Various Asian sauces/condiments/products premium brand guide?

[jedovaty]

Hi:

For those of you in the US/Canada, would you be able to recommend a few "good" and "premium" brands for Asian condiments?  Ideally with minimal preservatives where possible.  Normally I like to buy a bunch of products I'm interested in and do my own taste tests then find the best tasting vs best compromise of ingredients vs price, but this is way out of my arena.  Things like dark and light soy sauce, sesame oil, goguchan, kombu, bonito, fermented beans, pickles, miso, rice wine, etc?  I visited both mitsuwa marketplace and 99 ranch recently and was completely overwhelmed. 

 

Here's what I have:

 - San-J organic tamari

 - eden organic sesame oil

 - red boat fish sauce

 - megachef and lee-kum-kee premium oyster sauces

 - ajin moto msg

 - takara senryo mirin (only mirin I found with no "fake" ingredients)

 - Baoning Handcrafted Black Vinegar

 - currently out of sake, I typically get the $15 one in the pretty frosted blue bottle

 

I found some shaoxing wine, I can't transcribe the brand here (can send photo later), it doesn't taste anything like the sherry recommended on the web, instead simply very salty sake that has salt in it with more salt and an extra pinch or two of salt for good measure.

 

What am I missing?  I was inspired by watching the pantry videos by influencers on youtube, but some are out of the country with products not necessarily available here, and if I can find the brands they like and use, it seems they are full of "junk" ingredients and plastered in california prop 65 warnings hahahaha.*  I'm okay with buying these if there are no alternatives.

 

I'm also totally open to the "what you have is good enough for most dishes" if that's the case

 

Thanks for your time!

 

*please let's not turn this into a prop 65 or it's okay to eat junk ingredients debate and/or lecture of what it is for or how stupid/great it is, I'm simply trying to figure out premium foreign ingredients

Edited April 2, 2023 by jedovaty
correct name of shaoxing (log)

[palo]

Where are you located?

 

At least State/Province - it makes everything simpler

 

p

[liuzhou]

16 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

I found some jioaxing wine, I can't transcribe the brand here (can send photo later), it doesn't taste anything like the sherry recommended on the web, instead simply very salty sake that has salt in it with more salt and an extra pinch or two of salt for good measure.

 

I'm not sure what 'Jiaoxing wine' is although I have been to Jiaoxing. Did you mean Shaoxing?

These wines are only salted in the USA and Canada because of the local alcohol licencing laws. Salting it renders them undrinkable and allows them to be sold in stores without liquor licences. They are not salted in China!

 

Lee Kum Kee is not what I would consider a 'premium' brand. It is the Chinese equivalent of Heinz.

 

All MSG is the same.

Edited April 2, 2023 by liuzhou (log)

[jedovaty]

Yes, Shaoxing wine, I'll fix my first post, sorry about that

 

The stores here carry two lee kum key oyster sauces, one has the product name "premium oyster sauce" so I picked that up long ago since it had better ingredients than their regular one.  I'm not purporting it to be premium.  Megachef is the only one with clean ingredients I could find.

 

I'm in southern california.

Edited April 2, 2023 by jedovaty (log)

[liuzhou]

3 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

The stores here carry two lee kum key oyster sauces, one has the product name "premium oyster sauce"

 

The joys of marketing.

[jedovaty]

2 minutes ago, liuzhou said:

 

The joys of marketing.

Thanks for the help I guess?

[liuzhou]

1 minute ago, jedovaty said:

Thanks for the help I guess?

 

That was my intention. Premium help!

[BeeZee]

I use Andrea Nguyen as a resource for Vietnamese cooking, but she has some good general info on condiments and Shaoxing on her website 

https://www.vietworldkitchen.com/blog/2021/06/vietnamese-condiment-cheat-sheet.html

[blue_dolphin]

28 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

What am I missing? 

My recommendation is to let your pantry grow according to what you want to cook rather than just trying to build a collection.  What are you missing in the recipes and cookbooks you are working from?

