five-spice powder

Five-spice powder
Simplified Chinese	五香粉
Traditional Chinese	五香粉
Hanyu Pinyin	wǔxiāngfěn
Transliterations Mandarin - Hanyu Pinyin wǔxiāngfěn

Five-spice powder is a mixture of five spices^[1][2] used in Chinese cuisine. One common recipe includes tunghing or "Chinese cinnamon" (also known as rougui, the ground bark of the cassia tree, a close relative of true cinnamon), powdered cassia buds, powdered star anise and anise seed, ginger root, and ground cloves. Another recipe for the powder consists of huajiao (Sichuan pepper), bajiao (star anise), rougui (cassia), cloves, and fennel seeds. It is used in most recipes for Cantonese roasted duck, as well as beef stew. It is also used as a marinade for Vietnamese broiled chicken. The five-spice powder mixture has followed the Chinese diaspora and has been incorporated into other national cuisines throughout Asia.

The formulae are based on the Chinese philosophy of balancing the yin and yang in food.

Although this spice is used in restaurant cooking, many Chinese households do not use it in day-to-day cooking. In Hawaii, some restaurants have it on the table.

A versatile seasoned salt can be easily made by stir-frying common salt with Five-spice powder under low heat in a dry pan until the spice and salt are well mixed.

Five-spice powder

References

1. ^ http://www.theepicentre.com/Spices/chinesefivespice.html
2. ^ http://www.schwartz.co.uk/productdetail.cfm?id=5198

External links

• The Wikibooks Cookbook may have additional variations on this theme

See also

• Red cooking