat to the beef (I used flank steak, which I would definitely recommend), so that it would be more juicy then crisp. - I added 1 tsp of sugar to 1 sauce mixture recipe. This made the sauce seem less salty, and really brought out the sesame flavor. I'm somewhat surprised that the original recipe has no sugar; I'm so used to there being some sugar in a recipe like this, to liven flavors, and that's exactly the effect it had when I added it. I did not find the final result too salty. Sichuan recipes' saltiness can really be affected by what brand of ingredients you choose. I used: - Pearl River Bridge light and dark soy sauces - Lian How brand Sesame paste Lian How is a brand I almost always prefer when there's a choice. It's possible that it's significantly less salty than other sesame pastes, I don't know. I have not eaten at Sam Lok. It sounds as though I need to remedy that. I've had a number of different restaurant renditions of Dan Dan Noodles, but my archetypal favorite is the version served at Szechuan Chonquing restaurant in Vancouver, BC. It's actually a soup noodles dish with an optional pork topping, but as you eat, the noodles soak up the soup and turn it into a thickish sauce. I like to use fried bread to soak up the extra sauce. The Dunlop second recipe doesn't really resemble the Szechuan Chonquing version...except that there is a sort of spiritual resemblence in the richness, piquancy, savoriness of the two dishes. So while I've made versions that seemed to come closer in flavor (Kenneth Lo's, IIRC) to the Vancouver noodles, Fuchsia Dunlop's is nevertheless my preferred Dan Dan Noodles for making at home. Sun Oct 22 19:11:23 -0700 2006 1953022 39317 SoupNoodles 1 1965054 Using suggestions from SoupNoodles, David Kaplan, and Melanie, I made a dramatically altered version of Dunlop's second recipe. Cautious of saltiness, I cut the soysauce to 1/5 and omitted the salt; added sugar, peanut butter (didn't have peanuts), and bean paste. I used the Lan Chi sesame paste, which is considerably darker than sesame tahini. Instead of beef, I used pork. I rinsed the Tianjin preserved vegetables. Even after rinsing, these vegetables were exceedingly salty. So, I only added 1/8 teaspoon, rather than 2 tablespoons. Therefore, be very careful about using this vegetable. The noodles are still not as tasty as those of Z&Y /Sam Lok and are too dry. But it's much closer! Thanks hounds for the help. Additional observations about Z&Y's version: 1. the meat had a finer texture than regular ground pork 2. the noodles were thick, like Shanghai noodles Mon Oct 23 03:10:15 -0700 2006 1953022 10025 elise h 2 1965088 Did you increase the quantity of sichuan pepper corn? To my eye, the noodles at Z&Y are thinner than what's sold in Chinatown as Shanghai noodles, which are closer to udon in scale. They looked like regular ol' "chow mein" use egg noodles to me, though we postulated that they might be the precooked "steamed" variety. Chinese noodle thread on General board - http://www.chowhound.com/topics/show/328608 Mon Oct 23 03:36:08 -0700 2006 1965054 10039 Melanie Wong 3 1965118 What may have thrown Elise off is that some noodle places featuring the Hong Kong Style noodle soups refer to the "regular mein" as "Shanghai style", probably because the "regular" mein is about the same thickness as used in noodle soups in Shanghai and other parts north, though not as thick as those used in "Shanghai style" chow mian. Hon's is one place that comes to mind that has "Shanghai Style" noodle soup on the menu referring to the medium thickness noodles. Mon Oct 23 03:56:52 -0700 2006 1965088 10255 Gary Soup 4 1965135 I should defer to her because she's Shanghainese and knows more about this than I do. (g) Mon Oct 23 04:06:41 -0700 2006 1965118 10039 Melanie Wong 5 1965179 Probably so, but I also don't recall Sam Lok's dan dan noodles being as thick as what I properly would call Shanghai noodles, but it's been a while since I've had them. Mon Oct 23 04:36:57 -0700 2006 1965135 10255 Gary Soup 3 1965169 Are the noodles in dan dan mien (either at Sam Lok, or in general) egg noodles? I thought the Sam Lok noodles were eggless wheat noodles, which is also what I bought when I tried to make it at home and was simply labeled "Chinese noodles" at 99 Ranch. If dan dan mien calls for egg noodles, what are the eggless wheat noodles used for in Chinese cooking? Mon Oct 23 04:30:21 -0700 2006 1965088 10032 david kaplan 1 1965193 I was searching for Fuchsia Dunlop mentions/recipes online and came across a site which has at least 2 videos. The one I watched featured her on a show (Good Food TV)which seemed to be hosted by a rather loud woman who said things like "Can you use the water? It's okay to drink?" when Dunlop was talking about the Hui people. She did make a wonderful looking "polo" or pilaf with lamb. I found it by searching for Fuchsia Dunlop. I think it was UKTV. The recipe is also written out. Mon Oct 23 04:50:35 -0700 2006 1953022 10245 oakjoan 1 1968568 If you want another take on making Dan Dan noodles from a reliable source, try Mrs Chiang's Szechwan Cookbook, which has the recipe at this link: http://www.shibboleth.org/mrs.chiangs/pmwiki.php?n=Main.DonDonNoodles Very different, but also great. Her Ants Climb A Tree, Red Cooked Beef With Noodles, and Noodles With Meat Sauce are family favorites, and her recipe organization is very easy to follow. Anyone else use her? Tue Oct 24 15:03:00 -0700 2006 1953022 12297 crowsonguy 2 1968586 Funny - that was my first foray into a Chinese cookbook when I was in my 20s back in the 80s (I think it was also one of the first authentic Szechuan cookbooks to come out). I remember it being really informative and full of information. I haven't used it in a long time - I'll have to pull it out and try some of the old recipes! Tue Oct 24 15:10:45 -0700 2006 1968568 10271 Rubee 2 1969285 Thanks for the link, bought the book at a local used cookbook store recently but I sometimes like to print out recipes and stick em up on the fridge when I cook. Tue Oct 24 18:42:44 -0700 2006 1968568 10864 sel 1 1970602 Made a pretty successful rendition of Fuchsia Dunlop's second version tonight. My divergences from the recipe: 1) I soaked the preserved vegetable in several changes of water. 2) I added a touch of sugar to the sauce. 3) I included chopped scallions at the end (which Dunlop only does in recipe #1. 4) I used ground pork instead of ground beef. 5) I used much, much more ground Szechuan pepper. 6) I used Shanghai-style fresh noodles. It was close enough to the Sam Lok version that I could finally figure out the remaining differences. First, the recipe calls for mixing all the liquids first into a smooth sauce, whereas Sam Lok keeps the chili oil separate (and at the bottom of the bowl) from the schmear of sesame paste (on top of the noodles). Stirring the Sam Lok noodles doesn't mix the elements as fully as Dunlop does. Second, Sam Lok uses many times the amount of chili oil that Dunlop does. The chili oil at Sam Lok is 1-2 inches deep at the bottom of the bowl. I cannot bring myself to use that much oil at home, for fear of becoming as big as the province of Szechuan, so I'm willing to live with that difference from Sam Lok's dan dan noodles. Wed Oct 25 03:34:04 -0700 2006 1953022 10032 david kaplan 2 1979021 Have any of you tried the Yibin "Kindling" Noodles that directly follow the Dan Dan Noodle recipes? Being a total novice in this area, I was wondering if nuts are common in noodle dishes (except peanuts). This one has walnuts, peanuts and sesame seeds. Sounds intriguing. Sat Oct 28 04:49:13 -0700 2006 1970602 10245 oakjoan