[Sca-cooks] Chinese sausage

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Also sprach Stefan li Rous:

>Other folks have mentioned "Chinese sausage" on this list before. So
>what is it? Does it taste different? How is it best used? And is
>there something I should know or avoid when picking some out?

My wife maintains that, of the commercially packaged types, the ones
made in Canada are generally somewhat leaner and of better quality
than the ones made in the US. Some markets sell both kinds.

Lop cheung are generally sweetish, like sugar-cured ham; if you're
expecting Jimmy Dean sausage you're in for a bit of mouth confusion.
I remember the first time I tried them, they were rolled into steamed
bread, essentially white steamed sausage rolls, but as my mom bought
them and for some reason assumed they were a dessert item, it was a
pretty odd experience. Even more so (note that I'm not speaking ill
of them in this regard, it's just something you need to anticipate)
are the ones that are nearly identical, but made with pork, or
sometimes turkey, liver.

Lop cheung appear to be quite fatty, but mostly it's just a
coarse-grind situation, as you'll find with, say, Italian sopressata,
which is a chunky-style salami that really isn't more fatty than most
other types, it's just that the meat and fat are less homogeneous.

They're usually .50 to .75 of an inch thick (Stefan, I know fractions
frequently get eaten in emails to you), but I believe the casings are
pork, just not very tightly packed. Reddish in color, they're usually
cured with salt, sugar (sometimes with something akin to hoisin
sauce, which _contains_ a lot of sugar), and zee secret ingredient,
pure grain alcohol. The finished sausage doesn't seem to contain much
or any alcohol, it's just there to help them dehydrate.

As (I think) Kiri mentioned, they make an excellent fried rice. I
like mine with just soy sauce, white pepper, scallion and scrambled
egg, with sometimes a _tiny_ pinch of msg or something containing it,
like Goya Adobo. Yes, this is, like, rilly Chinese, yew kneow? But
msg doesn't bother any of us, it's an ancient product, and it's
gotten a bad rap because idiots will insist on misusing it. Fried
rice made like this is also good with mushrooms and, if you want to
go wild, a few fresh bean sprouts. Onion is okay, too, but it makes
it more like a commercial product and less like the real stuff.

FWIW, the real secret to proper fried rice, as far as I can tell, is
(drumroll, please) to be sure and _fry_ the rice. You saute it's
grainy little butt off, until it is shiny (use just enough oil to
create this effect), separated,  and each grain slightly puffed. Only
then do you add liquid seasonings. The best way to ruin fried rice
and create salty, gummy porridge is to add things like soy sauce
before the rice is ready for it.

My favorite presentations for lop cheung, though, involve steaming
them. One is for chunks of marinated chicken (frequently wings at our
house, mixed raw with a little soy, a little peanut oil, white
pepper, minced ginger, maybe some crushed garlic, maybe a splash of
sherry ) with slices of lop cheung, zha toy (a salted mustard-green
stem-knob, something like kohlrabi, frequently looking like little
convoluted brains rolled in red chili powder when you see them in the
market... most people rinse the chili off before using, but we have a
high loony proportion on this list, so I doubt there's too much of
that going on), plus soaked black mushrooms, soaked dried lily buds,
and scallions. Steamed until the chicken and everything else is
tender, it's a lovely moist dish with a stupendous gravy.

The other, and much simpler, method, is to cook a pot of rice and
steam the lop cheung on top. We do this every year for New Year's,
but it's also a frequent quick meal at our house, just the rice with
the sausages steamed on top, with a plate of salt or canned fried
fish (Asian markets sell a billion different types of this; we like
fried dace with salted black beans) on top of the sausages, right in
the rice pot, tightly covered.

A quick rice-cooking primer. In a tightly-coverable saucepan
(heavy-bottomed is a plus), put two to three cups of rice (there's
not much point in doing less than two cups, and some people eat less
rice than others, so you'll need to experiment... this method doesn't
work as well for really large quantities of rice, more than four cups
or so). Run cold water over the rice until the pot is nearly full,
and stir with your hand. You'll see surface starch being washed away;
pour off this water and repeat until the rice is cleaned of all
surface starch and the water is clear. Then pour off all but about
one-half inch of the water above the surface of the rice. Place on
high heat, bring to a boil, and boil until the water is absorbed.
You'll hear a crackling sound at the bottom of the pot, like Rice
Crispies snap-crackle-popping in milk (my apologies for an
American-specific description), at which point you remove the pot
from the heat, stir/fluff the rice, and lay on top of it your rinsed
sausage or anything else you want to steam, which should not include
anything that'll take more than about 20 to 30 minutes to steam: pork
roasts are out. Cover and put the pot back on the flame; lower the
heat to a steady minimum.

Prep and cook your veg. while you wait; we've been known to saute
frozen leaf spinach, fresh watercress, or even a head of iceberg
lettuce, with fu yi / fu ngoi / fermented bean cake , which is little
cubes of brine-pickled bean curd, with or without chili pepper
flakes, which deteriorates into a rich, creamy, salty and tangy sauce
right in your wok.

In 20 to 40 minutes, depending on whether you like the rice crust
that forms on the bottom of the pot (this is deep-fried for the
garnish for sizzling-rice soup, or reboiled as a treat for the
elderly and children), the rice should be done and flavored with some
of the fat from the sausage.

Eat. Have a good time.

>If you see this before Saturday afternoon and reply, could you please
>copy me by email? I'm on the digest and might not otherwise see it
>before I leave on my errands tomorrow.
>
>Thanks,
>    Stefan
>(Someday I'll remember to write down where I got various items.
>Right now, I'm not sure which groceries to go looking in)

Today sounds like a good day to start ;-)

Adamantius