Moo shu pork
Encyclopedia
Moo shu pork is a dish of northern Chinese
origin, possibly originally from Shandong
. It is believed to have first appeared on the menus of Chinese restaurants in the United States
in the late 1960s, and is also a staple of American Chinese cuisine
.
meat and scrambled eggs
, stir fried in sesame
and/or peanut oil
together with thinly sliced wood ear
mushrooms (black fungus) and day lily buds. Thinly sliced bamboo shoot
s may also be used. The dish is seasoned with minced ginger
and garlic
, scallion
s, soy sauce
, and rice cooking wine
(usually huangjiu
).
In the United States, the dish seems to have appeared in Chinese restaurants in New York City
and Washington, D.C.
, in approximately 1966, receiving mention in a New York Times guide to Washington, D.C., restaurants published in that year. One of the first restaurants in Manhattan
to serve the dish was Pearl's, one of the best known New York City restaurants to serve non-Cantonese food
in the 1960s. A 1967 article in The New York Times
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. The dish was also early on the menu at Joyce Chen's, a celebrated pioneering Mandarin-style restaurant in Cambridge, Massachusetts
. At that time, the dish was at first prepared in a traditional manner, but, as wood ears and day lily buds were scarce, a modified recipe was developed. In this modified recipe, which gradually came to predominate in North America, green cabbage
is usually the predominant ingredient, along with scrambled eggs, carrot
s, day lily buds, wood ear mushrooms, scallions, and bean sprouts. Shiitake
mushrooms, bok choy
, snow pea
pods, bell pepper
s, onion
s, and celery
are sometimes also used, and dry sherry
is often substituted for the huangjiu. The vegetables (except the day lily buds and bean sprouts) are generally sliced into long, thin strips before cooking.
While these are the typical ingredients, there is some variation in the recipe from chef to chef or restaurant to restaurant. In both the Chinese and Americanized versions, monosodium glutamate
, salt, sugar, corn starch
, and ground white pepper
are also often added. In less authentic North American restaurants, the wood ears and day lily buds (ingredients less familiar to most American customers) are often omitted entirely. Because finely sliced cabbage and carrots make up a large portion of the American-style recipe's ingredients, pre-bagged
coleslaw
mix is often used to save the time of slicing these vegetables.
Although most commonly made with pork, the same basic dish can be prepared by substituting another meat or seafood; generally only a single meat is used. If made with chicken instead of pork, the dish is called moo shu chicken, and the name is similarly altered if prepared with beef or shrimp. If prepared without any meat, it is called moo shu vegetables or moo shu tofu.
and several (generally four) warm, steamed, thin, white tortilla
-like wrappers made of flour, called "moo shu pancake
s" (Chinese: 木须饼, pinyin: mù xū bǐng), "Mandarin pancakes", or báo bǐng (薄饼, literally "thin pancakes"); these are similar to those served with Peking Duck
. In the late 20th century, some inauthentic North American Chinese restaurants began serving Mexican
-style flour tortilla
s in place of the traditional moo shu wrappers, which are thinner and more brittle in texture.
The moo shu pork is then wrapped in the moo shu pancakes, which are eaten by hand in the manner of a soft taco
. The diner typically wraps his or her own pancakes, although waiters in Chinese restaurants are often willing to perform this function as a courtesy to diners who are unable to do so. First, a small amount of hoisin sauce is spread onto the pancake, then a spoonful or two of moo shu pork is placed in the center of the pancake. The bottom of the pancake is folded up slightly (to prevent the contents from falling out), and the pancake is either folded or wrapped from left to right, in the manner of a soft taco
.http://books.google.com/books?id=fZIRc28P5xYC&pg=PT120&dq=%22moo+shu%22+fold+%22lovegren%22 Unlike the practice in wrapping a burrito
, the top is usually not folded over, as the pancake is generally eaten immediately and thus there is no danger of the food falling out of the top, which is the part that is eaten first. Because the dish often contains a great deal of liquid, care must be taken that the pancake does not become soaked through and break during rolling or eating.
Like Chinese noodle dishes, moo shu pork is not typically served with steamed white rice
.
One story gives the name as 木犀肉 (pinyin: mù xī ròu). The last character 肉 (ròu) means "meat" and refers to the pork in the dish. The first part 木犀 (mù xī) is the name for the Sweet Osmanthus
: a small ornamental tree that produces bunches of small and fragrant blossoms that may be yellow or white.
