Black bean sauce is a cooking sauce rather than a table sauce, which is to say that you cook things in it rather than squirt it on something while you eat. It is made from douchi, soy beans that have been preserved in salt and fermented, a process which turns the naturally white or yellowish beans black, hence the name, and it has been an important ingredient in Chinese cooking for over two thousand years. You can make it yourself at home out of black beans, garlic and soy sauce, but it is much easier just to buy the commercially made product, which comes either as a sauce or a paste.
Ingredients
300g lean pork, thinly sliced.
1 tbsp dry sherry.
1 tbsp light soy sauce.
2 tsp sesame oil.
½ cup ready-made black bean sauce.
1 tblsp raw sugar.
2 tblsp cornflour.
Salt to taste [remember the sauce is already salty].
Water.
3 cups chopped mixed vegetables, e.g. cabbage, cauliflower florets, spring onions.
Preparation.
Slice the meat and place in a bowl. Whisk together the sherry, soy sauce and sesame oil and pour the mixture over the meat. Cover and allow to marinate for at least an hour. Beat together the black bean sauce, the sugar, cornflour and salt to taste. Top up with water to the capacity of two cups and set aside. Prepare the vegetables and set aside.
Method.
Heat a wok or sauté pan over a medium to high flame and stir fry the meat in the marinade. When browned all over, add the bean sauce mixture, bring to the boil, reduce to a simmer, cover and cook for a further 5 minutes. Add the vegetables, bring back to the boil, reduce to a simmer, cover and cook for a further 5 minutes. Serve immediately.
Serve with: Rice on the side, or over noodles.
Serves: 2.
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