Ader1

Does this have to be fresh? Dried Za'atar or dried Greek Oregano is quite easy to come by.

The guy gave me a wok to take home with me and a 'spatula/ladle' and I bought a packet of salt to practice 'tossing' it. When I went back to the restaurant I just couldn't do it with out lifting off the 'nest' because I had been practicing walking around my apartment with the wok in the air. They then made be do it on the wok cooker with chopped cabbage. It was difficult. The kitchen was spartan and the weather was hot. But I soon managed to get into the required rhythm. Because that's what it is.....developing muscle memory to remember this rhythm. Shame is that now I am home I don't have cooking equipment to do this. I'm planning on rectifying this though.

hey alder1, you should be able to find zatar in Uk quite easily now - its a Middle eastern herb blend, mostly dried tyme, oregano and sesame amongst others. have a feeling I saw it in Waitrose when i was last back - if you are near london teh spice shop in notting hill sells it and I am pretty sure you can order from them online too OK thanks

I did buy a Kenwood A901. I purchased it for £35 pounds. It was aesthetically in a very good condition. When I switched it on I though I smelled some burning. Nothing much. I then went and mixed some bread dough in it and after a little while started smoking. I've searched on the internet and apparently some capacitors do become faulty. After opening it up, one of the capacitors was cracked. I bought new ones on ebay for £6 and my friend soldered them in place. It seems to be working fine now although I haven't tried mixing dough in it yet. The mixer is apparently about 30 years old!

Oh no......I've never heard of za'tar before.

I noticed that as well. He was quite adept at the tossing. However, may I just add this one thing? I did spend some time working in a restaurant in China and I was learning how to 'toss'. The wok I was using was I would say larger than the one in the above video. Anyway, I was stir frying away as best I could and lifting the wok off of it's 'nest' (if that's a correct enough term?). And the guy who run the restaurant told me not to lift it up but more slide it towards you and back to it's housing/nest. The wok 'spatchula' was also used to kind of push the contents away from yourself to the other end of the wok and then tossed back as one moved the wok towards oneself. Of course, Kingkristo's set up wouldn't be suitable for this as are most western gas cookers. The guy showing me how to do it pointed out that in Chinese restaurants many of the woks are so big you'd never lift it up and 'toss'. I'm just saying what he told me but maybe in home cooking situations they do lift the woks up of the 'nest'?

I may buy this later this year as a Christmas treat.....for myself. For anybody who's got it.....what's the Shawarma (sp?) recipe like? I know it's there because it's in the index.

Well, perhaps you shouldn't title them as "Real Chinese", then. I'm not quite sure where you are coming from insisting that Kinsgchristo stick to some Chinese culinary rules which you find acceptable according to what you've experienced in China. In answer to me on another thread when I asked about what some dish was which I had eaten in China you said: Who is to say that some Chinese restaurant in Manchester or anywhere else for that matter did exactly the same ie "throw together what he could find" and found that it worked? According to you it would be "a fine tradition". This is what kingchristo is trying to recreate.

Thank you for that Panaderia Camadiense. That's given me a few ideas. Thank you too Lisa for your suggestion. I'll have a go at this in the next few weeks.

I have just been looking at the forum on people's favorite potato chips. It got me thinking about trying to make some myself at home. Has anybody here tried making chips themselves. What equipment is required? I suppose you would require a slicer of some sort. I like mine pretty thin. Then how would would one infuse them with flavor? Oven baked or fried? I have to admit I prefer the fried varieties. So, how would would go about making them?

Thanks for the replies. Looks like it will have to be the Nina Simonds book. Any more suggestions?

I'm looking for a good book about cooking Noodles. I checked amazon and there seems to be quite a lot there. I would be nice to find something which describes the main Asian noodles types as well as some noodle dish recipes. I'm asking here because I don't have that much faith in amazon book reviews. Thank you.

I had a kid of snack in a Chinese 'restaurant' in Chengdu. It had many of those black mushrooms (Cloud ear, Jews Ear,......)in it and it had pickled Chillies in it too. Those are the two things I remember in it...possibly some other veg like carrots but I can't remember. It was great. Any ideas what it was called? It was just a snack this guy I was with bought while we drank a beer.

Just look at the dough in this video. It just shows you what effect Peng Hui or whatever they are using has on the dough.

It makes the BBC stuff seem amateur in comparison. I think the book is mainly Chinese with just a few headings in English unless they have to editions? Is this correct?

Thanks Will. That looks great and in fact, I wanted a recipe for the beef more than anything to try out which this guy Kenny provides. :-)

I asked my friend in China this who asked this guy running a noodle restaurant. This is what he said in reply: "Penghui has very strong corrosivity,if add Peng Hui to the water when making the dough at the beginning,it a long time between finish making the dough and use dough to make noodle ,Penghui's corrosion can take gluten cut very short,the dough will become very soft,you know,then soft dough is very difficult to make noodle,so when the customer come in, do noodles add Penghui is right time. "

I think the Hobarts will be well out of my range price wise. The older Kenwoods have a better reputation though don't they?

Some on here have mentioned the Kenwood Chef. Should I be looking at a particular model for dough mixing?

Thank you Lisa. I take a look.

I've been trying to find a recipe for this snack on the web without success. Would anybody have a recipe or any pointers? Thank you. There's a photo of some in the following link: http://christine-wei.tumblr.com/post/1423939474/taipei-main-station-potsticker-gyoza

This is what I found regarding the composition of Peng Hui....The chemical composition of instant Peng ash is Sodium: 8% ~ 40%, and potassium: 0% ~ 18%, and chloride: 6% ~ 50%, and sulfur: 0.08% ~ 2%. This cam from a Chinese book written about La Mian 'Hand pulled noodles'. I can't tell you how accurate that is but the translation is correct. A friend of mine telephoned the company which makes Peng Hui and they wouldn't tell her what was in it. I wanted to find out if I could take some to Europe with me. They didn't seem interested and said that it would not be possible because it's a white powder and rather difficult to do these days with the tightened security of the last few years.

Some of them noodles are quite thin. Well done. Are you lifting the noodles off the table completely? I've seen some noodle pulling where the puller allows gravity to do it's work to some degree. This is not correct. Noodles should be made by pulling alone and kept on the table.....bench.

If you notice Emily.....it does break with him and he says that it's ok and to just grab the broken end and continue.....and the dough isn't at all thin. It is also uneven in thickness. That is no good. Have you seen real La Mian practitioners peform? They can pull noodles so thinly that you can thread several of the noodles through the eye of a needle. Ok....who needs to do that? But what this guy does in the video would certainly (in my opinion) not be pleasant to eat.

Does anybody here know the chemical composition of Peng Hui?