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Szechwan Cuisine

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The cuisine of the Western region of China is well-known for its spiciness, but many Western palates overlook the complex interplay of savory, sour, hot and sweet flavors that underlie the fiery spice of the Szechwan pepper and other spices that give the Szechwan cuisine its characteristic burn.

For decades, most of the world was familiar mainly with Cantonese cuisine, and thought of it as ‘Chinese cuisine’. In reality, though, China is an enormous country that encompasses nearly every kind of climate imaginable. The amazing variety of foods, spices and climates have led to many distinct styles of Chinese cuisine. Szechwan cuisine, originating in a steamy, sub-tropical climate, includes smoked, pickled and spiced foods, as well as foods spiced with a heavy hand for both preservation and flavor.

While the Szechwan pepper, a fruit that grows in the Chongging province, has always been used in Szechwan cooking, most agree that it wasn’t until Christopher Columbus brought the chili back from his travels. Besides the flavors that sear the mouth, Szechwan cooking uses an interplay of flavors to create the full impact of a dish. Hot and Sour Soup, for instance, when prepared properly is neither exclusively hot, nor ultimately sour. Prepared with sorrel, lemongrass, tofu and other spices, its first impression is the heady, rich scent of roast meat and sour lemon. That aroma is belied at the first touch on the tongue – the soup is salty first, though not intensely so. The subtle blending of flavors melds, changing in the mouth to mildly sour – the sorrel and lemongrass making themselves known. It is not until the mouthful of soup has been swallowed that the fire sets in as the chili oil finally seeps into the taste buds.

This is not unusual for Szechwan cooking. The first mouthful of Kung Pao chicken seldom brings tears to your eyes. It is only as you chew and swallow and take yet another bite that the true heat of the dish begins to assert itself. Double Cooked Spicy Pork seems almost bland at first, with the flavors blending subtly in the background until the intense fire of the chili oil in which the pork is fried suddenly flames in your mouth.

There’s more than fire to Szechwan cuisine though. Smoked meats are common, and the smoking often makes use of unusual materials and flavors. Szechwan Tea-Smoked Duck is a delicacy that combines the flavors of citrus and ginger and garlic, juxtaposing them with a long, slow cooking over a fire laced with oolong and green tea leaves. The result is a succulent meat that melts in the mouth and leaves behind a hint of gingered orange.

One tradition of Szechwan cuisine that is becoming more common in the Western world is the Szechwan Hot Pot. Similar to a ‘fondue’, a Hot Pot is more an event than a meal. Chunks and slices of raw meat, seafood and vegetables are offered to diners at a table that holds a ‘Hot Pot’ – a pot of chili oil over a flame. Each diner selects their food and dips it in the chili oil until it is cooked. Often, hosts will also offer a pot of simple broth for those guests who prefer a more bland meal, or can’t tolerate the spiciness of food fried in chili oil.

Savory, rich and spicy, Szechwan cuisine is cuisine based on intensity – intensely hot, intensely sour, and intensely delicious.

Regional Cuisine Of China Szechuan Style

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The Szechuan style of cuisine arose from a culturally distinct area in the central western of part of China, a province known as Sichuan. This area of China came into its own culturally towards the end of the Shang Dynasty, during the 15th century. However, it was also the climate of the area that helped to shape the culinary traditions that were to arise from Sichuan province and make their way into the realm of international cuisine.

The province from which the cuisine that the world knows as Szechuan evolved is often hot and humid, and this contributed to this necessity of preparing foods in ways that differ significantly from other regions of China. Szechuan cuisine is primarily known for its hot and spicy dishes, though naturally there is more to Szechuan food than spice and sauces rich and strong in flavor.

A general overview of culinary history and trends reveals that, for the most part, areas that tended to spice heavily were areas in which the fresh food supply was not as reliable as in places that traditionally used a lighter hand in their use of spices. The climate of Sichuan is conducive to faster food spoilage. This, particularly in the past, made necessary food preservation techniques that themselves left behind a strong flavor, such as salting, pickling, drying, and smoking. Thus, spices served to mask the flavors of less than fresh foods and those that have been preserved by methods that affect their natural flavors. In addition to masking certain flavors, the use of hot spices, such as chili peppers, tends to be more common to hot climates, as the sweat that they can produce is thought to cool the body.

