Hey guys, a few notes: 1. I’m a little worried that I sounded a little overly ‘negative’ in the introduction. Again, I do actually genuinely enjoy rice bowls. At my university canteen in Boston (way back in the day), there was a ‘stir fry station’ that whipped these sorts of concoctions up - dubious authenticity to… anything… but I adored them nonetheless. I think Farya Faraji put it pretty well in his recently video on orientalism: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-LR511iAedYU.htmlsi=SdPQ9KWhtkZWTJfH&t=860 And luckily, in the food space, I don’t think this sort of thing is the ‘norm’, the way he describes it for music. 2. Second, I think I should actually emphasize that these sorts of ‘big plates of rice’ are nowhere near unique to Guangdong. In fact, when it comes to one person lunches, it might even be the most common serving style. You can see it at canteen-style buffets, Gaijiaofan (盖浇饭) platters, Longjiang Pork Knuckle rice joints, and maybe even Sichuan tofu rice might qualify… 3. For both the beef and the chicken, for the slurry it would be preferable to use either potato or tapioca starch, as those hold a bit better than cornstarch. 4. Another thing that you see quite a bit - especially for roast meat platters - is rice that’s been drizzled with scallion oil. We wanted to keep things on the simple side in the video, but there’s instructions in the accompanying substack post if you’re curious. 5. Oh, that travel guideI referenced- 廣州快覽 - it can be found in its entirety here upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ee/SSID-13748832_%E5%BB%A3%E5%B7%9E%E5%BF%AB%E8%A6%BD.pdf 6. Visual at 1:14 is in the early 1940s in Hong Kong (taken by Harrison Forman - collections.lib.uwm.edu/digital/collection/agsphoto/id/16346/rec/85) not 1920s Guangzhou. I usually am a little more obsessive about trying to pair visuals a little more accurately, but after a couple hours of searching I settled on this one being ‘good enough for a RU-vid cooking video’ haha (it was between that or a lineup of shoe stores in an alley in 1920s Guangzhou). Apologies if you have similarly obsessive inclinations.
Pleasantly surprised to see you mention Farya's video on orientalist music. I watched it fairly recently and I saw a ton of parallels between orientalist music and American Chinese food.
@@ogorangeducksuch a great video, so many food parallels. luckily it feels like the situation with East Asian cuisines doesn’t seem anywhere near as dire as with middle eastern music.
so maybe this is a dumb question but -- what do you do with the oil you pass the meat through, afterwards? It seems like a lot of oil to just get rid of, but is it safe to keep it and reuse later?
As someone who grew up with the "small rice bowl and shared side dishes" style of eating, I'm partial to the "everything in one plate" style because I'll have at least one less thing to wash.
I live alone. Sometimes I just pour my sauté into the little pot where I've made rice, take the pot to my computer and eat out of it watching youtube... no dishes ever
@@brokenglassshimmerlikestar3407 sometimes i simply cook everything in my rice cooker (rice w/ seasoned presautéed meat then put my steamer basket full of veggies over it). This way also no dishes to wash provided you can eat all the rice & its trimmings in 1 sitting.
@@brokenglassshimmerlikestar3407My favorite "i cba to cook today" meal during uni was cook some rice, and during the last 2 minutes of cooking, add in a cube of furu and a tin of sardines in oil, and crack in an egg. Most delicious slop ever
Rice plate eateries are common in Singapore too. We call it caifan. 菜饭 or economy rice. There’s typically a big spread of precooked dishes to go with rice, and the customer just tops his rice with his customised choice of dishes. Economical, tasty meals on the go for everyone.
don't know if anyone will see this, but the thing about small bowl of rice vs plate with stuff is something i never realised and is super interesting! in singapore we have economy rice stalls where you get a plate of rice and the hawkers put whatever toppings you ask for on top, but we also have those sit-down chinese restaurants where families order multiple dishes and bowls of rice. i think here people eat the rice in a small bowl mostly for family gatherings when everyone's around a table, and if it's an individual thing or with friends they'll go with everything-on-a-plate.
Nah it’s not the American in you, this is just a good way to consume rice. In an agricutral society you always feed a bunch of close-knit people at once so it makes more sense to just share the big dishes around a table. In a more industrilised setting though (where eaters don’t know each other as well) it becomes easier for each person to have a dish of a little of everything. That’s why this seems more common in Hong Kong and the US, also Taiwan and Macao, and to some extent Japan and Korea. It’s not as common in China simply because China still leans a lot more toward manual labour agriculture. You can already see this way of eating catching on among mingongs; it’s just natural.
I think the real problem is that you have people who think "what Chinese is" versus "What actually Chinese is/do". This kind of plated rice (or more commonly, lunch box) is common in any Chinese cities.