 

If you have a friend who cooks one of the cuisines you are interested in, ask them if you can tag along on a shopping trip.  The 99 Ranch in Monterey Park is indeed overwhelming but even there, if you are looking for a specific Chinese ingredient,  you should be able to get some help from either the staff or fellow shoppers, particular on a non-weekend day.   And while 99 Ranch has a variety of Asian ingredients, it's probably not the best place to ask for advice on Japanese, Vietnamese, Cambodian or Thai recipes.  Mitsuwa Marketplace will be great for Japanese, LAX-C in Thai Town is the place for that cuisine.  This is not to say the ingredients are not available but your chances of good advice rise when you're at the mother ship.

 

I agree with @BeeZee on Andrea Nguyen for Vietnamese food and would add Leela Punyaratabandhu's blog for Thai ingredients.  She's the author of Simple Thai Food and Bangkok and while the blog is no longer active it can still be searched. 

 

Older, but still reliable brand recommendations can be found in Bruce Cost's Asian Ingredients and Lucky Peach 101 Easy Asian Recipes. 

 

Finally, most grocery stores in So Cal can sell alcohol so you should able to find Shaoxing wine that's not salted.  It's usually shelved with the alcoholic beverages rather than with cooking ingredients. 

[jedovaty]

Thanks, BD, that makes sense and I should've thought of that!  Duh. 

 

I feel silly for starting this topic, so maybe moderator can just delete it.  There was inspiration earlier earlier, now I just want to douse my ground turkey spaghetti in ketchup.  😁

[liuzhou]

21 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

I feel silly for starting this topic, so maybe moderator can just delete it.

 

I hope not! It's a perfectly good topic.

You want to learn something. Asking is good!

I know a bit about Chinese and some other Asian food because that's where I live and eat, but there is a world of other cuisines I know nothing about. If I get into those for whatever reason, I'll be asking a load of questions.

 

And I would love to see your picture of the Shaoxing you found and perhaps transcribe the brand for you!

 

 

[Margaret Pilgrim]

And your cupboard now can support a tremendous number of dishes already.    When one cooks from a variety of cuisines, the number of condiments or ingredients can become mind and space shelf boggling.

[Midlife]

I’m lucky enough to live near two 99 Ranch markets, a Tokyo Central, a Seiwa, and a Mitzuwa. If there’s something I can’t find in that group I don’t know what it might be. 

[heidih]

But what makes the original question different is the person emphsizing all natural, no additives, organic. That seems a more specialized set. 

Also when for instance my Voetnamese friemd got me cooking the cuisine of her motherland she'd often note that she used one brand for  cooking (usually less expensive) and another for finishing or dipping.

[jedovaty]

Thanks for the continued discussion.  The comments about filling up the pantry needlessly are poignant, since I don't really have much of a pantry (this home's kitchen was designed as a vacation home, and due for a remodel).

 

I've continued thinking about the idea, and I think to help with direction, my underlying goal is to expand and explore "asian" cooking that's more than ginger, garlic, soy sauce, oyster sauce, and sesame oil - which it is not!  Kind of like exploring beyond mirepoix, butter, and wine for french food; or salsa, tortillas, and tacos; or garlic, oo, 00, oregano, san marzanos, and pasta for Italian.  Hopefully this concept makes sense.

 

Which means I need to get out, read recipes, explore restaurants (I know there are some traditional ones hidden away in parts of Irvine and Tustin, then up in Alhambra area), and hang my hat with some of my friends   This will then help me understand and explore flavors better.  Good good, I am once again motivated and excited 😁

 

@liuzhou I'll get a picture of the cheap, salty wine that has a little salt with an extra pinch of salt today

[KennethT]

29 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

Thanks for the continued discussion.  The comments about filling up the pantry needlessly are poignant, since I don't really have much of a pantry (this home's kitchen was designed as a vacation home, and due for a remodel).

