If the title of this post does nothing for you, stop for a minute and listen. The sounds you hear are squeals of excitement and moans of hunger from all the people for whom the three words zha jiang mian evoke yearning memories of their favorite comfort food, a deeply flavorful noodle bowl from childhood.
A Chinese-Korean hybrid, zha jiang mian may soon join the noodle bowls from around the world – ramen, pho, pad thai – that have become mainstream American fare. Korean food is expanding out of urban Koreatowns: restaurants are cropping up featuring bimimbab, the spicy vegetable and rice bowl, or light, crispy Korean fried chicken, glazed with a sweet garlic sauce. Momofuku’s David Chang is taking over the world. Zha jiang mian can’t be far behind.
Like curry from India growing into the national dish of England, zha jiang mian (pronounced zah-jahng-myun) is a Chinese dish that has been enthusiastically adopted as Korea’s most popular comfort food (phoneticized from Korean it’s jajangmyeon). In Korea, it’s as popular and ubiquitous as pizza in America.
Zha jiang may look mysteriously dark, but it’s simply an Asian take on spaghetti with meat sauce. Instead of tangy tomato, zha jiang is infused with a satisfyingly intense richness, salty and a bit sweet, with the heft of meat and the soft crunch of finely chopped vegetables.
The story of zha jiang mian is the story of my family. My parents both came from Shandong, the coastal province in northern China that is also the ancestral home of Confucius and zha jiang mian. Beginning in 1897, when Germany leased from China the main city of Qingdao (and promptly set up breweries, such as Tsingtao), Shandong endured a tumultuous half-century, from German control to Chinese-Japanese dispute post-World War I, to Chinese warlords, to Japanese invasion, to civil war and finally the iron curtain of Communist control in 1949.
No wonder that desperate people from Shandong left to seek opportunities elsewhere. Like many men of their era, both my grandfathers labored in Korea, sending money home to their wives and children in China and visiting rarely. When the situation in Shandong became dire, both of my grandmothers took what children they could and begged, borrowed and bribed to find transit to Korea.
War broke out in Korea shortly after. My parents grew up in shanty towns with other Chinese refugees, and though my mom lived in Korea for over a decade, she speaks no Korean at all. The main cultural exchange was through food. Like many others, my mom’s family sold food by the roadside for income. My parents developed a lifelong love of spicy Korean kimchi, and Koreans were exposed to many Shandong specialties, including zha jiang mian.
There are many variations on zha jiang mian, but the basics are the same: meat (usually chopped or ground pork, sometimes seafood) and vegetables (onion, plus napa cabbage, zucchini, carrot, potato or sweet potato) combined with a thick fermented soybean sauce that is first fried in oil to bring out its depth of flavor.
Before you back away from the words “fermented soybean sauce,” let me remind you that soy sauce and miso are also fermented from soybeans, and that fermentation is the road to big-time umami, whether it’s cheese or fish sauce or Worcestershire sauce. Fermentation is a tasty process.
Chinese zha jiang is based on a light-brown sauce made from yellow soybeans, but Korean zha jiang calls for a dark sauce made from black soybeans. My mom’s traditional recipe combines the salty yellow soybean sauce with sweet hoisin sauce. But in recent years she has expanded her mix to include the dark Korean sauce for color and flavor, plus a spoonful of miso for additional dimension.
Traditionally, zha jiang is served with fresh, hand-pulled noodles, which have a pliant chew and a subtle variation in noodle width. Americans associate rice with Chinese food, but in the more extreme climate of northern China, wheat is the staple commodity.
For hand-pulled noodles, flour and water are kneaded together for noodle dough and stretched, folded and stretched repeatedly until the single ball of dough is transformed into a neat twist of thin noodles looking like a skein of yarn. It’s a major arm workout as well as a dying art form.
There are some excellent fresh zha jiang noodles sold at Asian markets – no comparison to hand-pulled, but still good. They are sold in refrigerated packets with four or five skeins of noodles each, and they cook very quickly. You can of course use dried noodles, but fresh makes a big difference if you can find it.
