[00:00] So I think when I say the word gruel, for a lot of&nbsp; you your mind's going to be jumping to something&nbsp;&nbsp; like… “you're serving us gruel?!?”. That is, it's&nbsp; slop, pig feed, poor people food… the mush that&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:12] you'd get at the orphanage, the workhouse,&nbsp; but the association above all, I think, is&nbsp;&nbsp; with the premodern. And maybe in fairness, I mean,&nbsp; gruel it definitely is an old, old food: I mean,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:26] by some measures it's the original food. What&nbsp; it is definitionally is some sort of simmered&nbsp;&nbsp; cereal grain in with water - it is so simple that&nbsp; it probably predated agriculture. Now gruel, it&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:39] should be said, is similar to but different from&nbsp; a porridge: a gruel is liquid and it's drinkable&nbsp;&nbsp; and porridge? I mean, we still have porridge&nbsp; for breakfast. But gruel, in the west I think,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[00:52] I think it's fair to say that it's starting to get&nbsp; to be a bit of an endangered species. But like,&nbsp;&nbsp; is that actually a culinary loss? Now, by the end&nbsp; of this video, I'm going to leave that up to you.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:04] But over here in China, at least, if you're&nbsp; familiar with Chinese food, you probably know&nbsp;&nbsp; about rice porridge, aka congee, aka Juk, aka&nbsp; Zhou. Now, we've covered Cantonese congee on&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:16] this channel before, but from there, if you kind&nbsp; of move up the coast north a little bit to the&nbsp;&nbsp; greater Min area of Fujian and Chaozhou, you can&nbsp; find something that's a little bit interesting.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:28] There, their staple is something called Xifan&nbsp; or Mue, and it looks a lot like a congee, but&nbsp;&nbsp; it's a lot thinner. And it's unseasoned. And it's&nbsp; drinkable. What you're looking at is a rice gruel.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[01:47] Now, I should probably warn you guys that this&nbsp; stuff, it uh it really is quite bland. I mean,&nbsp;&nbsp; there's a reason why travelers to China usually&nbsp; don't come back home raving about the unseasoned&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:00] rice gruel of Fujian and Chaozhou. And for the&nbsp; longest time, I didn't really get it either.&nbsp;&nbsp; But trust me that this stuff, it is actually&nbsp; genius. And these days, it's one of my go-to&nbsp;&nbsp; ways of eating rice. So now the way to think about&nbsp; this is that in that region, this is traditionally&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:19] their equivalent of a bowl of white rice,&nbsp; the staple starch that you'll have next&nbsp;&nbsp; to your meal practically every single day.&nbsp; Now, you can find that kind of practice in&nbsp;&nbsp; pockets around the country. But for me, living&nbsp; practically my entire adult life in Guangdong,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:36] it's most synonymous with here, the&nbsp; city of Chaozhou, where it's called mue.&nbsp;&nbsp; So what you'll do in Chaozhou is you'll&nbsp; serve your mue alongside some salty/umami&nbsp;&nbsp;
[02:48] snacks and dishes... and you could kind of almost&nbsp; think of the plain gruel as a pallette cleanser.&nbsp;&nbsp; So like you've got something like this. These are&nbsp; ganlan or Chinese olives, and they're actually a&nbsp;&nbsp; pretty intense ingredient. But what you can do is&nbsp; you can eat them next to and interspersed with the&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:04] mue: ditto with stuff like preserved daikon, fried&nbsp; peanuts, salty omelets, fish cooked in seawater&nbsp;&nbsp; (very traditionally)… stuff that is a little&nbsp; strong, a little salty and these days in Chaozhou,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:18] they'll even have these entire banquet concepts&nbsp; that are centered around that simple idea. So&nbsp;&nbsp; that's the context. But even then, for most of my&nbsp; years here in China, it never really clicked. Like&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:30] I still loved Chaozhou food. I mean, their Loshui&nbsp; Master Stock is probably my personal favorite&nbsp;&nbsp; variant, and we do still need to really, really&nbsp; cover their Guorou. But this specific aspect of&nbsp;&nbsp; it, it was never really my thing. And so it wasn't&nbsp; until the first year that we lived down in Bangkok&nbsp;&nbsp;