 

I've continued thinking about the idea, and I think to help with direction, my underlying goal is to expand and explore "asian" cooking that's more than ginger, garlic, soy sauce, oyster sauce, and sesame oil - which it is not!  Kind of like exploring beyond mirepoix, butter, and wine for french food; or salsa, tortillas, and tacos; or garlic, oo, 00, oregano, san marzanos, and pasta for Italian.  Hopefully this concept makes sense.

 

Which means I need to get out, read recipes, explore restaurants (I know there are some traditional ones hidden away in parts of Irvine and Tustin, then up in Alhambra area), and hang my hat with some of my friends   This will then help me understand and explore flavors better.  Good good, I am once again motivated and excited 😁

 

@liuzhou I'll get a picture of the cheap, salty wine that has a little salt with an extra pinch of salt today

The biggest thing I can think of is that you're looking to do more "Asian" cooking - that's like saying that I want to do more European cooking.  Cooking in general is very regional - so much so that cooking in one part of a single country can be different than other parts, so expanding that to a continent is a lot to deal with.  Hungarian food has very little in common with French food - whether that's Southwestern France or South France, the Jura region, Brittany or elsewhere.

 

As is such, food in Japan has almost nothing in common with food from anywhere in SE Asia, and among SE Asian countries/regions there's wide diversity again.

 

Something as simple as soy sauce is different in Japan than it is in China, and then even more different when compared to soy sauce from Thailand.

 

As @heidih pointed out, something like fish sauce has different grades for a reason - fish sauce used in cooking would not be the same as you'd use for a cold dipping sauce that's never seen heat and is primarily just fish sauce and maybe a little sugar.  Red Boat is high quality, but there's no reason to use it when making a stir fry - everything that makes it high quality is basically lost.

 

So, in order for this thread to be more useful to you, can you get more specific in terms of what kinds of Asian foods you want to get into?  Chinese?  If so, from what region as they can vary wildly.  SE Asian? If so, Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysian?  All different requiring different ingredients.

Edited April 3, 2023 by KennethT (log)

[jedovaty]

6 minutes ago, KennethT said:

 Cooking in general is very regional - so much so that cooking in one part of a single country can be different than other parts, so expanding that to a continent is a lot to deal with.  Hungarian food has very little in common with French food - whether that's Southwestern France or South France, the Jura region, Brittany or elsewhere.

 

So, in order for this thread to be more useful to you, can you get more specific in terms of what kinds of Asian foods you want to get into?  Chinese?  If so, from what region as they can vary wildly.  SE Asian? If so, Thai, Vietnamese, Malaysian?  All different requiring different ingredients.

Exactly.  And that's what I need to figure out before I start asking for ingredients help.

[KennethT]

35 minutes ago, jedovaty said:

Exactly.  And that's what I need to figure out before I start asking for ingredients help.

Also, take a look through RecipEgullet - there's quite a few recipes in there for food from all over Asia - even in just the most recent few pages.

[heidih]

And because of where you live with access to so many reasonably priced restaurants with excellent food cooked by people who come from the countries and grew up with the cuisines - you maytrend more to going out (esp in a group to share) and enjoying the breadth of dishes  

[Annie_H]

I have a similar list of ingredients and care about organic and what is in it. Organic unseasoned rice wine vinegar. AC vinegar with the 'mother'. I don't use alot of fish sauce so I have RedBoat. Things I use often like red wine vinegar I have basic and high end. No different than tinned tomatoes--DiNapoli and a lesser quality for something heavily seasoned like chili. 

We only use 4 oils--Extra virgin, avocado, sesame, and usually have a evoo of higher quality from Italy or Greece. 

When I moved to NYC from Italy in '86, just a backpack and first apartment with a futon on the floor and nothing to cook with but pots from thrift stores. We ate out all the time, then mastered a few things at home. Pasta was easy. A simple roasted chicken Sunday dinner. Then after a love of fresh spring rolls I mastered that. 