My mom’s zha jiang is the real deal. I’ll walk you through her original Chinese zha jiang sauce, because the sauce ingredients are easier to find. And I’ll also give you the expanded recipe for her ultimate zha jiang sauce, incorporating both Chinese and Korean traditions, for those of you with the opportunity and desire to go the extra mile.
These two sauces, even this brand, should be available in any Asian market for around $2. If you don’t live near an Asian market, you can get hoisin sauce and ground bean sauce on Amazon. (You can get free shipping on the three-packs, which is a good deal if you can find two friends to split with you. Also they store forever, so you can use them over a long time.)
In the Korean version, the key ingredient is chunjang, a paste made with fermented black beans. You’ll definitely find it in Korean markets, but a general Asian market may or may not stock it.
These fresh noodles are the best, if you can find them. It says udon in English, but my mom wants to tell you that the last two of the large black characters on this packaging are the ones that say zha jiang in Korean – so look for these on a label if you don’t see this brand. Or you could ask someone at the store.
The green leafy part of the cabbage can stay in biggish pieces. But the white parts need to be diced small. My mom cuts vertical sticks first.
Then dices the sticks into small pieces.
First vertical slices on the zucchini, then vertical sticks, then dice.
Using one skillet, my mom cooks the vegetables one after another, so she can make sure they’re each cooked precisely. A few minutes for the onions to soften.
Just a quick turn in the pan for the zucchini, keeping it brief to maintain texture and color.
And a few more minutes for the cabbage. The leaves wilt quickly in the heat, but the white parts take a few minutes before their edges become translucent.
Cook meat, breaking up clumps, until no longer pink. My mom always uses organic ground turkey now, which she finds more reliable and better quality than pork. She also likes the lighter flavor.
Zha jiang means fried sauce, so this next step is where the magic happens. Start with enough oil to pool when the pan is tilted. Sizzle a couple slices of ginger to flavor the oil.
Then add the sauces, stirring into the oil.
The sauce requires a good fry. Get it bubbling hot, then turn heat down to keep it simmering for another minute or two.
Add back the meat and stir to coat well.
Then the vegetables.
There’s a drier northern Chinese topping for noodles that is similar to this.
But to make the rich sauce of zha jiang, we add water, with some soy sauce and chicken broth for added flavor.
Plus a bit of cornstarch for thickness.
Zha jiang isn’t complete without julienned cucumber on top. Slice a thin-skinned cucumber on the diagonal, then julienne one little stack of slices at a time.
Fresh zha jiang noodles only take three minutes to cook.
Here’s the classic Shandong zha jiang.
My mom’s ultimate zha jiang sauce has two more sauce ingredients: dark Korean chunjang and a scoop of Japanese miso.
Zha jiang often has seafood added. My mom likes shrimp in hers. She slices the shrimp in half, then dices it into small pieces.
Same process, but a much darker sauce.
I’m not kidding, this is love at first bite. The non-Asians in my family love it as much as the rest of us. I’m sure someone will make a killing one of these days bringing zha jiang to the masses. But in the meantime, I’m bringing it to you. I hope you’ll try it.
This was long post for what is really an uncomplicated home-cooked dish. But northern Chinese food isn’t as familiar to Americans as the Cantonese cuisine brought by early immigrants. And I wanted to capture – for the Shandong ren that came through Korea, for the Koreans that have adopted zha jiang as their own, for my mom, my brothers and my kids, and myself – this dish that has come so far and carries with it the story of the two people to whom I owe everything.
Zha Jiang Mian (Noodles with Meat Sauce)Fresh noodles with this meaty, umami-packed sauce – salty, a little sweet and deep with flavor, comes from my parents’ home province of Shandong. Shandong people brought zha jiang to nearby Korea, where it has become beloved and ubiquitous comfort food, like pizza in the United States.
Ultimate zha jiang sauceOver the years my mom has incorporated chunjang, the dark, glossy, fermented black bean paste Koreans use for zha jiang. She also adds a bit of Japanese miso and some diced shrimp for even more flavor.