I have a feeling that "eggs are purely for breakfast" is only a US thing. It's not a German thing and the French seem to have a "eggs are NOT for breakfast" thing.
It isn't even really right in the US - we just sneak the eggs in as other things. Quiche is not a breakfast food, for example, and while a bit fancy for every day, béarnaise and hollandaise sauce both have egg as a major component.
@@oldcowbb Egg+red meat gets you the even funnier Tanin-Don. (Stranger bowl) And while duck is sadly under utilized in Japan (duck+rice polyculture paired with freshwater carp is one of those things that fell to the wayside as a consequence of urbanization and widespread adoption of chemical pesticides) and this has never been officially stated, should duck+egg become a standard bowl, it should be called either step-parent or auntie bowl
as an italian i do that, often. i put white rice at the bottom, meat on one side, a nice salad mix on the other side and that's my dinner ready. maybe an egg on top if i'm really starving! obviously not chinese style but it's the same concept as this. the rice takes all the juices and becomes super tasty. proof that we don't eat pasta or bread or risotto all the time haha
I love rice with a bunch of saucy stuff over it! Would love to see more recipes like this, because I usually go for mostly veggies with either soy sauce or curry sauce.. and that gets boring quite fast
I think egg on/in a rice dish is very asian. We cook indonesian and an egg is often a part of a non breakfast dish. I've seen it in japanese cooking too. I don't recall off hand if it appears in Thai food, or South Korean food, but I wouldn't be surprised. Frankly, even in Europe, savory dinner omelettes are common enough, as are savory filled crepes or pancakes.
Countries in the Malaysian Straits (Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia) have a kind of meal where a few ingredients or dishes are served over rice in the same plate. We call it economic rice (cai fan/cai png), as it’s meant to be cheap yet filling and delicious all at the same time. For Malays and Indonesians they call it Nasi Padang, where the same style of ingredients or dishes are served over rice on a Pandan leaf.
Im partial to the single bowl/plate presentation in the same way im partial to the one pot preparation: less dishes to clean. Also for me it takes a note from both poké and bibimbap presentation, so I just love the visual appeal of a rice bowl loaded with various fresh and savory components. **Also: Japanese curry and rice. I LOVE the visual appeal of a sea of curry with a beautiful mound of steamy rice, sesame seeds, green onion, and a bit of julienne pickled ginger. **Also: Mapo Tofu
The problem I have with instagram style rice bowl is that they are all to dry. A good rice bowl should have every grain of rice covered in some form of sauce or fat
Big bowl of rice with a lot of sauce is not uncommon in other cuisines (Carribean, South Asian, etc). The first dish reminds me of oyakodon. If it's considered an American thing, it might have to do with its biggest cities being quite diverse.
So you say you're an American you've never heard of steak and eggs? it's a classic and it doesn't have to be for breakfast you can have steak and eggs and lunch dinner supper goodnight snack sticking eggs is classic eggs and sauce for dinner eggs and pancakes for dinner really is just a pancakes and eggs But we always did not always but usually I would have like fries with that homemade fresh cut french fries skin on they were delicious an omelet for lunch is great
The only issue I would have with the egg dish is that I can't stand runny eggs even if it's just the sauce it will just be disgusting slime I refuse to put in my mouth, but that is a personal issue of mine in that I really hate eggs or chicken with any moisture at all
I have one question for you why do you always cook with msg can you not cook without it once I mean you don't use a lot of salt which is fine then you use msd which is like 10 times worse than salt you know there's a lot of people out there with hypertension nowadays and it's because they have too much sodium in their system and monosodium glutamate Is it sodium products maybe food taste better but I've never thought it did I always thought I had a chemical taste the Chinese food I love Chinese food don't get me wrong but I like it when it's made without MSG and minimal salt using sea salt instead of regular sodium chloride sea salt is sodium chloride plus other minerals which are salt and flavored like potassium glory manganese chloride magnesium chloride there's a whole bunch of other things that mix with chloride It made great tasting salt everybody says oh Himalaya salt is the best oh guess what it's mostly sodium chloride with the pink color coming from other minerals like iron and other stuff more than one kind of salt some are dangerous some are not most are not and the body needs those trace elements. Once I would love to see all the cooks on youtube and TV and wherever cook with minimum amount of salt and when I say salt I'm talking like sea salt just enough to flavor the dish you don't need a lot and the majority of human beings on the planet are have hypertension high blood pressure because of too much sodium in our foods we don't need it to preserve the food anymore we've refrigeration the people are learning how to use fresh fruits and vegetables immediately they said leaving them around in the fridge for like a month until they turn God knows what color that is Can you try and not make a dish with MSG or massive amounts of sodium just sea salt just a pinch that the small pinch it's like a couple of shakes with salt shaker that's all you need for a whole dish