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Moo shu pork (木须肉, also spelled mù xū ròu, moo shi pork, mu shu or mu xu pork) is a dish of northern Chinese origin, originating from Shandong. It invariably contains egg, whose yellow color is reminiscent of blossoms of the 
No Matter How You Spell It, It's Still Mo-Shu-Ro
" by Craig Claiborne (''The New York Times'', November 2, 1967).
osmanthus
''Osmanthus'' ''Sunset Western Garden Book,'' 1995:606–607 is a genus of about 30 species of flowering plants in the family Oleaceae. Most of the species are native to eastern Asia ( China, Japan, Korea, Indochina, the Himalayas, etc.),and ...
tree, after which the dish is named.
Description
Chinese
In its traditional Chinese version, moo shu pork consists of slicedpork tenderloin
Pork tenderloin, also called pork fillet, pork steak or Gentleman's Cut, is a long, thin cut of pork.
As with all quadrupeds, the tenderloin refers to the psoas major muscle along the central spine portion, ventral to the lumbar vertebrae, t ...
, cucumber, and scrambled eggs
Scrambled eggs is a dish made from eggs (usually chicken eggs) stirred, whipped or beaten together while being gently heated, typically with salt, butter, oil and sometimes other ingredients.
Preparation
Only eggs are necessary to make scramble ...
, stir fried in lard
Lard is a semi-solid white fat product obtained by rendering the fatty tissue of a pig.Lard
entry in the ...
together with bite-sized cuttings of wood ear mushrooms (black fungus) and enoki mushrooms. Historically the original dish in Shandong cuisine contained bamboo shoots. It was adapted into Beijing cuisine replacing bamboo with crunchy entry in the ...
daylily
A daylily or day lily is a flowering plant in the genus ''Hemerocallis'' , a member of the family Asphodelaceae, subfamily Hemerocallidoideae. Despite the common name, it is not in fact a lily. Gardening enthusiasts and horticulturists have long ...
blossoms. When home-cooked either may be replaced with cucumber. The dish is seasoned with minced ginger
Ginger (''Zingiber officinale'') is a flowering plant whose rhizome, ginger root or ginger, is widely used as a spice and a folk medicine. It is a herbaceous perennial which grows annual pseudostems (false stems made of the rolled bases of ...
and garlic
Garlic (''Allium sativum'') is a species of bulbous flowering plant in the genus ''Allium''. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, chive, Welsh onion and Chinese onion. It is native to South Asia, Central Asia and northe ...
, scallion
Scallions (also known as spring onions or green onions) are vegetables derived from various species in the genus ''Allium''. Scallions generally have a milder taste than most onions and their close relatives include garlic, shallot, leek, chi ...
s, soy sauce, and rice cooking wine (usually ''huangjiu
''Huangjiu'' (), meaning yellow wine, is a Chinese alcoholic beverage, and is most popular in the Jiangnan area. ''Huangjiu'' is brewed by mixing boiled grains including rice, glutinous rice or millet with qū as starter culture, followed by ...
''). The dish is traditionally eaten by itself.
American Chinese
The dish is prepared with julienned pork, cabbage, scrambled egg, carrots, and wood ear mushrooms (black fungus).Hoisin sauce
Hoisin sauce is a thick, fragrant sauce commonly used in Cantonese cuisine as a glaze for meat, an addition to stir fry, or as dipping sauce. It is dark-coloured in appearance and sweet and salty in taste. Although regional variants exist, hoi ...
is painted on the inside of a thin flour-and-water pancake, or recently, sometimes, a Mexican tortilla, which is then used to wrap the filling.
In the United States, the dish seems to have appeared in Chinese restaurants in New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...
and Washington, D.C. in approximately 1966, receiving mention in a ''New York Times'' guide to Washington restaurants published that year. One of the first restaurants in Manhattan
Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five Boroughs of New York City, boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the List of co ...
to serve the dish was Pearl's, one of the best known New York City Chinese restaurants to serve non- Cantonese food in the 1960s. A 1967 article in ''The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' states that another of the first restaurateurs to serve the dish in Manhattan was Emily Kwoh, the owner of the Mandarin House, Mandarin East, and Great Shanghai restaurants." by Craig Claiborne (''The New York Times'', November 2, 1967).
See also
*List of pork dishes
This is a list of notable pork dishes. Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig ('' Sus domesticus''). It is one of the most commonly consumed meats worldwide,Raloff, JanetFood for Thought: Global Food Trends Science News Online. ...
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Moo Shu Pork American Chinese cuisine Egg dishes Pork dishes Shandong cuisine