[03:48] in the depths of my very first hot season that the&nbsp; puzzle pieces finally started to come together.&nbsp;&nbsp; Because this stuff in hot, muggy weather,&nbsp; this is the most comfortable side starch&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:00] that you can possibly have. Now, before I get&nbsp; into why, I suppose I should back up and explain&nbsp;&nbsp; real quick why there is unseasoned Chaozhou&nbsp; style rice gruel in Bangkok of all places. So,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:17] simply put, Chazhou is to Thailand what Sicily&nbsp; or Naples is to New York City. Immigrants from&nbsp;&nbsp; Chaozhou really helped forge what we know of today&nbsp; as Bangkok. So, if you went to Bangkok's Chinatown&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:31] and you got some Thai Chinese food, what you'd be&nbsp; greeted by is stuff that is pretty much old school&nbsp;&nbsp; Chaozhou dishes or localized Chaozhou dishes, that&nbsp; kind of thing. But then even outside of Chinatown,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[04:44] there's a lot of restaurants in Bangkok that&nbsp; are run by Chaozhou descendants and they can&nbsp;&nbsp; serve up a real mix. So you might be able&nbsp; to find some olive pork that wouldn't be&nbsp;&nbsp; too too out of place in Chaozhou next to some&nbsp; Thai Chinese stuff like Chinese sausage yam,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:00] all together with things that might be a lot more&nbsp; synonymous with central Thailand like Tom Kha Kai&nbsp;&nbsp; or deep fried shrimp cakes. And at a lot of&nbsp; these restaurants, they'll also have mue or&nbsp;&nbsp; as it's called in Thai, called them Khao Tom Kui.&nbsp; And so it's here at this patio at our neighborhood&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:19] restaurant in Dindang called Jae Lek that I was&nbsp; eating a central Thai wing bean salad...and mue&nbsp;&nbsp; finally clicked for me. So how to explain this&nbsp; first? Often the mue it's served room temperature.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:34] So on a hot day, it's just really nice&nbsp; and hydrating, but also importantly,&nbsp;&nbsp; like we were talking about before, it also really&nbsp; helps balance a meal that has strong flavors.&nbsp;&nbsp; And like I don't know about you, but when it&nbsp; is muggy as hell, when I'm sweating bullets,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[05:49] it's often not all that comfortable to really load&nbsp; up on rich dishes or salty dishes or spicy dishes.&nbsp;&nbsp; But the plain me kind of punctuates those&nbsp; flavors, clears the mouth, lets you go on fresh.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:03] Now, you'll definitely need to try this&nbsp; yourself, but I just think it's really nice&nbsp;&nbsp; in the context of a hot summer meal. And so, given&nbsp; that we have a super El Nino barreling down on us,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:16] and given that this summer is hot, and given that&nbsp; nevertheless it is going to be the coldest summer&nbsp;&nbsp; for the rest of your life, I do think it's&nbsp; time to teach you the genius of Mue. So,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:30] mue together with how to assemble the&nbsp; pickle spread as you'd see it in Chaozhou.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then, we'll show you a basic preserved daikon&nbsp; omelette and a Chaozhou style fried vegetable&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:44] so that you can make a full proper mue meal just&nbsp; like you'd see it in Chaozhou. But then lastly,&nbsp;&nbsp; I also wanted to do something a little bit&nbsp; weird. Because that wing bean salad was such an&nbsp;&nbsp;
[06:56] important dish for me in my mue journey, I really&nbsp; wanted to show you that one too. Now, years ago,&nbsp;&nbsp; uh, we asked Jae Lek how they made theirs, and&nbsp; they invited us back into the kitchen. We got some&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:09] basic cell phone footage that I've been sitting on&nbsp; for a while... and I do really like the thing with&nbsp;&nbsp; Mue. Now, I should say that in an actual Thai&nbsp; context, I think most people would point to&nbsp;&nbsp; dishes like omelets or the aforementioned olive&nbsp; pork to go along with their Khao Tom Kui. So,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:26] this is a little bit me out on my own limb,&nbsp; but if you're still iffy on this whole&nbsp;&nbsp; unseasoned rice gruel concept, definitely try&nbsp; it with a mix of Chaozhou and Bangkok flavors,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:39] preferably in the dead heat of summer, because&nbsp; that is really what it ended up converting me.&nbsp;&nbsp; So, to make our mue then first, let's talk rice.&nbsp; So, for a nice and milky mue, what you're going to&nbsp;&nbsp;