- 1/3 pound ground turkey (93% lean)
- 1/4 pound raw shrimp, peeled and diced
- Cooking oil
- 1 medium onion (about 1 cup, finely diced)
- 4 cups napa cabbage (green parts roughly cut, white parts 1/4″ dice)
- 1 medium zucchini (about 1 cup, 1/4″ dice)
- 2 slices ginger (optional)
- 1/3 cup chunjang (fermented black bean paste; found in Korean markets)
- 2 tablespoons ground bean sauce (found in Asian markets; Koon Chun with the yellow and blue label is a good one)
- 2 tablespoons hoisin sauce (found in Asian markets; Koon Chun with the yellow and blue label is a good one)
- 1 tablespoon miso paste
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- 1/2 cup water
- 3 tablespoons cornstarch, mixed with 3 tablespoons water
- 1/2 teaspoon pure sesame oil
Simplified zha jiang sauceIf you don’t have access to Korean chungjang, this my mom’s classic zha jiang sauce, which uses two Chinese sauces – hoisin and ground bean sauce – that are more widely available. This version is not as dark but still rich and flavorful.
- 1/2 pound ground turkey (93% lean)
- Cooking oil
- 1 medium onion (about 1 cup, finely diced)
- 4 cups napa cabbage (green parts roughly cut, white parts 1/4″ dice)
- 1 medium zucchini (about 1 cup, 1/4″ dice)
- 2 slices ginger (optional)
- 1/3 cup ground bean sauce (found in Asian markets; Koon Chun with the yellow and blue label is a good one)
- 1/3 cup hoisin sauce (found in Asian markets; Koon Chun with the yellow and blue label is a good one)
- 3 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- 1/2 cup water
- 3 tablespoons cornstarch, mixed with 3 tablespoons water
- 1/2 teaspoon pure sesame oil
Other ingredients
- Fresh zha jiang noodles (buy at an Asian store, in the refrigerated or frozen section) or udon noodles
- Cucumber (thin-skinned Persian are ideal, but small kirby cucumbers are also fine)
Preparation
- Wash and dry napa cabbage leaves. Green leafy parts may be left in larger pieces (2″ or so), but white parts must be diced small (cut white parts vertically into 1/4″ wide sticks, then cut sticks into 1/4″ dice).
- Cut zucchini in 1/4″ dice also (slice lengthwise intro 1/4″ strips, then strips into 1/4″ sticks, then sticks into 1/4″ dice).
- Heat 2 tablespoons of cooking oil in a skillet over medium heat. Add onion and cook until softened; remove to a bowl. Add a bit more oil and cook cabbage until edges look translucent; remove and add to bowl. Add zucchini and cook briefly, just to coat with a bit of oil; remove and add to other vegetables.
- Heat a bit more oil and cook ground meat, breaking it up well with a spatula. When all traces of pink are gone, remove meat to a separate bowl.
- Heat 3 tablespoons of oil in the skillet with the ginger slices. Add ground bean sauce and hoisin sauce (also chunjang and miso, if using) and cook, stirring, until the sauces are bubbling hot and mostly mixed into the oil.
- Add meat back in (try and leave out any juice that may have accumulated), and mix well with sauce. Cook for another minute, then remove ginger slices. Add back vegetables and stir.
- Add soy sauce, water and chicken broth (you may substitute 3 tablespoons water plus 1 tablespoon soy sauce if you don’t have chicken broth) and stir. Cook to heat.
- Mix cornstarch with water, then stir into the skillet. Cook until sauce thickens. Add sesame oil to finish.
- Slice cucumber thinly on the diagonal. Then take one little stack of cucumber slices at a time and cut thin matchsticks. Set aside for garnish.
- Cook fresh noodles in boiling water (if you can’t read the directions, just know that fresh noodles cook quickly, so taste it after 3 minutes and check). Serve immediately, as the noodles get gummy and stick together as they cool. Top with meat sauce and garnish with slivered cucumber.
Notes
- Ground pork is the traditional meat for this dish, but we’ve found quality of ground pork in the store inconsistent and usually poor. You could buy pork loin and chop it (some recipes even will call for pork belly), but ground turkey is our favorite alternative for its consistency, availability, leanness and subtle taste. Organic is especially good.
- Other vegetables may be used, such as fine-diced white potato, sweet potato or carrot.
Here’s the link to a printable version.