Make This Sichuan Street Food in Your Kitchen
Be seduced by ‘strange flavor’ peanuts and a bowl of Chongqing ‘small’ noodles
In the years before its 2001 release, Sichuan cookbook “Land of Plenty” was a tough sell to publishers, British author Fuchsia Dunlop said over dinner in the fall. Nearly 20 years later, the update, called “The Food of Sichuan,” has helped the English-speaking world better understand cuisine from the region. And it has even been translated to Chinese.
“Because I am a foreigner, I feel like I have to do my very best to [convey dishes] authentically,” Dunlop said. “Otherwise, what’s the point?”
While this year’s “Pasta Grannies” cookbook captures the dying art of regional Italian pasta making, “The Food of Sichuan” chronicles dishes that are also in danger of fading out.
“Things change very fast,” Dunlop said, citing a few dishes that were easy finds when the book was first published that have become rarer in the culinary landscape. One is pork in lychee sauce with crispy rice. “So you have this rice crust and pork, and you pour this sauce over it so it crackles and pops,” she said. In the recipe notes, she calls it“dramatic” and “quite the party piece.”
Fast-forward to the present and some dishes that were considered old-fashioned are…