Scrambled eggs have an appearance that remind people of the mixed yellow and white flowers, so 木犀 (mù xī) is a poetic way of referring to the scrambled eggs used in preparing this dish. Additionally, at Chinese Confucian
death anniversary
celebrations, the Chinese word for "egg" (蛋; pinyin: dàn) is avoided when referring to dishes containing eggs, as many Chinese curses contain this word. Thus, the word dàn was typically substituted using the euphemism
"Sweet Osmanthus." By this reasoning, in this version of the dish's name, the first character, 木 (mù) is short for 木耳 (mù'ěr, meaning "wood ear fungus") and 樨 (xī, meaning "Sweet Osmanthus tree") is short for 桂花 (guíhuā, meaning "Sweet Osmanthus flower").
The second way of writing the name of this dish that is commonly seen in Chinese restaurants in the United States is 木须肉 (pinyin: mù xū ròu). The second character 须 (xū) means "whiskers," and is often given an additional determinative component in writing (to distinguish the meaning of "whiskers" from the other meanings of 須) so that it comes to be written as 鬚. It is possible that 木須肉 (literally "wood whiskers pork") might have been used on the menus of the first American Chinese restaurants to serve the dish in place of the correct compound 木樨肉 ("sweet osmanthus pork") due to haste or simply because of the limitations of Chinese typewriters. It may also merely have been the result of writing the wrong character with a similar pronunciation.
There are two additional explanations of the name have unclear origins and may be examples of folk etymology: There is a neighborhood with a similar name in Beijing
called Muxi Di (木樨地), which is home to the Muxi Di train station (木樨地站). The dish is also occasionally also called 苜蓿肉 (mùsù ròu) meaning "alfalfa
meat".
North China
thumb|250px|Northern [[People's Republic of China]] region.Northern China or North China is a geographical region of China. The heartland of North China is the North China Plain....
origin, possibly originally from Shandong
Shandong
' is a Province located on the eastern coast of the People's Republic of China. Shandong has played a major role in Chinese history from the beginning of Chinese civilization along the lower reaches of the Yellow River and served as a pivotal cultural and religious site for Taoism, Chinese...
. It is believed to have first appeared on the menus of Chinese restaurants in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
in the late 1960s, and is also a staple of American Chinese cuisine
American Chinese cuisine
American Chinese cuisine refers to the style of food served by many Chinese restaurants in the United States. This type of cooking typically caters to Western tastes, and differs significantly from the original Chinese cuisine.-History:...
.
Description
In its traditional Chinese version, moo shu pork consists of sliced or shredded pork chopPork chop
A pork chop is a cut of pork cut perpendicularly to the spine of the pig and usually containing a rib or part of a vertebra, served as an individual portion.-Variations:...
meat and scrambled eggs
Scrambled eggs
Scrambled eggs is a dish made from beaten whites and yolks of eggs . Beaten eggs are put into a hot pot or pan and stirred frequently, forming curds as they coagulate.-Sample preparation:...
, stir fried in sesame
Sesame oil
Sesame oil is an edible vegetable oil derived from sesame seeds. Besides being used as a cooking oil in South India, it is often used as a flavor enhancer in Chinese, Japanese, Korean, and to a lesser extent Southeast Asian cuisine.The oil from the nutrient rich seed is popular in alternative...
and/or peanut oil
Peanut oil
Peanut oil is an organic material oil derived from peanuts, noted to have the aroma and taste of its parent legume....
together with thinly sliced wood ear
Auricularia auricula-judae
Auricularia auricula-judae, known as the Jew's ear, jelly ear or by a number of other common names, is a species of edible Auriculariales fungus found worldwide. The fruiting body is distinguished by its noticeably ear-like shape and brown colouration; it grows upon wood, especially elder...
mushrooms (black fungus) and day lily buds. Thinly sliced bamboo shoot
Bamboo shoot
Bamboo shoots or bamboo sprouts are the edible shoots of many bamboo species including Bambusa vulgaris and Phyllostachys edulis. They are used in numerous Asian dishes and broths...
s may also be used. The dish is seasoned with minced ginger
Ginger
Ginger is the rhizome of the plant Zingiber officinale, consumed as a delicacy, medicine, or spice. It lends its name to its genus and family . Other notable members of this plant family are turmeric, cardamom, and galangal....
and garlic
Garlic
Allium sativum, commonly known as garlic, is a species in the onion genus, Allium. Its close relatives include the onion, shallot, leek, chive, and rakkyo. Dating back over 6,000 years, garlic is native to central Asia, and has long been a staple in the Mediterranean region, as well as a frequent...
