Chinese Food
Ingredients Glossary
Below are the Chinese food ingredients mentioned on this webpage, with photos and tips. For more items, please search the main ingredients glossary.
Shi Feng Tang - see Honey rock sugar
Silver Ear, Silver Fungus, Silver Tree Ear Fungus, Snow Fungus - see White Fungus.
Spinach - There are many different types of spinach around the world. The one that my family likes to stir fry frequently is the sharp leaf, long stem spinach as shown in the picture below. Take a look at our
delicious stir fry Spinach with Ikan Bilis recipe!
When buying, choose spinach that is firm and fresh green. Do not choose those which are excessively crushed, withering or have many dirty leaves with white spots.Spinach needs to be soaked and rinsed about 3 times before cooking to remove all dirt, soil, damaged/withered/spotted parts and hard-to-chew stem skins. It is time-consuming to wash this vegetable before cooking but it is very delicious and nuitritious when consumed.
Spring Onion (called "Cong" in mandarin) is frequently used in Chinese cuisine for garnishing purpose and to add fragrance to dishes or soups. Fresh Spring Onion is firm and green. As Spring Onion grown at different places/farms have different level of fragrance, experiment and choose the one that you like most.
Incidentally, Spring Onion looks like "Jiu Cai", a type of vegetable used in making dumplings. Some supermarkets like to place them side-by-side on the shelf. Thus, make sure you buy the correct pack as they taste and smell very differently. It happened to me many years ago...
Sweet Potatoes (called "Fan Shu" in mandarin) have yellow, orange or purple colour flesh. Do not be misled by the colour of its skin. Although the sweet potatoes in below picture have purple colour skin, their flesh is actually yellow.
The tiny spots on the sweet potatoes are normal as these were where the roots used to grow. However, do not choose sweet potatoes with black spots that sink deep into the body as it is likely that the flesh underneath have gone bad. Sometimes, the ends will also turn black and some Aunties (when allowed) like to crack them off to see whether the flesh inside have gone bad. Where available, choose "fat" sweet potatoes rather than skinny ones. Sweet potato can be grilled or steamed (after the skin has been scrubbed clean) and eaten alone as a snack. It can also be peeled and cooked into desserts or porridge. Take a look at our easy Sweet Potato recipes below:
- Longan and Sweet Potato Soup Recipe
- Simple Sweet Potato Dessert Soup
Taro - see Yam.
Tofu - see Bean curd.
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