Meat and bean sauce (za\ jiang\ mian\)

January 3, 2010

Ingredients:
  • ginger, minced
  • scallion/green onion, minced
  • ground pork (about 1lb)
  • peas, cooked soybeans, peanuts, etc. (optional)
  • dry tofu, chopped: I used to use '5 spice thick dry tofu' (wu^ xian- da\ gan-) but my mom prefers unspiced tofu gan- so that it only takes up the flavors you cook into it here
  • 1 6-oz. can of sweet bean sauce (tian/ mian\ jiang\): the brand we use is a blue can, but here I could only find a different brand that came in a jar. This is the most important sauce to have.
  • 1/2 6-oz. can of bean sauce
  • spicy bean sauce, if desired (generally we don't have this spicy though)
  • Asian cooking wine (I'm not sure the rice cooking wine I used here is the right kind, but it was the only kind available in the Asian aisle at the local Shop-Rite)
  • soy sauce (next time I will skip this until the end, to avoid the final result being too salty)
  • sugar

Heat oil in pan and fry up the ginger and scallions a bit. Then, stir in the ground pork and break it up so it doesn't form patties.

Once the meat is mostly cooked, throw in the peas/soybeans and tofu. Once you think those are cooked (doesn't take too long), add the various sauces to taste. Let it all simmer for a few minutes longer, occasionally stirring. Mix it all in with the noodles before eating.

Making this with 1lb of ground pork will make enough to last several meals. It'll keep in the fridge for a bit, I used to bring back tubs of this to college and then could just make noodles for a really quick meal.