, scallion
Scallion
Scallions , are the edible plants of various Allium species, all of which are "onion-like", having hollow green leaves and lacking a fully developed root bulb.-Etymology:The words...
s, soy sauce
Soy sauce
Soy sauce is a condiment produced by fermenting soybeans with Aspergillus oryzae or Aspergillus sojae molds, along with water and salt...
, and rice cooking wine
Rice wine
Rice wine is an alcoholic beverage made from rice. Unlike wine, which is made by fermentation of naturally sweet grapes and other fruit, rice "wine" results from the fermentation of rice starch converted to sugars...
(usually huangjiu
Huangjiu
Huangjiu is a type of Chinese beverage brewed directly from grains such as rice, millet, or wheat. Unlike baijiu, such liquors are not distilled, and contain less than 20% alcohol, due to the inhibition of fermentation by ethanol at that concentration...
).
In the United States, the dish seems to have appeared in Chinese restaurants in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C.
Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, "the District", or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States. On July 16, 1790, the United States Congress approved the creation of a permanent national capital as permitted by the U.S. Constitution....
, in approximately 1966, receiving mention in a New York Times guide to Washington, D.C., restaurants published in that year. One of the first restaurants in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
to serve the dish was Pearl's, one of the best known New York City restaurants to serve non-Cantonese food
Cantonese cuisine
Cantonese cuisine comes from Guangdong Province in southern China and is one of 8 superdivisions of Chinese cuisine. Its prominence outside China is due to the great numbers of early emigrants from Guangdong. Cantonese chefs are highly sought after throughout the country...
in the 1960s. A 1967 article in The New York Times
The New York Times
The New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
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. The dish was also early on the menu at Joyce Chen's, a celebrated pioneering Mandarin-style restaurant in Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge, Massachusetts
Cambridge is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Greater Boston area. It was named in honor of the University of Cambridge in England, an important center of the Puritan theology embraced by the town's founders. Cambridge is home to two of the world's most prominent...
. At that time, the dish was at first prepared in a traditional manner, but, as wood ears and day lily buds were scarce, a modified recipe was developed. In this modified recipe, which gradually came to predominate in North America, green cabbage
Cabbage
Cabbage is a popular cultivar of the species Brassica oleracea Linne of the Family Brassicaceae and is a leafy green vegetable...
is usually the predominant ingredient, along with scrambled eggs, carrot
Carrot
The carrot is a root vegetable, usually orange in colour, though purple, red, white, and yellow varieties exist. It has a crisp texture when fresh...
s, day lily buds, wood ear mushrooms, scallions, and bean sprouts. Shiitake
Shiitake
The Shiitake is an edible mushroom native to East Asia, which is cultivated and consumed in many Asian countries, as well as being dried and exported to many countries around the world. It is a feature of many Asian cuisines including Vietnamese, Chinese, Japanese, Korean and Thai...
mushrooms, bok choy
Chinese cabbage
Chinese cabbage can refer to two distinct varieties of Chinese leaf vegetables used often in Chinese cuisine. These vegetables are both related to the Western cabbage, and are of the same species as the common turnip...
, snow pea
Snow pea
The snow pea is a legume, more specifically a variety of pea eaten whole in its pod while still unripe...
pods, bell pepper
Bell pepper
Bell pepper, also known as sweet pepper or a pepper and capsicum , is a cultivar group of the species Capsicum annuum . Cultivars of the plant produce fruits in different colors, including red, yellow, orange and green. Bell peppers are sometimes grouped with less pungent pepper varieties as...
s, onion
Onion
The onion , also known as the bulb onion, common onion and garden onion, is the most widely cultivated species of the genus Allium. The genus Allium also contains a number of other species variously referred to as onions and cultivated for food, such as the Japanese bunching onion The onion...
s, and celery
Celery
Apium graveolens is a plant species in the family Apiaceae commonly known as celery or celeriac , depending on whether the petioles or roots are eaten: celery refers to the former and celeriac to the latter. Apium graveolens grows to 1 m tall...
are sometimes also used, and dry sherry
Sherry
Sherry is a fortified wine made from white grapes that are grown near the town of Jerez , Spain. In Spanish, it is called vino de Jerez....
is often substituted for the huangjiu. The vegetables (except the day lily buds and bean sprouts) are generally sliced into long, thin strips before cooking.
