Hot and Sour Soup

This is my mother's recipe created over the course of about 20 years of experimentation and having visited many Chinese restaurants.

Hot and sour soup is a dish that, unfortunately, most restaurants prepare poorly. As the name implies, it should be both hot, and sour. Most restaurants either do not add enough peppers (including black pepper), or do not add enough vinegar.

For peppers, I use a medley of peppers that I have steeped in rice vinegar for a week, and then puréed. If you don't have access to fresh peppers, I suggest Sriracha. I also suggest a dollop of Szechuan pepper paste, which you can now find in any supermarket. If you make your own pepper paste, consider adding garlic either to the paste, or to the dish itself. Sriracha, on the other hand, has all the garlic you need.

Note that hot and sour soup, like many dishes that are a hodge-podge of strongly-flavored ingredients, tastes subtly different after sitting overnight. Consider preparing everything except the vinegar one night ahead, and store in the fridge. The next day, heat, add vinegar, and serve.

In some places, I am inexact. Hot and sour soup is the kind of dish where you need to decide exact amounts yourself, for your tastes. As a general rule, when I list something, like, say, hoisin sauce, I end up using about half-a-jar, or half-a-bottle. Add a little bit at a time, until it approaches the taste you like. Remember that vinegar will cut everything when you add it, so prepare the soup a little stronger than you prefer leading up to the last step, where you add the vinegar.

Ingredients

• 4 cartons of beef stock
• 1 can chicken stock
• Sugar
• 2 cans bamboo shoots, julienned
• Carrots, julienned (in same amount as bamboo shoots)
• Dried shitake mushrooms, reconstituted and cut into strips
• Dried woodear mushrooms, reconstituted and cut into strips
• White button mushrooms, sliced
• Soy sauce (I prefer a mix of Tamari and low-sodium)
• Hoisin sauce
• Oyster sauce
• 2 tablespoons of hot pepper paste (or more, if you like it hotter than average)
• Pork, thinly-sliced
• Cornstarch
• Carton of extra-firm tofu
• Black pepper
• 2 eggs
• Toasted sesame oil
• Rice wine vinegar
• Cider vinegar
• Chopped green onions

Directions

1. In a bowl, sprinkle pork with rice vinegar, and coat in corn starch. Set aside for a few hours.
2. Combine stock and broth and boil. Add sugar and carrots and continue boiling until carrots soften. From here on, pause a moment between ingredients to give them time to rise to the soup's temperature. The soup should continue boiling the entire time.
3. Add bamboo shoots.
4. Add mushrooms.
5. Add hot peppers and black peppers.
6. Add pork to boiling soup, breaking it up as you drop it in.
7. Add tofu.
8. Add hoisin sauce, oyster sauce, and toasted sesame oil.
9. Beat eggs and dribble them into soup over the back of a fork while stirring. (You may need 3 hands for this)
10. If desired, mix cornstarch and water and add to soup until it reaches desired thickness.
12. If you are preparing a day in advance, let soup cool, and store in refrigerator overnight. The next day, reheat to a boil.
13. Add vinegar until it reaches desired tartness.
14. Garnish with chopped green onions and serve.