· Ingredient · 3 min read
Making Authentic Sichuan Mala Tang at Home
Today, I will introduce a mala hot pot recipe from my hometown of Sichuan. It uses some local ingredients and recipes. Please follow my steps step by step. You can make delicious and healthy mala hot pot yourself.
Ingredients
- 300g of Sichuan-produced "Juancheng Brand" Pixian Douban (this is the main ingredient), 250g of rapeseed oil.
- 150g of dried red pepper (cut into small pieces of about 2 cm); 50g of peppercorns.
- 3 tablespoons of sugar; 150g of dried ginger (sliced) and garlic cloves; 250g of green onions (two and a half inches); a bag of 150g of spices sold in a grocery store (such as Huixiang star anise and galangal); appropriate amount of salt (depending on the saltiness of the Douban you buy, because some manufacturers produce Douban that is too salty); a tablespoon of chicken essence.
Method
- Pour oil into a hot pan, and when the oil is cooked, fry the dried peppers and peppercorns briefly (turn off the heat) and set aside.
- Add sugar to the oil pan and stir-fry slowly. When the sugar melts and bubbles (you can turn on a low heat during the frying process, pay attention to the melted sugar starting to float to the top of the oil. At this time, the sugar bubbles are golden yellow. If they turn dark red or black, they are burnt). Immediately add ginger, onion, garlic and star anise and stir-fry, then add Pixian bean curd pork belly to bring out the fragrance.
- Turn on high heat, add bone soup, add salt (according to the saltiness of the soup, slightly more than the usual cooking flavor) and chicken essence, add fried dried chili and peppercorns after the soup boils, turn to low heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
- You can fry more base ingredients according to this ratio. When the taste is not enough, add ingredients to the soup (those who like spicy food can also directly add some unfried dried chili segments and new peppercorns to the hot ingredients).
Notes
- When frying sugar, only low heat is used. Sugar must be fried until it melts and bubbles on the surface of the oil (the bubbles should be golden yellow. If it is fried and burnt, it cannot be used anymore, and the soup will be bitter). Only in this way can the soup be bright red and not sweet.
- Douban must be made from Pixian Douban, the brand of Juancheng, to be authentic. Many other products are unqualified or have a bad taste.
- It is best to use rapeseed oil (i.e. non-refined oil). The base material made from it has better color, aroma and taste than refined oils such as salad oil.