the human body doesn't need more than that any dish most natural salts in the foods are enough for the sustain the body we don't need extra salt we crave it because in hot weather we need it and that's fine but most human beings don't live in hot climates all year round I forgot that makes sense central America or central South America Brazil Indonesia that makes sense because the heat is stifling down there we only get up here in New England or wherever us northern hemisphere because we have summer but in the winter time it can get below zero like 20 below with a wind chill the minus 60 yes minus 60 it's real it happens some places gets even colder like Siberia Just try see if you can make a dish without MSG and after a while without using it you'll find the food taste so much better believe me I eat food with very minimal salt and then when I grab something like from a store it's prepared food oh my God the amount of salt in the food is outrageous It's like biting into a cake of salt or have you ever eaten salt pork or salt dried codfish it's like biting some piece of that or salted beef before you wash it on the 6 soap off it's like bite into a kick assault it's disgusting how much sodium is put into our foods on purpose not because we like it but because the food manufacturers are owned by the drug corporations and the drug corporations need to sell high blood pressure medication so they introduce all the salt into our bodies or younger by the time we're old we have to take the high blood pressure medication stop the cycle cause really you might just suck your body needs a day is how to shake or to a salt shaker and that's what most of the whole taped clothes At one time salt used to be the most valued import export from any country because it was so rare and it was difficult to bring back from where it was produced which is desert stick wet deserts that go dry and the salt was left behind when the water evaporates well please like the Atacama Desert the Sahara Mongolia it's different place where there's salt salt pins a the Mediterranean was a salt pan at one time before the water came in
MSG contains 70% less sodium than sodium chloride by weight. MSG occurs naturally in many raw and prepared foods: parmesan cheese, tomatoes mushrooms, broccoli, soy sauce, miso, yeast, and, braised meats and poultry. Glutamate is the natural form of glutamine, the most common amino acid found in food proteins.
You are correct. In Australia, egg goes on everything. Bacon, ham, and egg pizza? That's an "Aussie Pizza". Hamburger with the lot? You better believe there's a fried egg in there. Also, I spotted a tornado omelet in there! Being diabetic, rice is off my menu unless it's dinner, but I have been making a dish where I fry some extra-large tomatoes, add some cheese to the top of them, then set a tornado omelet over the top. Delicious way to consume egg, cheese, and tomato.
i laughed seeing a legit cooking channel finds a way to showcase the "spam egg rice." this is funny the most comfort food out of all three for someone who grew up in HK lol
8:42 you dont know how much of a relief i felt when I saw I could finally get back at all my friends who turn their nose up to my "meat and egg on rice" meals saying "its not chinese"
There's also lu rou fan 滷肉飯 braised pork rice! (some people like to differentiate between 爌肉飯 khong bah png, which includes an entire chunk of pork belly, and 滷肉飯 loh bah png, which uses chopped up pork instead) Also found in Taiwan is 燴飯, rice served with meat cooked in sauce
Pretty normal in South East Asia. As a Malaysian, mixed rice or economy rice is pretty popular budget meal here. The most popular variant is Nasi Kandar, a plate of white rice with fried chicken, mixed curry gravy, vegetables like turmeric cabbage and a large crispy papadam chip.
Man. When you said a “big bowl of rice with a bunch of saucy stuff all over it” my heart got so happy. Rice with sauce on it is just my absolute favorite genre of food
2:12 In Argentina we even have a special name for eggs on meat: "a caballo" (on horseback). So a "bife a caballo" is a steak with one or more commonly two fried eggs on top of it
inch is commonly used for specifying the size of displays even outside the US, so one inch of ginger is maybe 1/6 of a smartphone display diagonale. Also Centigrade is the american way of using Celsius without using Celsius.
Anyone put off by eggs and beef has clearly never had the noble Steak and Eggs. And given the fact that it's steak, you can get *fancy* with it. Prime ribeye, reverse-seared to medium rare (I recommend slow-cooking in a smoker up to temp with your favorite chips soaked in a well-paired alcohol, then seared on a grill), add some surf with scallops or even lobster if you want, and two to three eggs, made however you want them (sunny-side up, over-easy, poached, scrambled... I did a French custard scramble once for a steak and eggs I made for myself). Of course you can add bacon. And believe it or not, this is often seen as a breakfast. So yeah... beef and eggs is a delicious thing. Actually... that does make me rather curious... does China have anything like prime steak? Or like a "wagyu beef" equivalent? What is the steak culture like in China?
its not an American thing, I live alone, i cook rice bowl style exclusively if i ever decide to eat rice. no reason to plate out everything when you are alone
I'm not even sure it's possible to be a HK-style cafe without a list of rice plates. At least in the US, it's the typical lunch special menu for almost any small, hole-in-the-wall Cantonese restaurant catering to students, office workers, and others who just want a quick, simple meal. The full menu is for dinner but lunch belongs to the rice plate.