[07:52] want is some sort of starchier short grain rice.&nbsp; Today we're using the rice from the northeast of&nbsp;&nbsp; China, which is probably the most common move&nbsp; in Chaozhou today, of which Japanese style rice&nbsp;&nbsp; would be an extremely close match. Now, down&nbsp; in Thailand, they'll obviously use their Thai&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:09] jasmine rice, so to split the difference&nbsp; starch-wise, often they'll add a little&nbsp;&nbsp; bit of sticky rice into their mix, and you could&nbsp; totally do that too if you wanted. So, then just&nbsp;&nbsp; wash your rice. This was 80g worth for two people.&nbsp; Then bring 1.6 L. that is 20 parts water to a boil&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:27] and then toss that in together with a spoon. Now,&nbsp; I should say that the spoon thing, it's kind of&nbsp;&nbsp; a little bit more of a Cantonese thing than a&nbsp; Chaozhou thing. So, you could definitely consider&nbsp;&nbsp; optional, but there's a pretty cool reason for the&nbsp; trick. And that's because in Chaozhou, they often&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:44] really really emphasize stirring the rice as it's&nbsp; cooking. What'll happen is that when stirring,&nbsp;&nbsp; the very exterior of the rice is going to slightly&nbsp; break down a touch and leave you with a milkier&nbsp;&nbsp;
[08:57] end result. We've even seen one dude that&nbsp; insists on 365 stirs. But with the spoon,&nbsp;&nbsp; what's going to happen is that it'll kind of&nbsp; jiggle around when it's boiling and then it'll&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:09] functionally sort of jostle the rice for you. Now,&nbsp; we'll still need to stir it a bit, but definitely&nbsp;&nbsp; not 365 times. So then let it come up to a heavy&nbsp; simmer. But definitely do remember to leave a big&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:23] crack on the lid. Gruels, congees like this are&nbsp; infamous for overflowing into a kitchen disaster.&nbsp;&nbsp; And again, you are still going to need to stir&nbsp; this thing occasionally, maybe once every 4 to 5&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:36] minutes or so. But no matter what, do not leave&nbsp; the room. Watch that thing like a hawk to make&nbsp;&nbsp; sure that it's not overflowing. If you do see it&nbsp; overflowing, don't panic. Just kind of open it up,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[09:48] stir it vigorously, put it back down. But no&nbsp; matter what, let that simmer for 20 minutes in&nbsp;&nbsp; all. Then heat off. And then you've got two&nbsp; ways that you can eat this. First, if it is&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:00] winter and you do want something hot,&nbsp; you can eat the thing straight away.&nbsp;&nbsp; But if it's summer, again, it can be a really nice&nbsp; idea to let that thing cool down. So, what you can&nbsp;&nbsp; do when you're cooking is make your mue first,&nbsp; then you can set that aside, let it cool down&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:15] while you're making everything else. Now, to&nbsp; eat this, we did make a couple dishes today,&nbsp;&nbsp; but I did want to talk about the pickles first.&nbsp; So, this was our spread. Here we've got some&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:27] fried peanuts, which I know aren't exactly a&nbsp; pickle, but they are pretty classic here. Then,&nbsp;&nbsp; we have the aforementioned Chinese olive, which is&nbsp; a pickle. And while they're not actually related,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:39] I do think that some nice briny western olives&nbsp; would also be really nice in this context, too.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then there's this stuff, ganlancai, which is an&nbsp; awesome ingredient - definitely my favorite of&nbsp;&nbsp;
[10:52] the spread. What it is is some preserved mustard&nbsp; greens cooked together with that Chinese olive&nbsp;&nbsp; and then jarred up. I really suggest this&nbsp; one. Then we have some preserved radish,&nbsp;&nbsp; caipu as it's called in Chaozhou. This guy, it was&nbsp; fried in with a little bit of lard and seasoned&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:09] with some sugar - recipe for that is down in the&nbsp; description box if you want it. Then we'll also&nbsp;&nbsp; have some furu fermented bean curd and of course a&nbsp; couple of salted eggs. Now, there's a couple ways&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:21] that you can do this. I've seen some people just&nbsp; kind of load stuff up into their bowl, but for me&nbsp;&nbsp; personally, I kind of like avoiding mue pollution.&nbsp; So, the way I was taught to avoid it was this.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:33] First you have your olive vegetable in one hand.&nbsp; Then you'll immediately (ish) gulp the mue. So… Now that kind of one two punch I'll usually just&nbsp; do with the pickles. With proper dishes I'll just&nbsp;&nbsp;
