Glazed bamboo shoots and shiitake mushrooms in dark soy sauce served in a traditional Chinese bowl on a rustic wooden table

Qing Dynasty · China

Yuan Mei's Braised Bamboo Shoots

Name: Yuan Mei's Braised Bamboo Shoots
Total time: 45 min
Yield: 4
Cuisine: China
Ingredients: 400 g fresh or tinned bamboo shoots, sliced; 100 g dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked and sliced; 300 ml chicken stock; 3 tablespoons light soy sauce; 1 tablespoon dark soy sauce; 2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine; 1 tablespoon sugar; 2 spring onions, cut into sections; 2 tablespoons vegetable oil

From Suiyuan Shidan · Yuan Mei · 1792

Verified from original source

Tender bamboo shoots braised in soy sauce with mushrooms and spring onions.

Historical note: Use winter bamboo, peel and cut into chunks, braise with soy sauce and stock.

History

Yuan Mei's braised bamboo shoots recipe appears in the *Suiyuan Shidan* (1792), a celebrated Chinese gastronomic treatise written by the Qing dynasty scholar-poet Yuan Mei. The work documented refined literati cuisine enjoyed in his garden estate near Nanjing. Bamboo shoots were prized in Chinese cooking for their delicate flavour and crisp texture, featuring in both vegetarian Buddhist temple fare and elite banquets. Yuan Mei emphasised simplicity and quality ingredients over elaboration. His recipes influenced later Chinese culinary writing and remain studied today as windows into eighteenth-century gastronomy.

Sources

Yuan Mei, Suiyuan Shidan (1792)
Sean J.S. Chen (translator), Recipes from the Garden of Contentment: Yuan Mei's Manual of Gastronomy (2018)
E.N. Anderson, The Food of China (1988)
H.T. Huang, Science and Civilisation in China, Volume 6: Biology and Biological Technology, Part V: Fermentations and Food Science (2000)
Frederick J. Simoons, Food in China: A Cultural and Historical Inquiry (1991)

Serves

Prep

15m

Cook

30m

Difficulty

Easy