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16 recipes

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Beef Si Byan

Beef Si Byan

A Burmese curry from the country's Indian-origin community, sitting somewhere between a Madras and a Burmese ohn-no in spice profile. You marinate chunks of beef chuck or shin in turmeric, fish sauce and salt while you fry onions in oil until they're deep brown - that long onion fry is the foundation. The beef browns in the same oil, then ginger-garlic paste, paprika and chilli powder go in, then tomato and water turn it into a stew. Two hours of slow simmer until the meat falls apart at a fork. The signature finish is the see byan, a deep red-orange oil slick that rises to the top of the curry as it reduces, which is what the dish is named for. Eaten with rice or paratha, and a small bowl of pickled vegetable on the side.

Burmese 3 hours 20 minutes Serves4
Brown Stew Shrimp and Sweet Potato Grits

Brown Stew Shrimp and Sweet Potato Grits

A Caribbean-Southern crossover that works because both traditions cook in a similar register: butter, peppers, alliums, slow heat, savoury depth. The brown stew base on top of the dish is Jamaican, bell peppers, carrot, Scotch bonnet, ginger, browning sauce, that mahogany-coloured gravy with the unmistakable allspice-and-thyme signature, and the bed underneath is from Lowcountry Charleston, where sweet potato grits enriched with butter, half-and-half and gouda are a long-running modern Southern restaurant standard. The shrimp themselves are quick-cooked and sweet, picking up the brown stew sauce. Two textures stacked: silky-rich grits, brothy stew on top with bite from the diced peppers and carrot. Smell is sweet-onion-and-browning-sugar over the corn-sweet base of the grits. Not difficult but it's two pans running at once, so timing matters; the grits hold on a low warm setting while the shrimp cook quickly. A modern fusion rather than a traditional dish, popularised by Black American chefs in the 2010s exploring the points of overlap between Lowcountry and Caribbean cookery.

Jamaican 1 hour Serves4
Egusi Soup

Egusi Soup

Beef or goat is parboiled with onion, stock cube and salt to make a base stock. Smoked fish hydrates in hot water and is picked clean. Egusi seeds are ground (or already-ground egusi powder is used) into a thick paste with a little water. Onion, garlic, ginger and Scotch bonnet blitz into a hot pepper paste. Palm oil heats until just smoking; the pepper paste fries in it 5 minutes. Egusi paste goes in and "fries" 10 minutes until it forms small clumps. Stock and meat join; everything simmers for 20 minutes. Smoked fish, ground crayfish and locust beans add depth. Chopped spinach (or bitter leaf) goes in for the last 5 minutes. Salt to season.

Nigerian 1 hour 40 minutes Serves6
Kung Pao Shrimp

Kung Pao Shrimp

Kung pao (gongbao) shrimp is the seafood cousin of the classic Sichuan gongbao jiding, named for the 19th-century governor-general Ding Baozhen whose title was Gong Bao. Where the chicken version uses diced meat, the shrimp version keeps the prawns whole or halved so they curl into bright pink commas around the chillies and peanuts. The flavour profile is the signature Sichuan "lychee" balance: a touch of sweetness from sugar, sourness from black vinegar, salt and umami from soy, and the warm tingle (ma la) of toasted Sichuan peppercorn paired with the smoky bite of dried er jing tiao chillies. This is a fast dish, fundamentally a wok exercise: every ingredient must be prepped and lined up before the heat goes on, because once the chillies hit the oil you have maybe ninety seconds before everything is overcooked. Difficulty is moderate for a home cook with a working wok and high burner; the trick is keeping the chillies dark red and fragrant without scorching them black, and pulling the shrimp out the moment they curl. Served over plain rice it is one of the most rewarding ten-minute meals in the repertoire.

Chinese 28 minutes Serves3-4
Mala Dry-Pot (Ganguo)

Mala Dry-Pot (Ganguo)

Ganguo, literally "dry pot", is the dry sister of hotpot. Where hotpot is a communal soup simmered at the table, dry pot is a wok composition: each ingredient pre-cooked separately, then everything tossed together at the last moment in a fragrant mala sauce based on Pixian doubanjiang, fermented black beans and chilli oil. The result lands somewhere between a stir-fry, a casserole and a giant heap of bar snacks. The dish is usually credited to Chongqing in the 1990s and exploded into nationwide popularity in the 2000s; it now anchors the menu of countless ganguo restaurants where you point at ingredients on a fridge and they appear minutes later in a single-handled wok at your table. Difficulty for a home cook is low if you accept the rhythm: blanch the vegetables, sear the proteins, then build the final dish from already-cooked components. The trick is restraint with the sauce, generous heat under the wok, and the willingness to commit to a long ingredient list. The recipe is endlessly flexible: lotus root, potato, cauliflower, mushrooms, squid, chicken wings, beef, fish balls, tofu skin, whatever you have, in any combination, totalling 1-1 ½ kg.

Chinese 50 minutes Serves4
Moin Moin

Moin Moin

Dried black-eyed beans soak briefly to loosen the skins. The skins rub off; the beans soak more to soften. They blend smooth with red pepper, onion, Scotch bonnet and a little water into a thick batter. Palm oil whisks in. Ground crayfish, a stock cube, salt and ground egusi (or breadcrumbs) bind. The batter portions into oiled ramekins (or banana leaf parcels). A hard-boiled egg half, a piece of smoked fish or a spoon of cooked beef goes into each. They steam in a wide pot 50-60 minutes until firm and set.

Nigerian 2 hours 30 minutes Serves4-6
Ohn No Khao Swè

Ohn No Khao Swè

Myanmar's coconut-chicken noodle soup, the dish closest in spirit to a Thai khao soi but with its own Burmese identity. You poach chicken thighs in stock with shallot, garlic, ginger and turmeric for twenty-five minutes, lift them out and shred the meat. The stock cooks down with coconut milk, fish sauce and paprika, thickened with a slurry of chickpea flour and water into a silky soup. Yellow egg noodles cook separately. Everything piles into the bowl at the end: noodles first, soup ladled over, shredded chicken in the middle, then heaping garnishes (sliced shallot, crispy fried shallot, halved boiled egg, lime wedges, cilantro, chilli flakes). The garnishes are half the dish; eat with chopsticks in one hand and a spoon in the other.

Burmese 1 hour 15 minutes Serves4
Sichuan Hot Pot

Sichuan Hot Pot

Two pots if you have them: a spicy red broth and a clear chicken broth. The red broth fries doubanjiang and chilli bean paste in beef tallow, adds Sichuan peppercorns, dried chillies, star anise, cassia, bay, ginger and garlic, then stock; simmers for 30 minutes. Diners cook their own ingredients in the simmering pot and dip in a small bowl of sesame oil + chopped garlic + coriander. The mala (numbing-hot) sensation comes from green Sichuan peppercorns + dried chilli together.

Chinese 1 hour 30 minutes Serves4-6
Wet Tha Hin Lay

Wet Tha Hin Lay

The Burmese pork curry, the simplest of the country's red-oil-slick curries and the dish that turns up in every household's lunch rotation. You marinate pork briefly in turmeric, salt and a splash of fish sauce, then cook onions hard in oil until they're deep golden brown - this is the colour and depth of the curry, and rushing it leaves the dish pale. The pork browns in the same oil, then garlic, ginger, paprika and chilli powder go in, then tomato softens. Water covers the meat and the curry simmers covered for an hour until tender, then uncovers for the se-byan stage that returns the oil to the surface in the characteristic red-orange slick. Served with white rice, a side of balachaung, and a green vegetable.

Burmese 2 hours 20 minutes Serves4