You know what, thank you for the spam and hotdog idea! No need to apologize for junky food :) I've been going through a cooking slump, but I do have all the ingredients for it (other than the token bok choy), and I think I can springboard from that into using my drumsticks for the chicken and shiitake bowl. Thanks again, keep well :) Edit: just fried it up with red onion instead of a green veg (I know, I know). Delicious!
that was a really cute beginning although to be fair, stuff on rice is definitely not just a western thing. I’m thinking donburi. I do sometimes make up donburi and have definitely made a spam and egg one. That technique of actually heating the special soy sauce is something I’ve never tried. I’m going to give that a go! I also think about one of my fave lunches when I lived in Philly of duck over rice with a green vegetable from that vendor in Reading Terminal Market. I’ve always wanted to know how they made the sauce that goes over it. I thought Chris might be from the Philly area. If you are reading this, maybe you can make a video on how to make that dish!
1:17 I guess that those meat-on-rice dishes are the ancestors of _khao man kai_ (chicken rice), _khao kha mu_ (pork leg rice), _khao mu daeng_ (red pork rice), and other Chinese-Thai rice dishes.
There's much wisdom in your egg sauce for the beef. Like your Fuyong Dan recipe (Can you believe it was seven years ago!), the technique is key, and not something I've ever seen communicated well in a cookbook! You really need to see it being done. Outstanding work, as always.
The Philippines is already pretty obsessed with piling stuff on top of a mountain of rice, so this is right up my alley. I am curious though, would subbing chicken in or pork instead of beef change the marinade for the first recipe? We tend to eat more chicken in my family just cuz its cheaper
Since Steph suggested it and I had the ingredients, I tried the full english diptoufan. Surprisingly, cumberland sausage doesn't go so well with seasoned soy but baked beans on rice is quite nice. Two slices of fried bread on top might have been overkill.
Could you do another video about China's contribution to 'vegan' cooking? Seitan, tofu, 素鸡，素鱼，腐皮，钱张: just to name some off the top of my head. So many amazing Chinese meatless protein choices!
Is beef and egg and odd combination to some people? Here in a lot of places in the US we have steak and eggs as a classic breakfast/lunch so it's never sounded weird to me personally, but I guess that goes to show just how much cuisine can vary all over the world
As someone who isn't cantonese I always find reading cantonese quite amusing, it makes sense but sounds very odd when you read it aloud in Mandarin, since many characters are neologisms created from existing Chinese characters or are archaic words that mandarin speakers might only encounter in ancient poetry or texts.
this saucy meat and rice is pretty similar to typical british chinese take away dishes that most americans love to make fun of. i love this style of dish, im going to make that egg and beef one this week!
I have no idea why America sees egg and goes "Breakfast" I thought that as you said I should not relate egg to breakfast. It is something I will add to make food sound exotic despite not being even remotely exotic. I even have egg and eggplant dishes called "Twice cracked" as in you crack the egg and the eggplant.
Ugh yes I also LOVE a rice bowl! My go-to meal prep is usually a ton of rice, some grilled or roasted veg, whatever protein I have, and some kind of yummy sauce to drown it in. Just having a big bite of everything together is so satisfying! I am also partial to the VERY American version of this where the base is mashed potatoes instead of rice lol. I can't wait to try these!
Slippery egg and beef is a fantastic rice box take out favorite! But here in NYC, it's usually not a scrambled egg. It's a straight egg cracked onto the piping hot stir-fried beef over hot white rice. The heat semi-cooks the raw egg and it coats the beef. The texture is incredibly appealing and it's delicious.
Chris, I think you're gonna enjoy food from warteg in Indonesia. The food is basically vegetables and side dishes (albeit they're usually less meaty, depends on the price range) over a plate of rice.
the main reason i like throwing everything over my rice is because it means i have only one bowl to wash vs multiple dishes and i don't want to go to the effort of using multiple plates unless its for a big family dinner. Here in austria we have multiple dishes where you would normally sit around a table and everyone takes what they like, but again if you do it at home you wouldn't bother unless its for a family dinner
oooh yeah my favorite subgenre of saucy stuff on rice is the 三菜一汤 fast food stalls that used to be more common in nyc chinatowns. these days they're a lot harder to find