While these are the typical ingredients, there is some variation in the recipe from chef to chef or restaurant to restaurant. In both the Chinese and Americanized versions, monosodium glutamate
Monosodium glutamate
Monosodium glutamate, also known as sodium glutamate or MSG, is the sodium salt of glutamic acid, one of the most abundant naturally occurring non-essential amino acids....
, salt, sugar, corn starch
Cornstarch
Corn starch, cornstarch, cornflour or maize starch is the starch of the corn grain obtained from the endosperm of the corn kernel.-History:...
, and ground white pepper
Black pepper
Black pepper is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit, known as a peppercorn when dried, is approximately in diameter, dark red when fully mature, and, like all drupes, contains a single seed...
are also often added. In less authentic North American restaurants, the wood ears and day lily buds (ingredients less familiar to most American customers) are often omitted entirely. Because finely sliced cabbage and carrots make up a large portion of the American-style recipe's ingredients, pre-bagged
Plastic bag
A plastic bag, polybag, or pouch is a type of packaging made of thin, flexible, plastic film, nonwoven fabric, or plastic textile. Plastic bags are used for containing and transporting goods such as foods, produce, powders, ice, magazines, comic books, chemicals and waste.Most plastic bags are...
coleslaw
Coleslaw
Coleslaw, sometimes simply called slaw in some American dialects, is a salad consisting primarily of shredded raw cabbage. It may also include shredded carrots and other ingredients such as fruits and vegetables, apples, onions, green onions, peppers and various spices.-History:The term "coleslaw"...
mix is often used to save the time of slicing these vegetables.
Although most commonly made with pork, the same basic dish can be prepared by substituting another meat or seafood; generally only a single meat is used. If made with chicken instead of pork, the dish is called moo shu chicken, and the name is similarly altered if prepared with beef or shrimp. If prepared without any meat, it is called moo shu vegetables or moo shu tofu.
Serving
Moo shu pork is served with a small dish of hoisin sauceHoisin sauce
Hoisin sauce, or haixian sauce, is a Chinese dipping sauce. The word hoisin is a romanization of the Chinese word for seafood "" as pronounced in Cantonese.-Ingredients:...
and several (generally four) warm, steamed, thin, white tortilla
Tortilla
In Mexico and Central America, a tortilla is a type of thin, unleavened flat bread, made from finely ground maize...
-like wrappers made of flour, called "moo shu pancake
Pancake
A pancake is a thin, flat, round cake prepared from a batter, and cooked on a hot griddle or frying pan. Most pancakes are quick breads; some use a yeast-raised or fermented batter. Most pancakes are cooked one side on a griddle and flipped partway through to cook the other side...
s" (Chinese: 木须饼, pinyin: mù xū bǐng), "Mandarin pancakes", or báo bǐng (薄饼, literally "thin pancakes"); these are similar to those served with Peking Duck
Peking Duck
Peking Duck, or Peking Roast Duck is a famous duck dish from Beijing that has been prepared since the imperial era, and is now considered one of China's national foods....
. In the late 20th century, some inauthentic North American Chinese restaurants began serving Mexican
Mexican cuisine
Mexican cuisine, a style of food that originates in Mexico, is known for its varied flavors, colourful decoration and variety of spices and ingredients, most of which are native to the country. The cuisine of Mexico has evolved through thousands of years of blending indigenous cultures, with later...
-style flour tortilla
Tortilla
In Mexico and Central America, a tortilla is a type of thin, unleavened flat bread, made from finely ground maize...
s in place of the traditional moo shu wrappers, which are thinner and more brittle in texture.
The moo shu pork is then wrapped in the moo shu pancakes, which are eaten by hand in the manner of a soft taco
Taco
A taco is a traditional Mexican dish composed of a corn or wheat tortilla folded or rolled around a filling. A taco can be made with a variety of fillings, including beef, chicken, seafood, vegetables and cheese, allowing for great versatility and variety...
. The diner typically wraps his or her own pancakes, although waiters in Chinese restaurants are often willing to perform this function as a courtesy to diners who are unable to do so. First, a small amount of hoisin sauce is spread onto the pancake, then a spoonful or two of moo shu pork is placed in the center of the pancake. The bottom of the pancake is folded up slightly (to prevent the contents from falling out), and the pancake is either folded or wrapped from left to right, in the manner of a soft taco
Taco
A taco is a traditional Mexican dish composed of a corn or wheat tortilla folded or rolled around a filling. A taco can be made with a variety of fillings, including beef, chicken, seafood, vegetables and cheese, allowing for great versatility and variety...
