The Chinese Pantry, Part 2: Pickled Mustard

If you've ever stood in front of the vast selection of Chinese pickled vegetables in an Asian grocery store, wondering which one is the right kind for the dish you want to make, I completely sympathize. (If you haven't, you're missing out!) There are almost as many different kinds of pickled and preserved mustard greens and vegetables as there are vegetables, and each region has a different twist on how to preserve them.

Some of the cookbooks I've read lump them all together as "pickled mustard greens" and "pickled vegetables." Dunlop goes to great lengths in her Sichuan and Hunan cookbooks to disguish between zha cai, ya cai, suan cai, and pao cai*, while also mentioning several other variants along the way. I have never located any of the preserved mustard greens in clay jars that she talks about in the Ann Arbor area. (Which doesn't mean they don't exist here, so if you've seen pickled mustard greens in clay jars let me know!)

(* Remember the "pao" character from my chili introduction, which means "pickled." So pao cai is literally "pickled vegetable.")

Dunlop tries to distinguish between them by calling them pickled mustard greens, preserved mustard greens, and preserved mustard tuber (zha cai), and then confuses the matter by translating suan cai as "pickled mustard greens" in her Sichuan cookbook but as "preserved mustard greens" in her Hunan cookbook. This confusion aside, she offers some of the most detailed explanations for the different preservation methods I've found in English language Chinese cookbooks. My main problem is that I can't find jars that use the exact same language she uses. Most of the jars I've looked at come with the characters for suan cai or other characters entirely, and the English translation is almost always "pickled mustard greens," thus making it difficult to tell just which kind of mustard green is actually in the container. So what is a person to do?

When I first went to find "ya cai" (what the recipe I wanted to make called for), I asked one of the store owners at Tsai Grocery. She spoke little English, we spoke little Chinese. I thought if I showed her the characters for ya cai, that would make it a snap. She studied the characters a long time and took her time surveying the shelves before making her suggestions. This one seemed to be her preferred option. She was very clear that these greens needed to be cooked a little rather than eating them straight out of the package. This packaging matches the description that Dunlop gives for pao cai in her Hunanese cookbook. (click on the image to see a larger version)

This jar was the second recommendation from the lady at Tsai Grocery. They are pre-chopped and pickled in a brine of water and soy sauce, sugar, chili oil, and sesame oil. A close inspection will reveal red flecks of chili. (This brand also has MSG and other preservatives.) She told us that these pickled mustard greens can be eaten straight out of the jar, if desired. For example, you can serve a bit on top of a bowl of rice or chopped up and sprinkled as garnish over a noodle dish.  (She says they're great with Dan Dan noodles.  I'd guess she means the kind of Dan Dan noodles with the creamy sesame-peanut sauce, which is not the version of the dish I posted earlier.)

 

This is another jar of pickled mustard greens. The characters are different. While the English is "pickled mustard greens," the Chinese characters say something else entirely which I haven't been able to fully translate. (The first character has to do with the concept of "opening.")  However, the chopped vegetable looks very similar to the second picture above, and the ingredients are nearly identical but with less preservatives (like citric acid) and no MSG. (I like this jar because the brand translates as "Comrade Food," which I find amusing.)

Some final thoughts on shopping for pickled mustard greens:

First, you won't necessarily find all the options in the same section of the grocery store. I saw pickled mustard greens in large plastic tubs in the chilly fresh produce section of Hua Xing, plastic-sealed packages piled in a box near the end of an aisle, and a long stretch of shelf filled with glass jars of pickled mustard greens and other vegetables. So make sure to look not just on the shelves for sealed glass jars, but also in the vegetable section and in coolers for preserved vegetables.

Second, don't be overwhelmed by all the choices. I try not to get too hung up on getting the exact kind of pickled greens for a recipe, otherwise I would never try cooking some dishes for fear of having the wrong item! I suspect that a lot of the different pickled greens can work as substitutes for each other. Perhaps an expert would find them quite different, but so far as I can tell, they all have the salty sour taste characteristic of pickled vegetables. So, until I get better information on how to distinguish the different types, I'm not going to worry about it! The first one pictured above is a very common type of pickled mustard greens that would work for most cooking situations. You can also look for "Tianjin [or Sichuan] preserved vegetables," which can substitute for pickled mustard greens.