6-7 years ago after glancing through the Momofuku book, I bought a copy and worked on a good ramen bowl. Winter months after the holidays became new recipe exploring like his BoSaam and broths. Started making my own spice rubs, fermentations....

Momofuku ramen at home

Entertaining is Alex trying to up his ramen game. 

Japanese stock better than mine

 

 

[Katie Meadow]

Resources for brands and ingredients from both Andrea Nguyen and Momofuku are very useful as suggested above, but availability may vary according to where you live and what Asian groceries exist near you. Beyond that,  many products may be a matter of personal preference. I don't find any one brand to be excellent across the board.

 

Just a few of my favorites:

Peanut oil:  Love Lion and Globe.

Red Boat fish sauce. Yes it's pricy but I don't use a lot of it.

Huy Fong chili garlic sauce. The most used basic Asian hot sauce in our house. I prefer it to Sriracha, generally.

Grandma chili crisp, the real brand name escapes me just now.

Blank Slate Sichuan chili oil. I order it from Mama Market

Wok Mei all natural oyster sauce. I like the taste. Don't get too excited it does say "Oyster flavored."

Mala Market brand Chinese Sesame Paste

SOY sauce: Although I really don't cook Japanese food much, my two current favorites soy sauces are:

     Haku Black Garlic Shoyu. This brand makes several others that I've not tried  

     Smoked Shoyu. I get it from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Soy-Sauce-Japanese-Additives-【CHAGANJU】/dp/B08VGBWQJW/ref=sr_1_3_sspa?crid=11CUS1WL6973J&keywords=smoked+shoyu&qid=1680725024&sprefix=smoked+shoyu%2Caps%2C171&sr=8-3-spons&psc=1&spLa=ZW5jcnlwdGVkUXVhbGlmaWVyPUEyVVdRNk5SRkdPUjM2JmVuY3J5cHRlZElkPUEwMDAwNTM0M1VXQUtKWjNOM0hFJmVuY3J5cHRlZEFkSWQ9QTA2Nzg2NDgxVzFGMlE3OE9YQ0kwJndpZGdldE5hbWU9c3BfYXRmJmFjdGlvbj1jbGlja1JlZGlyZWN0JmRvTm90TG9nQ2xpY2s9dHJ1ZQ==

Peanut sauce: Jade brand, easily available in big supermarkets. I flinch every time a Chinese recipe calls for peanut butter. This          Jade stuff is really useful, and it pack a punch. I use it for chicken stir-fry as an additional ingredient for a sauce.

Dry red chiles: I use a lot of Chiles de Arbol for various things. I also like the Mala Market Facing Heaven Chilis. The aren't that hot, but the have a very nice flavor.

Dried black tree fungus: I prefer the smaller more delicate cloud ears, but they aren't often available in the Chinatown markets that I depend on. So, I splurge on the ones from Mala Market. Yeah, Mala Market is expensive. They also have an extensive selection of Sichuan peppercorns.

 

Thee are a few off the top of my head. I'm not very adventurous; once I find a product I like I tend to stick with it.

   

 

 

Edited April 5, 2023 by Katie Meadow (log)

[C. sapidus]

34 minutes ago, Katie Meadow said:

Yeah, Mala Market is expensive. They also have an extensive selection of Sichuan peppercorns.

   

 

 

 

I just bookmarked Mala Market. Thanks!

[palo]

Ran across this in my virtual travels:

 

https://www.seriouseats.com/japanese-cooking-pantry-staples

 

Might be of use

 

p

[liuzhou]

5 hours ago, Katie Meadow said:

Grandma chili crisp, the real brand name escapes me just now.

 

Lao Gan Ma （老干妈),  It actually means 'Godmother'; not 'Grandma'.

Edited April 6, 2023 by liuzhou (log)

[liuzhou]

On 4/6/2023 at 4:21 AM, Katie Meadow said:

I flinch every time a Chinese recipe calls for peanut butter.

 

Sorry, it's an old post and I just noticed that sentence. May I ask why?