Much of the spicing of regional Chinese cooking is based upon bringing together five fundamental taste sensations – sweet, sour, pungent, salty and bitter. The balance of these particular elements in any one dish or regional cuisine can vary, according to need and desire, especially as influenced by climate, culture and food availability.

In Szechuan cuisine, there are a variety of ingredients and spices used to create these basic taste sensations. These include a variety of chili peppers, peppercorns over various types, Sichuan peppers, which are in reality a type of fruit, not pepper, and produce a numbing effect in addition to their warm flavor. Sichuan peppers, also called flower pepper and mountain pepper, are a traditional part of the Chinese five spice powder, or at least of those that are modeled upon the most authentic versions of the spice combinations common to regional Chinese cooking.

Other ingredients used commonly in Szechuan cuisine to create the five fundamental taste sensations include different types of sugars, such as beet root sugar and cane sugar, as well as local fruits for sweetness. The sour comes from pickled vegetables and different varieties of vinegar. A special bitter melon is added to many dishes to offer the touch of bitterness that complements other flavors. Other spices and flavors include dried orange peel, garlic, ginger, sesame oil and bean paste. Salt is important to Szechuan cuisine, and the area produces uniquely flavored salts that help to distinguish authentic Szechuan cuisine from the other regional cuisines from China.

Szechuan cuisine is marked by its rich traditional flavors, which stem from a culture of hundreds of years and are in part shaped by the natural forces of climate. Authentic Szechuan cuisine offers a unique dining experience made up of adventurous and creative taste sensations.

Regional Cuisine: Hunan Cuisine

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Hunan cuisine shares many commonalities with its close, more well-known cousin, Szechwan cooking, Both cuisines originate in the Western region of China. The climate there is sub-tropical – humid and warm enough to encourage the use of fiery spices to help cool the body, and to require high spicing of food as a preservative. With similar climate, the two regions also share many ingredients – rice is a major staple in both diets, and chili peppers are an important part of most dishes. The two styles of regional cuisine are similar enough that many restaurants and cookbooks lump them together under ‘Western Chinese cooking’ or simple refer to both as Szechwan cuisine.

There are some important differences, though. Hunan cooking is, for one thing, even more fiery than most Szechwan dishes. Szechwan dishes often include chili paste for rubbing into meats, or including in sauce. Hunan chefs include the entire dried chili pepper, with its intensely spicy seeds and rind.

The differences in the actual land of the two regions also has an effect on the differences in their cuisine. The Szechwan region is mountainous jungle, with little arable land for farming. The Hunan region, by contrast, is a land of soft rolling hills and slow rivers. Because of its fertile hillocks and valleys, the Hunan region has access to an amazing variety of ingredients that aren’t available to Szechwan chefs. Seafood and beef are both far more common in Hunan cooking, as are many vegetables.

The land, and the hardships associated with it, also give the Hunan more time to concentrate on food. Hunan cooking features complex and time-consuming preparation time. Many dishes begin their preparation the day before they are to be served, and may be marinated, then steamed or smoked, and finally deep-fried or stewed before they reach the table. The same attention is paid to the preparation of ingredients, and it is said that Hunan cuisine is the most pleasing to the eye of all Chinese cuisines. The shape of a food in a particular recipe is nearly as important as its presence in the final dish. Hunan chefs are specialists with the knife – carving fanciful shapes of vegetables and fruits that will be used in preparing meals, or to present them.

Hunan cuisine is noted for its use of chili peppers, garlic and shallots, and for the use of sauces to accent the flavors in the ingredients of a dish. It is not uncommon for a Hunan dish to play on the contrasts of flavors – hot and sour, sweet and sour, sweet and hot – pungent, spicy and deliciously sweet all at once. Hunan chefs are noted for their ability to create a symphony of taste with their ingredients. A classic example is Hunan spicy beef with vegetables, where the beef is first marinated overnight in a citrus and ginger mixture, then washed and rubbed with chili paste before being simmered in a pungent brown sauce. The end result is a meat that is meltingly tender on the tongue and changes flavor even as you enjoy it.

More and more, restaurants are beginning to sort out the two cuisines, and Hunan cuisine is coming into its own. Crispy duck and Garlic-Fried String Beans are taking their place alongside Kung Pao Chicken and Double Cooked Spicy Pork. But there is no battle between the two for a place of honor among Chinese Regional cuisines – rather, there are only winners – the diners who have the pleasure of sampling both.