[11:50] kind of eat them a little bit more relaxed and&nbsp; normally… and so speaking of which, let's show&nbsp;&nbsp; you this omelette. So this guy, Caipu Jiandan,&nbsp; it's probably one of the most classic home cooking&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:02] dishes in Chaozhou because most people sort&nbsp; of like the world over, they'll have some eggs&nbsp;&nbsp; lying around their kitchen. But in Chaozhou,&nbsp; they'll practically equally also have some Caipu,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:14] so it's pretty straightforward to just smash the&nbsp; two together. So to make it, first just mince 20g&nbsp;&nbsp; of your preserved radish together with one clove&nbsp; of garlic. Set those aside. And then to a hot wok,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:26] toss in a half tablespoon of lard and give it&nbsp; a good swirl. Fry your garlic over medium until&nbsp;&nbsp; it's fragrant, about 15 seconds. Then toss in the&nbsp; caipu. Then fry that all together until the caipu&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:38] is toasted with some light brown bits. And set&nbsp; that aside to cool down. Then crack four eggs to a&nbsp;&nbsp; bowl. And then to that, toss in an eighth teaspoon&nbsp; each MSG and white pepper. Whisk that super well,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[12:52] really beating the snot out of it. until no stray&nbsp; strands of egg white remain. Then mix in the fried&nbsp;&nbsp; caipu and garlic mixture… and now we can make an&nbsp; omelette. So to a hot wok, swirl in a tablespoon&nbsp;&nbsp;
[13:05] half of lard and give that a good swirl to get a&nbsp; nice non-stick surface. Then flame on medium high&nbsp;&nbsp; now, pour in your thoroughly whisked egg. Then&nbsp; begin to give it all a bit of a scramble. Once&nbsp;&nbsp;
[13:17] it's about 80% set strings, give or take, evenly&nbsp; spread the thing out and let it fry. If you're on&nbsp;&nbsp; a round bottom wok like us periodically turn it to&nbsp; make sure that everything is cooking evenly, then&nbsp;&nbsp;
[13:32] once it's no longer runny, about 3 to 4 minutes,&nbsp; flip. Let the other side brown for about 2 minutes&nbsp;&nbsp; or so for the sake of good-looking... then&nbsp; out and garnish with a little bit of cilantro.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[13:47] Then for a vegetable, for me at least, I'd&nbsp; consider the two most classic vegetables&nbsp;&nbsp; to go along with a Chaozhou Mue to be first,&nbsp; maye or hemp leaves [jute, actually], then&nbsp;&nbsp; second fanshuye or sweet potato leaves. Neither&nbsp; of which are available where we live in Yunnan,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:05] unfortunately. So instead, we're going&nbsp; to be using water spinach, aka Ong Choy.&nbsp;&nbsp; Now, if you haven't worked with Ong Choy before, a&nbsp; little bit like asparagus, they kind of have these&nbsp;&nbsp; fibrous ends. So, just like asparagus, find&nbsp; the point where the fibrousness begins,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:22] snap it there, and then you can discard that or&nbsp; alternatively save it for stews and other dishes.&nbsp;&nbsp; Then take the remainder and then snap them&nbsp; into two inch sections and set them aside. Now,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:36] Ong Choy, it loves to hide a whole bunch of&nbsp; little dirt and schmutz inside of it. So,&nbsp;&nbsp; do really make sure to do a bang-up&nbsp; job washing that and then let it drain.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[14:48] Then the flavor profile for this vegetable, it&nbsp; really is dead simple. It leans on this stuff,&nbsp;&nbsp; puning doujiang, and not really all that much&nbsp; else. Now, this bottle, it should be available&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:02] at most Chinese supermarkets, but you might see it&nbsp; under the name Dao Jiew or Taucho, which is what&nbsp;&nbsp; it's called in and around Southeast Asia. What it&nbsp; is is a sort of lightly fermented soybean sauce…&nbsp;&nbsp; and we'll be using 2 tbsp worth to fry our&nbsp; vegetable. Now, to do so, to a hot wok, just&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:19] swirl in two tbsp of lard. And over a medium low&nbsp; flame, fry two cloves worth of minced garlic until&nbsp;&nbsp; it's fragrant, about 30 seconds. Then add in the&nbsp; doujiang and fry those together for about a minute&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:31] to sort of make a sauce of those two things. Then&nbsp; up the flame to high and add in the vegetable.&nbsp;&nbsp; Mix and fry to let that wilt about 1 minute&nbsp; or so. Then sprinkle in a teaspoon of sugar.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:43] Mix and then fry that for another 30 seconds.&nbsp; Then an 1/8 teaspoon of MSG and a final mix.&nbsp;&nbsp; And then with that, you've got yourself a Chaozhou&nbsp; style stir-fried veg… perfect to down some mue.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[15:59] Then last up, wingbean salad. Now, this dish is&nbsp; an expat favorite in Thailand, and I think with&nbsp;&nbsp; one bite, you'll definitely see why. The thing, it&nbsp; just tastes like Bangkok. But we should probably&nbsp;&nbsp;
