many east asian dishes included some ready made sauce like 豆瓣酱 or 柱侯酱 in chinese cuisines or 고추장 in korean cuisine. These sauces make our dishes delicious but unfortunately they are very high in salt and/or sugars. Is there some way to make the dishes with these sauces from scratch or without such high salt/sugar? We often have to add sugar in the dish in addition to the sauces. Thanks.
I’m sure this is a similar problem in other cuisines but my question is just about east asian cuisines.
edit: i’m referring to homemade food, not restaurant food.
Professionally cooked western food also uses a lot of sugar and salt - especially frozen foods. Sugar is really fucking addictive so eating high sugar foods regularly will lower how much sweetness you’ll get from it - this sounds especially relevant if you’re directly adding sugar in addition to the sauce.
Sugar and salt both have very negative side effects if over consumed but a moderate amount of them is fine. I’d suggest trying to scale back the total sweetness to whatever level you can tolerate without it becoming bland and use more flavored spices to make up the difference. Additionally, not all sugars are created equal and it might benefit you to try switching off of refined sugar to one of the alternative sugars so that your body can more easily process your sweeteners.
Opinions may vary but I think it’s incorrect to try to completely eliminate sweeteners from your diet, usually I’ve seen people suffer from extreme cravings that drive them to occasionally binge eat candy before returning to a “sugar free” lifestyle. It’s important to respect yourself and allow for moderation rather than trying to cold turkey yourself. Duck sauce is extremely sweet but having a small quantity of meat smothered in duck sauce among an otherwise balanced meal can be a nice and reasonable treat.
Many western foods made at home can easily made with less salt and rarely require sugar to be added.
I can’t reduce the salt or sugar in the premade sauces that are required in east asian dishes. I don’t know what duck sauce is but we don’t eat that in asia; it’s also a condiment and not a required ingredient in our dishes like fermented bean paste
this sample recipe for taiwanese spicy beef soup which is a classic taiwanese dish as you can see requires both rock sugar and salt to be added to the already salt doubanjiang: https://seonkyounglongest.com/taiwanese-beef-noodle-soup/
Duck sauce is a name that was adapted in American Chinese cooking. The original product, which is used in Asia (particularly known with Canto food), is plum sauce. Same thing, though you may get a slightly different product depending on where it was made.
There’s a huge difference between using salt and sugars, and adding TOO MUCH of them. Just cutting the suggested amount added in half gets you closer to what you’re asking for. As for the premade stuff, just add less, or dilute them a bit maybe.
I think you were the only one who understood my question
Cutting down on the sauces is a good alternative and what I’m doing in the meantime; unfortunately I think these sauces are heavy contributors to the flavour of the dish so the result is the flavour is kinda weak in the dish. Doubanjiang or gochujang for example are staples of the respective Asian cuisines and dishes.
I think some kind of food is just not designed to be healthy. It was made to be tasty without thinking about health. You can either make it more healthy and less tasty or you can eat it less often (as a treat).
yep, that’s true. our typical dishes are actually not much meat and have a lot of vegetables like water spinach dishes