Maocai () is a stew-like dish originating from the

Chinese Chinese may refer to: * Something related to China * Chinese people, people identified with China, through nationality, citizenship, and/or ethnicity **Han Chinese, East Asian ethnic group native to China. **'' Zhonghua minzu'', the supra-ethnic ...

city of

Chengdu Chengdu; Sichuanese dialects, Sichuanese pronunciation: , Standard Chinese pronunciation: ; Chinese postal romanization, previously Romanization of Chinese, romanized as Chengtu. is the capital city of the Chinese province of Sichuan. With a ...

, in

Sichuan Sichuan is a province in Southwestern China, occupying the Sichuan Basin and Tibetan Plateau—between the Jinsha River to the west, the Daba Mountains to the north, and the Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau to the south. Its capital city is Cheng ...

. It is composed of a variety of vegetables as well as meat and/or fish in a stock made of mala sauce. Although it is similar to styles of

hot pot Hot pot ( zh, c=, s=wikt:火锅, 火锅, t=wikt:火鍋, 火鍋, p=huǒguō, l=fire pot, first=t) or hotpot, also known as steamboat, is a dish (food), dish of soup/stock (food), stock kept simmering in a cooking pot, pot by a heat source on ...

common in this region, its chief difference lies in the fact that the ingredients are already cooked when served, and hence no simmering is done at the table.

Common ingredients

Although there is great variation in the ingredients used in ''maocai'', typically any of the following vegetables are included:

lotus root ''Nelumbo nucifera'', also known as the pink lotus, sacred lotus, Indian lotus, or simply lotus, is one of two extant species of aquatic plant in the family Nelumbonaceae. It is sometimes colloquially called a water lily, though this more of ...

potato The potato () is a starchy tuberous vegetable native to the Americas that is consumed as a staple food in many parts of the world. Potatoes are underground stem tubers of the plant ''Solanum tuberosum'', a perennial in the nightshade famil ...

slices,

Chinese cabbage Chinese cabbage (''Brassica rapa'', subspecies ''pekinensis'' and ''chinensis'') is either of two cultivar groups of leaf vegetables often used in Chinese cuisine: the Pekinensis Group (napa cabbage) and the Chinensis Group (bok choy). These v ...

cucumber The cucumber (''Cucumis sativus'') is a widely-cultivated creeping vine plant in the family Cucurbitaceae that bears cylindrical to spherical fruits, which are used as culinary vegetables.winter melon ''Benincasa hispida'', the wax gourd, also called ash gourd, white gourd, winter gourd, winter melon, tallow gourd, ash pumpkin, Chinese preserving melon, is a vine grown for its very large fruit, eaten as a vegetable when mature. It is nat ...

cauliflower Cauliflower is one of several vegetables cultivated from the species '' Brassica oleracea'' in the genus '' Brassica'', which is in the Brassicaceae (or mustard) family. Cauliflower usually grows with one main stem that carries a large, rou ...

wood ear Wood is a structural tissue/material found as xylem in the stems and roots of trees and other woody plants. It is an organic materiala natural composite of cellulosic fibers that are strong in tension and embedded in a matrix of lignin tha ...

enoki ''Flammulina filiformis'', commonly called enoki mushroom, is a species of edible agaric (gilled mushroom) in the family Physalacriaceae. It is widely cultivated in East Asia, and well known for its role in Japanese and Chinese cuisine. Unti ...

oyster mushrooms ''Pleurotus'' is a genus of gilled mushrooms which includes one of the most widely eaten mushrooms, '' P. ostreatus''. Species of ''Pleurotus'' may be called oyster, abalone, or tree mushrooms, and are some of the most commonly cultivated ...

seaweed Seaweed, or macroalgae, refers to thousands of species of macroscopic, multicellular, marine algae. The term includes some types of ''Rhodophyta'' (red), '' Phaeophyta'' (brown) and ''Chlorophyta'' (green) macroalgae. Seaweed species such as ...

bamboo Bamboos are a diverse group of mostly evergreen perennial plant, perennial flowering plants making up the subfamily (biology), subfamily Bambusoideae of the grass family Poaceae. Giant bamboos are the largest members of the grass family, in th ...

shoots,

tofu or bean curd is a food prepared by Coagulation (milk), coagulating soy milk and then pressing the resulting curds into solid white blocks of varying softness: ''silken'', ''soft'', ''firm'', and ''extra (or super) firm''. It originated in Chin ...

, yuba, beansprouts, as well as

rice vermicelli Rice vermicelli is a thin form of rice noodle. It is sometimes referred to as "rice noodles" or "rice sticks", but should not be confused with cellophane noodles, a different Asian type of vermicelli made from mung bean starch or rice starch r ...

and

cellophane noodles Glass noodles, or fensi (), sometimes called cellophane noodles, are a type of transparent noodle made from starch (such as mung bean starch, potato starch, sweet potato starch, tapioca, or canna (plant), canna starch) and water. They originated ...

made of

sweet potato The sweet potato or sweetpotato (''Ipomoea batatas'') is a dicotyledonous plant in the morning glory family, Convolvulaceae. Its sizeable, starchy, sweet-tasting tuberous roots are used as a root vegetable, which is a staple food in parts of ...

starch. The meats most frequently encountered are

beef Beef is the culinary name for meat from cattle (''Bos taurus''). Beef can be prepared in various ways; Cut of beef, cuts are often used for steak, which can be cooked to varying degrees of doneness, while trimmings are often Ground beef, grou ...

pork Pork is the culinary name for the meat of the pig (''Sus domesticus''). It is the most commonly consumed meat worldwide, with evidence of pig animal husbandry, husbandry dating back to 8000–9000 BCE. Pork is eaten both freshly cooke ...

and lamb, although other meats and more specific cuts may be used too.

Preparation

The name ''maocai'' is derived from the verb ''mao'' (; Chengdu dialect: ) which in

Sichuanese Mandarin Sichuanese,; Sichuanese Pinyin: ''Si4cuan1hua4''; zh, p=Sìchuānhuà, w=Szŭ4-ch'uan1-hua4 also called Sichuanese Mandarin, is a branch of Southwestern Mandarin spoken mainly in Sichuan and Chongqing, which was part of Sichuan Province fr ...

refers to the blanching of the ingredients in a colander in hot water by moving the colander up and down repeatedly. This pre-cooking of the ingredients before immersion in the stock sets it apart from most types of hot pot.

References

{{China-cuisine-stub Chinese meat dishes Chinese seafood dishes Chinese soups and stews Culture in Chengdu Sichuan cuisine