[16:11] talk about sourcing first because I'm sure you&nbsp; might be a little bit curious about the titular&nbsp;&nbsp; wingbean. Now, wingbeans, they are bean. They also&nbsp; look pretty cool and they importantly have this&nbsp;&nbsp;
[16:24] really nice satisfying snap to them. They are a&nbsp; tropical plant, so you're probably not going to&nbsp;&nbsp; be able to find these. If you can find them in a&nbsp; Southeast Asian supermarket or something, that's&nbsp;&nbsp; awesome. But if not, the always excellent Pailin&nbsp; recommends substituting them with green beans.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[16:42] Now, I definitely don't want to go toe-to-toe&nbsp; with Pailin. She has undeniably forgotten more&nbsp;&nbsp; about Thai cuisines than I've ever learned. But&nbsp; for me at least, I just think that green beans,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[16:55] they kind of lack that snap of the wing bean. So&nbsp; instead, our substitute was going to be something&nbsp;&nbsp; a little bit more speculative. We tried celery&nbsp; - personally, I think it does really work here,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[17:11] and if you want a full recipe for that one, that's&nbsp; also down in the description if you want it.&nbsp;&nbsp; But besides the wingbean, the other important&nbsp; sourcing bit is going to be this guy. Nam&nbsp;&nbsp; Phrik Phao aka Thai chili paste. Now, this one,&nbsp; there's no way around it. It's absolutely critical&nbsp;&nbsp;
[17:30] for this flavor - this and evaporated milk is&nbsp; going to be the foundation of our profile here.&nbsp;&nbsp; It is pretty widely available online, though. So&nbsp; no matter what, just beg borrow steel your way&nbsp;&nbsp;
[17:43] to 45 grams worth and then set that aside. Then&nbsp; for the wingbean, the only thing to really worry&nbsp;&nbsp; about is the string. Sometimes on the older&nbsp; beans, you can get a little bit of a string,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[17:58] like a string bean. So if you can find one,&nbsp; just pull it away and set it aside. But then&nbsp;&nbsp; just slice 150g of the bean on a bias into about&nbsp; 1 cm sections. Then we'll quickly blanch those in&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:11] boiling water for about 20 seconds. Then remove,&nbsp; shock, with cool water and then drain. Then also&nbsp;&nbsp; boil 60g of minced pork in the same water until&nbsp; it's cooked through and also let that one drain.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:25] Then for the final mix to a large bowl just&nbsp; toss in your Nam Phrik Phao Thai chili paste,&nbsp;&nbsp; 5g of granulated sugar and 2g of MSG. 10g worth&nbsp; of a solid fish sauce, another 10 grams or about&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:39] two-thirds of a lime's worth of lime juice. Mix,&nbsp; mix, mix… then toss in one sliced spicy chili,&nbsp;&nbsp; a quarter of a small onion, also sliced, the pork,&nbsp; the beans, and I almost forgot my evaporated milk,&nbsp;&nbsp;
[18:52] 20g worth, and then mix that super well. And for&nbsp; the full Bangkok restaurant effect, just like Jae&nbsp;&nbsp; Lek, we'll garnish our plate with a bit of sliced&nbsp; cabbage and carrot. Then, toss on our salad.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[19:06] Nestle in a sliced boiled egg, preferably with&nbsp; a yolk on the gooey-er side. And then with that,&nbsp;&nbsp; the Thai wing bean salad is also good to go. So,&nbsp; uh, mue or white mue has another very classic&nbsp;&nbsp;
[19:22] variation around the Chashan area, which is with&nbsp; sweet potato. Where it came from, it was during&nbsp;&nbsp; the time where rice is very rare and you cannot&nbsp; even afford to use uh rice to make a thin gruel.&nbsp;&nbsp;
[19:35] And what you will do is that you will grab some&nbsp; sweet potato and mince it very small and boil&nbsp;&nbsp; it together with a little bit of rice and it will&nbsp; end up having a similar consistency with the gruel&nbsp;&nbsp;
[19:47] that also fills you up. So right, check out the&nbsp; recipe in description box. A big thank you for&nbsp;&nbsp; everyone that's supporting us on Patreon and of&nbsp; course subscribe for more Chinese cooking videos.