I would love to hear others' experiences with and brand recommendations for mustard greens and other Chinese pickled vegetables.

Comments

[thu]

I got a good recipe for "cai chua" pork rib soup.

It really easy to do to. Its kinda sweet and sour chinese pickled cabbage soup with tomatoes...yummy. :)

[Joe, Kitchen Chick's Husband]

Cool! Mind posting it?

[thu]

Here it is:
Cai Chua/Chinese Pickle Cabbage with Pork Ribs soup

1 package of Chinese pickle cabbage. Rinse well, and cut to bite size pieces
1 lb or so pork ribs. Ribs cut to ½ inch size
1 Ripe tomato, cut in wedges
Chopped cilantro
Salt & pepper

-Clean ribs and pre-boil ribs for 3-5 minutes, drain and set ribs aside
-In a clean pot, boil 2-3 or so quart of water
-Add meat and bring it to a boil
-Lower the heat and let it simmer for ½ hr or so
-Added in cut Chinese cabbage, and tomatoes & salt
-Let it simmer for ½ hr or so
-Do a taste test and adjust your seasoning accordingly.
-If its too salty or too tart, add in more water (let it simmer for another 15 minutes if you add more water)
-Pour the soup into a bowl and sprinkle it with some chopped cilantro and a dash of freshly ground pepper.
-Serve with a bowl of white rice

Enjoy

[Kate R.]

OMG, this article rules! Thank you so much. I have tried various jar pickled mustard but couldn't find the stuff I had with pork in SF chinatown. Perhaps this is a close facsimile! :O)

[MQ]

Here in Selangor, Malaysia I usually bought this pickled mustard at the wet market. It has no brand because I think the Chinese vegetable seller pickled them herself in a big plastic container. Of course there are branded one imported from China at the hypermarkets in jar and plastic packaging like in your pics.

I noticed there are 2 types-the leafy and another one which looks like round cabbage with less leaves.

I usually slice them thinly, soak in the water to get rid of too much salt and fry them with beef and sliced red chili.

When I was 5 and we lived in Sarawak, our Chinese neighbor taught my mom how to plant the mustard and pickle them. It's tricky though because wrong technique and unsuitable weather will spoil the final result of the pickled vege. :)

[allopathicholistic]

Oh I wish I saw this a year ago when you first put it up. Thanks, the pics are really helpful. I really really like pickle soup (the first one from Caravelle) with other vegetables and tofu. yum

[allopathicholistic]

P.S. the first character you circled on the Caravelle package is "syoon" = "sour"

[Julie]

I recently got some chinese pickled vegetables after moving from Devon to near London area in UK after 10 years! I was overjoyed. I also bought a roast duck. I saved the bones of the roast duck and boiled my soup instead of pork ribes and added some tofu to it! It was amazing and reminds me of home. My mother used to do it with roast pig legs but that is not soemthing one can easily get in UK! Yummy!

[Kitchen Chick]

Thanks "allopathicholistic", for pointing out my error. I'd better go back and double-check all those characters.

[Phoebe]

Thanks for the pictures and detailed write up here.

The 2 characters in the 2nd picture can be understood literally as "open the palate".

The 2 characters in the 3rd picture can be understood literally as "open the stomach".

Both can be used to mean a side dish to improve the appetite.

If I am not wrong, pao cai (whether the chinese or korean version) is almost always pickled/preserved chinese cabbage, not mustard green.

I'm interested in preserving chinese mustard green(kai choy) to make 'hum choy'. Anyone can tell me how to do it?

[Yuan]

Nice blog! My search for ma yi shang shu led me to your tasty food pics. Could you post the table of contents of Land of Plenty? Amazon doesn't have it for some reason.

I think the pickled mustard green you want is called xue3 cai4 (literally, snow vegetable 雪菜). It is just salty, not sour and they come moist in small cans (about half the size of canned dace). I think the can is yellow and orange with various characters/pictures. It is very good in pork baozi and nearly everything :) You have to be careful though: if you get the wrong can, you'll end up with zha cai instead (the root rather than the leaves). A dried version is called mei2 gan1 cai4 (plum dry vegetable 梅干菜). This is used in the famous mei2 cai4 kou4 rou4 （梅菜扣肉）. Since Boston does not really like spicy food (the fresh habaneros aren't even spicy here...), I often resort to lao3 gan1 ma1 （老干妈) chili sauce with peanuts. I prefer that over hot sauce in that laoganma isn't sour. They also sell pretty good fermented black beans (豆豉).

When people ask me for good Sichuan food, I always tell them to get my three favorites: shui2 zhu3 yu2 (water-boiled fish, 水煮鱼), la4 zi3 ji1 ding1 (pepper chicken cubes, 辣子鸡丁), and hui2 guo1 rou4 (twice cooked pork, 回锅肉). I usually suggest fu1 qi1 fei4 pian4 (husband and wife lung pieces, 夫妻肺片) and ma2 la4 niu2 jin1 (beef tendon, 麻辣牛筋) as appetizers. Fuqi feipian is famous in Sichuan. I think you've ordered all of these in some form or another. Another good dish at Chung King (not sure why it is called that as its menu has the proper spelling: Chong Qing) is jiao1 yan2 pai2 gu3 (pepper and salt spareribs). It might not actually be Sichuan food, but it is the only spicy dish (and its shrimp variant: jiaoyan xia) that I order at Cantonese restaurants.

"开胃菜"

[sacundim]

I've found the ya cai around here in the SF Bay Area. It comes in vacuum sealed bags and in jars. The brand in jars that I find out here says "yacai pickles" in the packaging, if I remember correctly.

I have an unopened package of bagged ya cai right here in my hands. It says (in English) "Tianfu Salted Vegetable," and the name of the company is Sichuan Province Hongteng Jiawei Food Co., Ltd.

The back of the bag has a sticker with distributor information (all sic):

PRODUCT OF CHINA
DISTRIBUTED BY:
SOLE AGENT IN AMERICA
TIFFANYFOOD CORP
1182FLUSHING AVENOE
BROOKLYN.NY11237
TEL:718-0326-2678

[Huei]

Looking to make Pao Cai I came by your blog.

Mustard greens is quite versatile and it can be salted or pickled (soured) which makes for very different flavors and uses. In my experience the Xue Cai (salted mustard leaves) is like zha cai (salted mustard heart). They are often used in dry stir fries with pork i.e. noodle dishes. These enhance dishes with that special mustard flavor with the addition of salt. Suan Cai is not only salted but left to ferment (therefore the name preserved) which gives them the sour flavor. This is often used in casserole or soup dishes. Hope this helps.

I am writing this most importantly to warn that please PLEASE, do not buy pickled or salted products from China. There is no food safety standards and there is no assurance regarding listed ingredients. They have been using "industrial salt" that is not fit for human consumption. Article:

http://www.wnd.com/?pageId=42500

There should be enough Taiwanese products to chose from. I have found that the Vietnamese markets sometimes make their own sour mustard greens and I have found that making your own Xue Cai is no surgery either. Salt and mustard leaves!

Good Luck!!

[Kris Liang]

You can actually buy these stuff through the internet at http://PosharpStore.com. It sounds there are lot of quite good selections of Sichuanese food items except their cooking ware.

[Lynn]

The literal translation for the last thing you couldn't translate with the word "opening", like someone already suggested, literally translates to "open stomach vegetable." The phrase "open stomach" in chinese merely means appetizing. So the name of that jar actually does not mean anything besides "appetizing vegetable". The image above says "appetizing sour vegetable". The characters palate and stomach are homynyms (they have the same sound) and, in this case, are being used interchangeably for appetizing.