.http://books.google.com/books?id=fZIRc28P5xYC&pg=PT120&dq=%22moo+shu%22+fold+%22lovegren%22 Unlike the practice in wrapping a burrito
Burrito
A burrito , or taco de harina, is a type of Mexican food. It consists of a wheat flour tortilla wrapped or folded around a filling. The flour tortilla is usually lightly grilled or steamed, to soften it and make it more pliable. In Mexico, refried beans or meat are sometimes the only fillings...
, the top is usually not folded over, as the pancake is generally eaten immediately and thus there is no danger of the food falling out of the top, which is the part that is eaten first. Because the dish often contains a great deal of liquid, care must be taken that the pancake does not become soaked through and break during rolling or eating.
Like Chinese noodle dishes, moo shu pork is not typically served with steamed white rice
White rice
White rice is the name given to milled rice that has had its husk, bran, and germ removed. This alters the flavour, texture and appearance of the rice and helps prevent spoilage and extend its storage life. After milling, the rice is polished, resulting in a seed with a bright, white, shiny...
.
Etymology
There are two primary histories for how the name of this dish is to be written and explained.One story gives the name as 木犀肉 (pinyin: mù xī ròu). The last character 肉 (ròu) means "meat" and refers to the pork in the dish. The first part 木犀 (mù xī) is the name for the Sweet Osmanthus
Sweet Osmanthus
Osmanthus fragrans is a species of Osmanthus native to Asia, from the Himalaya east through southern China and to Taiwan and to southern Japan...
: a small ornamental tree that produces bunches of small and fragrant blossoms that may be yellow or white.
Confucianism
Confucianism is a Chinese ethical and philosophical system developed from the teachings of the Chinese philosopher Confucius . Confucianism originated as an "ethical-sociopolitical teaching" during the Spring and Autumn Period, but later developed metaphysical and cosmological elements in the Han...
death anniversary
Death anniversary
A death anniversary is a custom observed in several Asian cultures including China, Pakistan, Israel, Georgia, India, Iran, Japan, Korea, Russia and Vietnam, as well as in other nations with significant overseas Chinese, Japanese, Korean, Jewish, and Vietnamese populations...
celebrations, the Chinese word for "egg" (蛋; pinyin: dàn) is avoided when referring to dishes containing eggs, as many Chinese curses contain this word. Thus, the word dàn was typically substituted using the euphemism
Euphemism
A euphemism is the substitution of a mild, inoffensive, relatively uncontroversial phrase for another more frank expression that might offend or otherwise suggest something unpleasant to the audience...
"Sweet Osmanthus." By this reasoning, in this version of the dish's name, the first character, 木 (mù) is short for 木耳 (mù'ěr, meaning "wood ear fungus") and 樨 (xī, meaning "Sweet Osmanthus tree") is short for 桂花 (guíhuā, meaning "Sweet Osmanthus flower").
The second way of writing the name of this dish that is commonly seen in Chinese restaurants in the United States is 木须肉 (pinyin: mù xū ròu). The second character 须 (xū) means "whiskers," and is often given an additional determinative component in writing (to distinguish the meaning of "whiskers" from the other meanings of 須) so that it comes to be written as 鬚. It is possible that 木須肉 (literally "wood whiskers pork") might have been used on the menus of the first American Chinese restaurants to serve the dish in place of the correct compound 木樨肉 ("sweet osmanthus pork") due to haste or simply because of the limitations of Chinese typewriters. It may also merely have been the result of writing the wrong character with a similar pronunciation.
There are two additional explanations of the name have unclear origins and may be examples of folk etymology: There is a neighborhood with a similar name in Beijing
Beijing
Beijing , also known as Peking , is the capital of the People's Republic of China and one of the most populous cities in the world, with a population of 19,612,368 as of 2010. The city is the country's political, cultural, and educational center, and home to the headquarters for most of China's...
called Muxi Di (木樨地), which is home to the Muxi Di train station (木樨地站). The dish is also occasionally also called 苜蓿肉 (mùsù ròu) meaning "alfalfa
Alfalfa
Alfalfa is a flowering plant in the pea family Fabaceae cultivated as an important forage crop in the US, Canada, Argentina, France, Australia, the Middle East, South Africa, and many other countries. It is known as lucerne in the UK, France, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand, and known as...
meat".