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salted radish


cew

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Last night we made some steamed dumplings with minced pork and salted radish. Delicious! The salted radish added such a great flavor and texture (coriander roots didn't hurt either).

Now I have half a package of salted radish to use up. Any ideas of what I can do with it?

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  • 2 weeks later...

Pad Thai.

... which is pretty regular at my house, so we go through a lot of salted radish.

Also, I have a chinese cookbook by Eileen Yin-Fei Lo in which she often calls for something called Mustard Pickle, or Szechuan Preserved Vegetable. You know what? It's basically the same thing, except it's has (mild) chili powder in it, and is used to the same effect. Oh, and it's much more colorful, reds and greens and so forth. The point is that she uses it in many "classic" Chinese dishes, and having tried a couple of such recipes of hers, I find I'm open to using the radish in lots of things I wouldn't have otherwise considered.

Dumplings, for one, sounds pretty good. Thanks for the tip on that one.

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Thanks, this was exactly the kind of information I was looking for. I'm going to try the salted radish in those wonderful Sichuan green beans (I remember seeing the Wild Ginger recipe somewhere on this site). By the way, how long can I keep the salted radish in the fridge before it spoils?

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Wait, Szechuan preserved vegetable is different from salted radish. It's a different plant, for one thing, and much less dry than the salted radish. It's pickled rather than just salted. By all means do go ahead and substitute them, but not in the same quantity--I'd use half as much salted radish as Szechuan vegetable.

Matthew Amster-Burton, aka "mamster"

Author, Hungry Monkey, coming in May

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You can also cut it in slivers, stir-fry with meat/chicken, lily buds, and maybe some tree ears (all in slivers) and use it to stuff pancakes for moo shu.

I had some Szechuan pickled veg in my fridge for years, in a jar with vinegar. I wouldn't advise keeping it that long (it loses flavor), but that kind of preserved vegetable is just that: preserved.

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yes, i always assume that anything in a jar with vinegar will keep pretty much forever. but the salted radish just come by themselves in a plastic packet, no vinegar.

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Goddamnit, Mamster. I should have expected a correction from you.

(there should be a smiley here)

Pretty smart, though, and I certainly appreciate it.

Also, I'm new here and I want to thank you for your articles. I really enjoy them. You know what? I've got stock on the stove right now, because I'll be visiting a friend with a brand new baby and I'm taking her your hot and sour soup! And, man, I've made a lot of hot and sour soup (both Chinese and Thai iterations) and that's a terrific recipe.

(I've already got stock, but if I'm gonna make soup for her, I've got to make soup for me, yes?)

And on top of that, I'm going through a bunch of Chinese recipes I've collected the last few years, having put them on hold because I couldn't obtain a certain peppercorn ... online auctions didn't occur to me. It was very frustrating (it took me years to learn about the ban, folks in the Chinese markets just stared at me blankly, leaving me to wonder why I can't find for purchase this seemingly necessary fruit that every decent book considers essential). Thanks very much. Very much.

...

And so to return this to topic ... I keep salted radish tightly wrapped, in its own plastic package, then in a ziplock bag with most of the air sucked out. Seal most of the top, put a straw in the the end, suck out as much remaining air as possible, and so forth. Or just seal the top, it won't be long before you're in there again, will it? I keep it in the cheese drawer in the refrigerator. Right next to the dried shrimp (which don't last so long). And I think the radish will last a long, long time. I've had multiple bags sitting around and it doesn't seem to degrade. But I'm not keeping the radish as long as say, Suzanne is keeping her vegetable.

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