Various Asian sauces/condiments/products premium brand guide?

[liuzhou]

On 6/21/2023 at 12:18 PM, liuzhou said:

 

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

 

Just wanted to say that peanut sauce and peanut butter are the same thing in Chinese - 花生酱 (huā shēng jiàng), just alternative, equally valid translations, hence my confusion as to why you would use one but flinch at the other.

 

 

 

[Katie Meadow]

@liuzhouI think of peanut butter and peanut sauce as very different critters. Peanut butter should be as simple as possible: ground up peanuts. Jif and Skippy, the two most widely used peanut butters in America, are highly processed and full of sugar. Most of us grew up on them in PB & J sandwiches. For that classic I prefer a more natural brand with no sugar added, like Adams. I'm not  so into it that I am willing to grind my own nuts, although that can be wonderful.

 

Perhaps I am culturally off base ur just of limited  experience, but I think of peanut sauce as a more complex sauce for Chinese noodles or dipping sauce for certain--mostly Asian--snacking items. But for an easy hack in making Asian style  peanut sauce I'm very happy with Jade brand  All Natural Sichuan Peanut Sauce. It has heat and flavor. There are plenty of other peanut-based sauce products out there on store shelves, but I'm not wild about the other ones I've tasted.

 

I didn't mean to dis the use of peanut butter as an ingredient in making sauces. I'm sure there's no end to the variety of sauces that can be whipped up by a talented cook; it's just one of those things I don't tackle. Hope this makes sense.

Edited June 24, 2023 by Katie Meadow (log)

[liuzhou]

8 minutes ago, Katie Meadow said:

liuzhoul think of peanut butter and peanut sauce as very different critters. Peanut butter should be as simple as possible: ground up peanuts. Jif and Skippy, the two most widely used peanut butters in America, are highly processed and full of sugar

 

I tend to agree with you. I just wanted to warn you and others that if you are buying something labelled Peanut Sauce in an Asian market or store, it's as likely as not to be peanut butter.

 

Skippy is international. I've seen it for sure in the UK as well as all across Asia. Definitely in China. But then China is the world's top producer of both the nuts and its byproducts.