The real soul of Sichuan cuisine — Doubanjiang with a homemade recipe you can try when the board beans are harvested.
What’s Doubanjiang
Doubanjiang, also known as Sichuan sauce or Board bean chili paste, is a traditional Chinese condiment made from fermented broad beans. It is considered the soul of Sichuan cuisine. It has a pungent, salty flavor and is often used in stir-frying dishes and stewed dishes.
Doubanjiang (豆瓣酱) literally means bean paste. There are several versions popular in different areas in China. Sichuan Doubanjiang is made from broad bean (fava beans) instead of soybean. There are two sub-versions—one is red oil doubanjiang, which is relatively easy to make and quite popular in housewives’ kitchen; the other one is famous Pixian doubanjiang produced in a small area named as Pixian of Sichuan province. Due to the excellent water sauces, great weather condition and ancestral recipe, Pixian Doubanjiang has its unique flavor and enjoys a high reputation all over world. Pixian doubanjiang usually goes through quite long fermentation time under sunshine. The prices vary based on the fermentation years. But the main market for Pixian doubanjiang is outside Sichuan province. It is quite sad that the tradition is losing due to the city development. Instead of using traditional fermentation method, modernized production lines are widely adopted to improve the outputs. However, we are lucky as there are still some brands (Pi’xian Doubanjiang on Amazon: Sichuan Pixian Broad Bean Paste with Red Chili Oil – 17.6 oz (500g) to trust. If you meet premiere three-year doubanjiang, do not miss it at whatever price.
Common housewives in Sichuan province love to make their own Doubanjiang at home. The homemade Doubanjiang is produced by a simpler process but yield great tastes too. My family has the tradition to make Doubanjiang each year, making several large jars in turn and exchange with family members. We usually call homemade doubanjiang red oil doubanjiang, because usually a layer of oil is used to separate the doubanjiang from air.
Caution: the following is an extremely long post, as I am trying my best to explain everything in detail. Making a jar of doubanjing is comforting and enjoyable, but also time-consuming and expensive. If you plan to try it at home, please know the most important fungus during the process: Aspergillus oryzae, how it works, and the best conditions.
I thought homemade doubanjiang can be quite easy after watching my mother and grandma making them a year and year again. But it is true only if you are in China because we are making our homemade doubanjiang based on an essential ingredient—fermented broad beans(霉豆瓣). There is almost no chance to find fermented broad beans outside China, even outside Sichuan. So I went back to my hometown this year and make my own batch from just dried fava beans under their directions. I only start with a small batch and yield around 1.5 kg doubanjiang at last(in the little earth jar shown in the above picture).
My mom did not make fermented broad beans previously but my grandma did. I have double-checked with her and tried several batches using natural fermentation in my apartment. Guess what? All of the tests failed. After reading lots of articles and papers, I found out the reason is the environment-my apartment. Fungus widely exists in my grandma’s yard as she makes fermented foods each year, but my apartment is too clean so there are very few starters around. So I further find out a shortcut and saver way–using the kit for the fermentation. Koji kit is the sprouts of Aspergillus oryzae. After being loaded with the sprouts, broad beans can be fermented in a short time and meanwhile reduce the chance to be infected by other harmful fungi.
Firstly soak the beans overnight with enough water and then drain.Transfer the beans to a steamer and steam for 20-45 minutes based on the hight of the layer until just well cooked (when you break them in halves in hand, there is no raw part inside, but the beans should not be too fragile to smash easily). You can taste the beans. They should be slightly stiff but well cooked already.
After steaming, transfer the beans out immediately and spread to cool down. In summer, make sure they are cooled down completely. Then mix the starter with 3g flour. The powder in the small spoon is the starter I use, known as koji kit (koji mold spores). You can purchase a Japanese version from amazon.
Spread the starter to the beans and massage with hands to make sure all the beans are loaded with starter.
Then flat them and cover with a wet clean cloth (I soak the cloth in cooled boiled water and please keep the cloth away from the beans). Place on a baking cooling rack so there is air going through underneath and place in shadow place (try to avoid sunshine). Keep the temperature between 30 to 36 degree C and the air humidity around 80% (at least 70%).
If weather condition is great, it should look this after several hours.
Then after another 12 to 16 hours, it looks like this.
Lovely? I watch them for minutes.
After another 12 hours to 16 hours, the white hair turns yellow.
When the hair turns yellow, stop the fermentation via drying under sunshine.
After one day drying under sunshine, it looks like. That’s the fermented broad beans(霉豆瓣).
Wash the beans under running water gently and drain. Then add 30ml Chinese white spirit (白酒), 250ml cooled boiled water and 50g salt.Mix well and fermented for 30 hours to 40 hours (covered).
