Chillies are served with everything in Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province. Red-hot dried red chillies. Almost every dish has a few in it and if it hasn't, you'll find a wee dish of crushed chillies in oil on the side. Dumplings are delicious dipped in a mixture of soya sauce, vinegar and chilli paste. Tofu is served braised in chilli sauce or skewered and grilled then smeared with chilli and oil mixture. Spicy noodle soup is a popular dish, too. Most dishes are made with pork or beef by default but food is usually made fresh, as everywhere in China, so it's not difficult to find veggie versions of the traditional spicy Sichuan standards.
The reason for food in Sichuan province being so heavily seasoned with chillies, is because the climate is so humid. The theory is that the chillies help to dry out the body by promoting sweating, thus countering the negative effects of high humidity on the organism. Chengdu is indeed a very humid city. It doesn't take long to start feeling overheated and sticky when you're out on the street. We spent a lot of time wandering about the streets and I can say that I did notice an improvement after eating chillies. After the initial burning sensation, I felt cooler and more refreshed.
Chillies lift your mood too. This isn't something I learned in Chengdu. I've known it for a long time. When was at university, my friend Ravindar used to eat chilli pickle on toast as a remedy for boredom. I tried it and it works. Boredom, irritation, slight depression - chillies will help.
The week after we visited Chengdu, we found ourselves in Kunming in Yunnan province. There's a Buddhist temple called the Yuangtong Temple which, like many Chinese Buddhist temples, operates a vegetarian restaurant. Here are some pictures of the temple; it's very picturesque. We checked out the restaurant and it was completely empty apart from a gang of uniformed waiters, which we took to be a bad sign. A glance at the menu added to our feelings of unease. Prices were high and all the dishes were modelled on meat dishes. There was shark-fin soup, prawn balls, braised chicken gizzards and even intestines. All mock, of course, but that really put me off. As we were leaving we noticed an entrance to what looked like another section of the same restaurant and on investigating, found out that it was just that. We had found the 'quick lunch' section with plastic chairs and tables and a serving hatch. We paid 10 yuan each and received a chit which we presented at the hatch. A few minutes later we got big bowls of spicy noodle soup just like the stuff we ate in Chengdu.
You can use various kinds of noodles for this. I used the kind that come all pressed together in sheets. You can also use packets of instant noodles. They're similar, but it might be better to add them a little later as they cook very quickly. The quantities here will make a big bowl each for four people.
Ingredients
120-150g of dry noodles
250-300g
or cabbage
1 green pepper
2 or 3 cloves of garlic
A bunch of spring onions
About a quarter teaspoon of crushed red chillies
A few crushed black peppercorns
2-3 teaspoons of tomato paste
A few generous splashes of soya sauce
A handful of dried black mushrooms
A handful of roasted peanuts
1 veggie stock cube
Oil
Salt
About 2 litres of hot water
Put the water in a pan to heat while you prepare the ingredients. Chop the cabbage, pepper and garlic into thin strips and cut up the green onions any way you like. Soak the mushrooms in a cup of boiling water.
Heat a little oil in a frying pan until it just begins to smoke then throw in the chopped vegetables. Stir fry everything for three or four minutes then stir in the chilli and black pepper. Add the vegetables to the pan of hot water along with the noodles, tomato paste, stock cube and soy sauce. Simmer for eight to ten minutes, adding salt to taste and the soup is ready.
Serve in bowls with a sprinkling of chopped peanuts on top.