While people have taken up sourdough baking or started a during the COVID-19 pandemic, the head chef of Melbourne's Etta restaurant, Rosheen Kaul, and illustrator Joanna Hu have played with very different ingredients.
In isolation, they wrote and self-published a Chinese recipe zine called the Isol(Asian) Cookbook, which has now become a fully-fledged cookbook called Chinese-ish: Home Cooking, Not Quite Authentic, 100% Delicious.
Rosheen Kaul, who's also worked at Melbourne restaurants Lee Ho Fook, Smith & Daughter, and Dinner by Heston Blumenthal, tells SBS Food, "The concept of the original Isol(Asian) Cookbook was classic Chinese cooking using pantry staples, encouraging those stuck at home like ourselves to learn Chinese cookery."
The cookbook features the basic pantry ingredients you need to make classic Chinese dishes, and a range of recipes that even the most reluctant home cook can follow.
"Arguably the most popular recipe happened to be one that I ate the most, my 'creamy tofu noodles', which uses a block of silken tofu as the base of the sauce, which is then seasoned with black vinegar, soy sauce and fresh chilli," Kaul says. "It's all then stirred through wheat noodles, and is incredibly easy and delicious, requiring minimal cooking."
"Chinese-ish" is the term the duo use to describe themselves.
Kaul was born in Singapore to parents of mixed Asian heritage (Kashmiri, Peranakan Chinese, Filipino), and she grew up between Australia, Malaysia, China and Indonesia.
"We're both of Chinese heritage, but having grown up in Australia, our identities will always be influenced by Western culture, or in my case, several additional Asian cultures," says Kaul.
Hu was born in Hunan province in China, and grew up in Melbourne. On the work front, she's an illustrator and ex-front-of-house at Vue de Monde, Saint Crispin and Fat Duck restaurants.
"I will always be Chinese-ish, that all-important 'ish' representing all the unspoken and assimilating and inheriting I've done of both cultures," writes Hu.
"There's nothing the European continent has done with potatoes that I don't love…but I also think a Sunday roast could be improved with some Lao Gan Ma chilli oil. I play mahjong with my grandmother each week, but I will also horrify her by drinking cold water straight from the tap."
We're Chinese, but we're also Australian, and we'd never be able to write a traditional Chinese cookbook because our authentic or 'lived' experience is as Asian Australians.
These multitudes have informed Kaul and Hu's approach to writing their cookbook, Chinese-ish.
"We're Chinese, but we're also Australian, and we'd never be able to write a traditional Chinese cookbook because our authentic or 'lived' experience is as Asian Australians," says Kaul.
"Many of the recipes after the more classic, introductory dishes are from the Chinese diaspora - the snippets of Chinese culture we've had in our lives, growing up away from our home culture."
These include recipes for Singaporean-Chinese dishes such as cereal prawns and braised seafood vermicelli, as well as Kaul's interpretation of Australian-Chinese dishes such as 'very inauthentic prawn toast' which, in addition to prawn and pork mince, uses guanciale, lemon, and dill.
"It's Chinese in its soul and appearance, but it tastes like an Australian summer," says Kaul. "Beautiful, fresh seafood with lemon and dill, and the delicious cured meats from our Italian community."
There are also classic Chinese dishes and ingredients woven into Australian cuisine, like Sichuan sausage sangas, which features below. In Chinese-ish, you'll find it in a chapter called 'Chinese-ish Snacks that feel kinda wrong', alongside the very inauthentic prawn toast, Beijing hot chicken and fiery Sichuan fondue.
The book does a wonderful job of empowering the reader with key information for successful "Chinese-ish" cooking, such as how to cook rice without a rice cooker, and how to cook nearly every type of noodle.
Here are some hot tips from Kaul for "Chinese-ish" cooking:
- Try not to be afraid of high-heat cooking (you'll never stir-fry properly on medium heat).
- Take the time to source the correct ingredients (dark and light soy can't be used interchangeably).
- Make sure your rice is cold and lump-free before frying, or it'll turn into mush.
- Take the time to hone your knife skills, and cut your vegetables and proteins into similar sizes for even cooking (sharpen your knives).
- Stop putting soy sauce on everything if it doesn't need it.
Meanwhile, I think I may have found my life's calling. I'm off to learn how to cook nearly every type of noodle.
'The Mostest' is an SBS Food column that sees comedian and food enthusiast Jennifer Wong be your guide. Read as she goes searching to uncover who we are as cooks and who we are as eaters. Expect history, incredible tips, must-make recipes and anecdotes all surrounded by food. Love the story? Follow the author here: Twitter , Facebook , Instagram .
Rosheen and Joanna's cookbook 'Chinese-ish', is published in July 2022 by Murdoch Books (RRP $39.99).
Sichuan sausage sanga
I love a 'sausage sizzle', as we call them in Australia, where you can grab a barbecued, slightly singed snag (sausage) wrapped in soft white bread, in exchange for a gold coin. This recipe keeps the sizzle, the sausage and the white bread, but the similarities end there. Instead, a flavourful, juicy, Sichuan peppercorn-spiced pork sausage is studded with guanciale, smeared with Japanese mayonnaise, and refreshed with lime juice. Definitely not your average sausage sanga.
Serves 4
Ingredients
- 450 g pork mince (ground pork)
- 50 g guanciale or pancetta
- 2 tsp grated ginger
- 2 tbsp fish sauce
- 1 tbsp light soy sauce
- 1 tbsp Dijon mustard
- 2 tsp caster sugar
- 1 tbsp cornflour
- 1 tbsp iced water
- Vegetable oil, for shallow frying
Spice mix
- 3 tsp Sichuan or Korean chilli flakes
- 2 tsp Sichuan peppercorns
- 1 tsp ground white pepper
- ½ tsp cumin seeds
- ½ tsp coriander seeds
- ½ tsp ground turmeric
To assemble
- 4 slices white bread
- Coriander leaves
- Mint leaves
- Kewpie mayonnaise
- Lime wedges
Method
- Place the pork mince in the freezer for 30 minutes before using.
- To make the spice mix, place all of the ingredients in a small frying pan and toast over low heat until very fragrant, taking care not to burn the chilli flakes. If the ingredients become too dark, start again. Set aside to cool, then blitz into a fine powder using a food processor.
- Add the chilled pork mince, guanciale, ginger, fish sauce, light soy sauce, Dijon mustard, sugar, cornflour and iced water to the spice mix and pulse until combined. The mixture should bounce back when pressed. Refrigerate the sausage mixture for 2 hours.
- Using wet hands, roll the sausage mixture into four 2 cm x 10 cm logs and freeze for at least 1 hour to set.
- Heat a frying pan over medium heat and add enough vegetable oil to evenly coat the base of the pan. Cook the sausages until they are a deep, golden brown, rolling them around continuously for about 10 minutes
- To assemble, wrap the sausages in white bread with a generous handful of fresh herbs, a decent smear of mayonnaise, and a good squeeze of lime juice.
