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The Yunnan Cookbook: Recipes from China's land of ethnic diversity
Yunnan, an exotic, mountainous land of former kingdoms which borders Tibet, Sichuan, Burma, Vietnam and Laos, is the most bio-diverse province in China. It is quite possibly the most beautiful part of the country, and also the most culturally rich. Each ethnic minority has its own distinct cooking ingredients, spices, aromas and flavors, all brought together for the first time in this unique cookbook.
248 pages, Hardcover
First published October 7, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
January 8, 2015
After preordering this book in June 2013, I received The Yunnan Cookbook: Recipes from China's Land of Ethnic Diversity in October 2014, and I was annoyed that the copy I received had about 15% of the pages upside down. Also, the book has no index, and almost none of the pages have page numbers, so the table of contents is nearly useless. I'm going to send my copy back to hopefully get one with all the pages right-side up. The page numbering issue, if on purpose, was a terrible design choice. I hope it was a mistake. I have not begrudged the book these errors in my rating.
That said, I really miss Yunnan food from my time in China, and I was excited to have the recipes. I spent a lot of time in Kunming and a bit in Jinghong, and it was nice to see some familiar dishes in the table of contents. The recipes have, for the most part, a home-cooking feel: uncomplicated, easy to execute if you've had some exposure to Chinese knife skills and Chinese cooking's typical order of operations (if you haven't, try Fuchsia Dunlop's Land of Plenty: A Treasury of Authentic Sichuan Cooking, aka Sichuan Cookery in the UK. It has great info in that regard.)
The recipes are sparsely worded, perhaps geared toward someone who has cooked Chinese food before. Thankfully, I have. I was happy to see some uniquely Yunnan ingredients as far as Chinese cooking is concerned: lots of raw and cooked tomato, fresh herbs, potatoes, and an almost over-use of pickled vegetables. In that often humid and hot climate, in a place where refrigeration hasn't made as many inroads, vegetables spoil quickly and are pickled for preservation, and these pickles show up in many dishes. Roasting and grilling, which features less prominently in the Chinese food of other regions but quite prominently in Yunnanese food, appears often in the book.
I made the eggplant with dried chilies dish, which was quite tasty. One issue, though, is that for this dish and a few others I've browsed, the picture of the recipe contains ingredients not listed in the recipe (in this instance, the picture shows fresh chilies instead of dried, unpeeled eggplant instead of peeled, apparently a little soy sauce for color and green onions, neither of which appear in the recipe). I added the green onion to good effect, peeled the eggplant as instructed, and didn't add in any uncalled-for soy.
I'll update this review as I try more recipes and thus get a better feel for the book.
[Update 22 Oct 2014] The "tomato and egg bake" dish came out cakey, not spicy enough, and overwhelmed by garlic chives and sichuan pepper. If I do it again, the ingredient ratios will need reworking, and I'll make it using a frittata egg base. The egg texture in the recipe was like dry quick bread or cornbread.
The Yunnan ham with eggplant and capsicum came out great using bacon as a substitute for Yunnan ham. More updates to come, I'm sure!
That said, I really miss Yunnan food from my time in China, and I was excited to have the recipes. I spent a lot of time in Kunming and a bit in Jinghong, and it was nice to see some familiar dishes in the table of contents. The recipes have, for the most part, a home-cooking feel: uncomplicated, easy to execute if you've had some exposure to Chinese knife skills and Chinese cooking's typical order of operations (if you haven't, try Fuchsia Dunlop's Land of Plenty: A Treasury of Authentic Sichuan Cooking, aka Sichuan Cookery in the UK. It has great info in that regard.)
The recipes are sparsely worded, perhaps geared toward someone who has cooked Chinese food before. Thankfully, I have. I was happy to see some uniquely Yunnan ingredients as far as Chinese cooking is concerned: lots of raw and cooked tomato, fresh herbs, potatoes, and an almost over-use of pickled vegetables. In that often humid and hot climate, in a place where refrigeration hasn't made as many inroads, vegetables spoil quickly and are pickled for preservation, and these pickles show up in many dishes. Roasting and grilling, which features less prominently in the Chinese food of other regions but quite prominently in Yunnanese food, appears often in the book.
I made the eggplant with dried chilies dish, which was quite tasty. One issue, though, is that for this dish and a few others I've browsed, the picture of the recipe contains ingredients not listed in the recipe (in this instance, the picture shows fresh chilies instead of dried, unpeeled eggplant instead of peeled, apparently a little soy sauce for color and green onions, neither of which appear in the recipe). I added the green onion to good effect, peeled the eggplant as instructed, and didn't add in any uncalled-for soy.
I'll update this review as I try more recipes and thus get a better feel for the book.
[Update 22 Oct 2014] The "tomato and egg bake" dish came out cakey, not spicy enough, and overwhelmed by garlic chives and sichuan pepper. If I do it again, the ingredient ratios will need reworking, and I'll make it using a frittata egg base. The egg texture in the recipe was like dry quick bread or cornbread.
The Yunnan ham with eggplant and capsicum came out great using bacon as a substitute for Yunnan ham. More updates to come, I'm sure!
August 2, 2015
This collaborative cookbook by Annabel Jackson and Linda Chia, mixes recipes with insightful vignettes giving the reader a real flavour of the many ethnic minorities and styles of cooking that make up the province of Yunnan.
As always when I review a cookbook I try at least two recipes to help make my review more practical and useful to potential buyers.
And following this review I will the republish a recipe from the book with the kind permission of the publishers Blacksmith Books so you can “try before you buy.” To read my whole review follow the link.
https://wannabetvchefblog.wordpress.c...
As always when I review a cookbook I try at least two recipes to help make my review more practical and useful to potential buyers.
And following this review I will the republish a recipe from the book with the kind permission of the publishers Blacksmith Books so you can “try before you buy.” To read my whole review follow the link.
https://wannabetvchefblog.wordpress.c...
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews