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Alison Stewart: This is All Of It, I'm Alison Stewart. More than one and a half million New York City residents celebrate Lunar New Year. This year Lunar New Year falls on Sunday, January 22nd, and 2023 is the Year of the Rabbit. If you're looking to celebrate, you can head to the Lower East Side to Sara D. Roosevelt Park on Sunday afternoon for the annual Lunar New Year cultural festival. Saturday, the Museum of Chinese in America will have candy and noodle-making demonstrations, and craft workshops, and a lion dance performance. If you're in the mood for music on January 31st, the New York Philharmonic program will feature Li Huanzhi's Spring Festival Overture and will be conducted by Long Yu.

Now, if you plan to celebrate at home, our next guest may have some ideas for you. Maggie Zhu's new cookbook is called Chinese Homestyle. The dishes featured in the cookbook are inspired by everyday meals she grew up with in Northern China, such as Old Beijing Fried Rice Noodles, and Buddha's delight. All of these meals are hearty with a twist. The recipes are plant-based. The book's full title is Chinese Homestyle, Everyday Plant-Based Recipes for Takeout, Dim Sum, Noodles & More. Joining me in studio right now is New York-based Food Writer, Maggie Zhu. Maggie, nice to meet you.

Maggie Zhu: Nice to meet you too. It's a pleasure to be here.

Alison: Tell me a little bit-- you lost your website, Omnivore's Cookbook in 2013, and you said your intention was to expose less-known regional cuisines such as Northern and Xinjiang food to a broader audience. What is unique about the cuisine from that area?

Maggie: I grew up in Beijing and I've been eating northern-style Chinese food in my whole life. The food is very savory and hearty compared-- I feel like the Chinese dishes that are more popular in the US are Cantonese style. This days like Sichuan food is very popular. I feel Shanghai food is slightly getting some tractions, but northern food is like very savory. I'd say it could be a little bit rustic, like very northern era where-- actually my grandma comes from. Beijing is actually another-- Beijing just because it gathers like all the good food all over the country. It's like New York you get to experience all kinds of nice food, but then they make it slightly nicer.

Northern food are simple and hearty. There's a lot of stews. We eat a lot of noodles and dumplings, and we actually make a lot of bread. The scallion pancake, we actually have 20 forms of that with different stuffing’s, and different herbs, and sometimes with no stuffing just like a simple thing. Those are the food that’s from Northern China.

Alison: You mentioned your grandmother. I wanted to ask because a lot of people are going to celebrate Lunar New Year with family, how did you grow up celebrating?

Maggie: On Chinese New Year Eve, the whole family gather together. We travel from Beijing to like my grandma's place, which is three hours outside of Beijing and the whole family gather together. They're like 20 people there. We make dumplings from early afternoon, start from prepping the dough and rolling out the wrappers, and make the fillings. It's really hour’s long process that everybody participate, and we just make hundreds of dumplings. Along the way, once a batch is ready we just cook them, and we take turn to share and eat dumplings. That's what we did on Chinese New Year's Eve. Now Chinese New Year Day, we make this huge spread of food that just have like everything, all kinds of proteins, and the vegetables, appetizer, noodles, and soups, and more.

Alison: Why did you decide to make this cookbook plant-based?

Maggie: Actually that's after I come to the US which was eight years ago. My husband Thomas, he is a runner and he trains for marathon and races. There's just one day he decided like, oh, you know what, let's try this out. It might be good for his training. We actually did a few months of entirely 100% plant-based. He found out that the food really help him to train, to recover from training faster. I love the meals because first off they're tasty, and I feel light after eating it.

In the afternoon I don't need four cups of coffee. I don't feel like falling asleep after a meal. I started to explore plant-based cooking more. Also after we moved to New York, I started to eat out at all kinds of nice vegetarian Chinese restaurant. There are a lot of Buddhist restaurant here in China. They're amazing. I was very inspired by all those hundreds of plant-based dishes that you don't really miss the meat at all. I think it's a really fun topic to explore.

Alison: My guest is Maggie Zhu. We're talking about her cookbook Chinese Homestyle, which will be out January 24th. In the cookbook you wrote, chili oil should be a staple for anyone who loves Chinese food and a little spiciness, and you include your own recipe. What are the key ingredients for good chili oil?

Maggie: It's actually really, really simple. The key ingredient is the chili pepper, the chili flakes that you want to-- the one we use in Chinese chili oil is the Chinese style that is grounded with several-- it is a blend of different dried chili peppers. Some are a little bit spicy, some are a little bit smokier. It has to be really fresh and the ground is not like powder. It's like flakes. It's not very small, so when you cook-- pour the hot oil onto it, it doesn't get like too spicy. It's more of the, you want the aroma and the smokiness from the peppers, but now all the spiciness. I do add a little bit aromatics like five-spice and bay leaves in it to make it more fragrant. Really the key is that you use a very fresh, high-quality chili flakes.

Alison: Now this may sound like a naive question, but do you use the chili oil solely for cooking, or is it something that you can mix into a dressing of some kind?

Maggie: That's the beauty of it because you can use it for everything. I feel like most of the time it's used as a finishing oil. We do use-- I personally use it the cooking too, but it is one of these things you usually add towards the end of the dish. If you're making a stir fry, you'll add at the end to just spice it up a little bit, or you are making a noodle soup, you'll add it at the end. You can use it for all kinds of other things like making a dressing, or just the top on your rice or noodles and everything. My husband like to top it on the peanut butter toast.

Alison: [laughs] I've heard though that your pan can get too hot. You have to be very careful about your pan getting too hot with your oil. How can you tell when your pan's the right temp?

Maggie: Actually Chinese cooking, especially stir-fries, you want it to get kind of hot. I'd say, first of all, you want to use a type of oil. Usually, neutral oil, for me, is really like peanut oil, but any neutral oil, like avocado, or grape seed, or canola that has a good smoking point, which is around 550. When you heat the pan enough, when you see a whisk of smoke start to appear, that's enough. You don't want it to like, oh, so smokey has started to like-

Alison: Make you scared.

Maggie: Yes, no. That's hot enough.

Alison: Chinese Eggplant with Garlic Sauce is on page 79 of your book, and this is one of your most popular recipes from your blog. Do you understand why it's one of the most popular?

Maggie: I think because of the simplicity of it. It's so simple you use-- I like to use Asian-- the long thin eggplant, they're called Asian eggplant. I also include the way you can prep it so you can use actually all types of eggplant which really helpful. Because the American type, the really big one, it has more moisture in it, so much water in those.

Alison: I know.

Maggie: It cause trouble because when you make a stir fry it can get soggy, or otherwise you might end up using a lot of oil. It just absorbs all the oil become like it's just greasy. I use salted water to soak the eggplant to draw moisture out. After that step, you pat them dry, and then you'll coat it with a very thin layer of cornstarch. By using this method, you can pretty much use all kinds of eggplant, and you can pan-fry them with like a thin layer of oil. Nothing like deep frying, but maybe slightly more than you're making like a very simple stir fry. Maybe three, four tablespoon, or even a little bit less. It create this beautiful crust that is crispy, crunchy, and the inside of the eggplant is tender.

Alison: You've got that contrast.

Maggie: Yes. I finish up with a really simple garlicky brown sauce that's made with light soy sauce, dark soy sauce, a little bit garlic, and Shaoxing wine. It's very simple, but then you'll get old aroma like this sticky, glossy sauce that's coated outside of the crispy eggplant.

Alison: Let's talk about Dan Dan Noodles on page 139. It's a dish you suggested for Lunar New Year's celebrations. Why did you suggest Dan Dan Noodles?

Maggie: First of all, it's delicious and it's popular like everybody loves it. It’s one of the dishes that you can prepare ahead of time. I think that's actually very helpful for-- Chinese cooking if you notice the ingredient lists tend to be a little bit longer, and chopping everything it takes some time. My readers always ask me like, oh, how you make 10 things and serve them hot at the same time? I'm like, "You know what, you can." You have to be strategic about it to make smart decisions about what to prepare, some appetizer or something cold, maybe a stew you can heat up later. Dan Dan Noodle is one of those you can make it the day before, and you can assemble it later, and it's just so tasty.

Alison: What's the flavor profile in your recipe?

Maggie: The sauce is really the star of the dish. It's has a nutty flavor base because you use Chinese sesame paste, and you use all kinds of seasonings like soy sauce-- Chinese vinegar is black vinegar, and the aromatics, ginger, garlic, green onion, spiced up with chili oil. Another key ingredient is Sichuan peppercorn. The shape looks black pepper, but the color is red. It has a zesty citrusy taste, and when you eat it, when you put it in your mouth, it literally numb your mouth. It's like this little party in your mouth. It has this amazing aroma that it's one of those things you go to a very authentic Sichuan restaurant, and you're like, "What is this?" It has this one ingredient that really bring the authenticity to the dish.

Alison: My guest is Maggie Zhu. The name of her cookbook is Chinese Homestyle: Everyday Plant-Based Recipes for Takeout, Dim Sum, Noodles & More. We're getting some ideas for Lunar New Year. Orange Cauliflower, this is so interesting. How do you to coach your cauliflower before you cook it?

Maggie: I use a very simple batter that's made with plant milk and cornstarch. It's a very thin batter, but the benefit is that you don't need to deep fry it. It's not like the type of Buffalo cauliflower sometimes you'll have in the restaurant. I feel there's more batter than the caul-

Interviewee: Even better than vegetable.

Maggie: Yes, I know. I really do not like to deep-fry things, anything at home because it's so messy, and you have to use so much oil, and it's like, "What I'm going to do after cooking." By using this thin coating you can use, again, a very thin layer of oil. You just pan-sear it and it will create this crispy crust that stay. The key is the cornstarch, it have this crunchy, crispy taste, and it holds. Even after you add the sauce it has this crispy texture which is really great.

Alison: How do you keep it from falling apart?

Maggie: You try not to overcook it.

Alison: Overcooking.

Maggie: I feel like when you make it you stir fry. For me, the key is to take them out of the pan before you add the sauce, and you always want to keep things slightly undercooked. Because you remember, after adding sauce it kind of boil. All the steam and heat it cooks through things really, really fast. You want to keep it a little [unintelligible 00:13:11].

Alison: You have Eggless Egg Drop Soup. How does one make Eggless Egg Drop Soup?

Maggie: I use the yuba sheet. I'm not sure if you're familiar with this ingredient. It's a type of tofu product which is made with soybean and water. It's literally the same thing that you'll make tofu, but because of different process its shape is like a piece of paper, its very thin. It has a very tender, soft texture that when you putt in a soup it cook in one minute, and it shapes like a egg ribbon. It's very mild and it doesn't fall apart. It's just a really cool product. It's very rarely used in Chinese cooking, and also in Japanese cooking.

I think you can even find those at Whole Foods. They're called yuba sheet.

Alison: Good to know. In our last minute, we'll ask about dessert. What are your favorite desserts for Lunar New Year?

Maggie: I think it's the Red Bean Sticky-- I call it pancake, but it's actually similar to mochi. You use those sticky rice flour to make it. It's a very simple dough to use. The dough is like clay, it's just very fun to work with, and you quickly mix the dough. I have those red bean paste I just lightly sweeten, and you put that in and make those small dumplings and pan fry them until crispy. It's crispy on the outside and tender-- sticky like a mochi on the inside.

Alison: Do you have-- you've been talking about searing. A particular kind of pan you like to use?

Maggie: I personally use both non-stick and the carbon still pan in my cooking. Always, I would promote not using a wok because I know that in the US there are almost two-third of the kitchen that they do not have a gas stove. It's usually induction or electric stove that is not that suitable for wok cooking, because you cannot get the pan hot enough. I personally like to use my large-- the carbon still pan is great. It's like a cast iron pan, but it's lightly lighter, and it holds heat really well. The non-stick pan is another good choice.

Alison: My guest has been Maggie Zhu. Her new cookbook is called Chinese Homestyle. Thank you for joining us and sharing all these recipes. Hopefully, people will try a few out for Lunar New Year.

Maggie: Thank you for inviting me. It was so fun to talk with you.

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