Then you will get this.
Wash the pepper and air dry for 5-10 hours. And then cut into small pieces. Add around 40g salt and set aside for 1 hour before mixing with the beans.
Scoop the red peppers to the beans and discard the extra liquid at the bottom. Mix in spices, 50ml oil and 2 tablespoons of fermented sticky rice (you can skip this if hard to acquire). And transfer the mixture into the pot.
This is optional! In the first 7 days, place in warm place (under sunshine ) and uncover by day and half covered by night.
Add oil to cover the doubanjiang (3-4 cm higher), cover the lid and place in warm place. Then we pass everything to time. Let it ferments for at least 3 months before enjoying. Use cleaned tool to scoop the sauce out and it can be kept for 2-3 years.
After three months. Homemade red oil doubanjiang has a lighter and brighter color comparing with Pixian doubanjiang.
Doubanjiang | Broad Bean Paste
Ingredients
- 150 g dried board beans , peeled
- 0.3 g kit starter
- 800 g to 1000g fresh pepper
- 3 tbsp. minced ginger , optional
- 30 ml white spirit , or other hard liquor
- 250 ml cooled boiled water
- 50 g for beans +40g (for fresh peppers) salt
- 2 tbsp. fermented sticky rice
- oil as needed
- a Jar
Spices (you can replace them with 1 tbsp. Chinese five spice powder)
- 2 star anises
- 3-4 bay leaves
- 1 tablespoon red Sichuan peppercorn
- 1 small piece of Chinese cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon cloves
- 1/4 teaspoon fennel seeds
- 1 tsao ko
- 2 cardamons
Instructions
Make fermented fava beans
- Firstly soak the beans overnight with enough water and then drain.Then transfer the beans to a steamer and steam the board beans for 20-45 minutes based on the hight of the layer until just well cooked (when you break it in halves in hand, there is no raw part inside, but the beans should not be too fragile to smash easily). You can taste the beans. They should be slightly stiff but well cooked already.
- After steaming, transfer the beans out immediately and spread to cool down. In summer, make sure they are cooled down completely. Then mix the starter with 3g flour.
- Spread the starter to the beans and message with hands to make sure all the beans are loaded with starter.
- Spread the starter to the beans and message with hand to make sure all the beans are loaded with starter.Then flat them and cover with a wet clean cloth (I soak the cloth in cooled boiled water and please keep the cloth away from the beans). Place on a baking cooling rack so there is air going through underneath and place in shadow place (try to avoid sunshine). Keep the temperature between 30 to 36 degree C and the air humidity around 80% (at least 70%). Wait for 24 to 48 hours until the white hair turns yellow.Stop the fermentation via drying under sunshine.
Make Doubanjiang mixture
- Wash the beans under running water gently and drain. Then add 30ml white spirit, 250ml cooled boiled water and 50g salt.Mix well and fermented for 30 hours to 40 hours (covered).
- Wash the pepper and air dry for 5-10 hours. And then cut into small pieces (I chop ginger along with peppers). Add around 40g salt and set aside for 1 hour before mixing with the beans.
- Scoop the red peppers to the beans and discard the liquid on bottom. Mix in spices, 50ml oil and 2 tablespoons of fermented sticky rice. And transfer the mixture into the pot.
- This is optional! In the first 7 days, place in warm place (under sunshine ) and uncover by day and half covered by night.
- Add oil to cover the doubanjiang (3-4 cm higher), cover the lid and place in warm place. Them we pass everything to time. Let it ferments for at least 3 months before enjoying.
Thank you so much for this recipe! I am very excited to make it. I have one question that I hope you can help to clarify. I realise other have asked the same, but I can’t see an answer. Do you recommend using fresh or dried broad beans? I’m guessing fresh, but it would be great if you could clarify.
Thanks for your help!
Tonya,
You need to use dried broad beans and then soak them according to the instruction.
Yay! Thanks so much for that detail, and for the prompt reply. It means I can make the paste now, instead of waiting for broad beans to be in season!
My pleasure Tonya! Wish you good luck with those lovely broad beans.
I really love sichuan cuisine, but in my country you can neither find restaurants who offer it nor can you buy the prefabricated product. Amazon is no alternative either, it makes not much sense to import individually. So I really appreciate that you give the receipe how to prepare sauce or paste, because the basic ingrediens like pepper corn or beans can be found. Each year in january I travel 1000 kilometers to Vienna in Austria where there are many chinese people, many shops and also some sichuan restaurants. Now on my way home I wanted to find out how to make the mapu tofu. Will work with your receipes, thank you for your work.
Do you stir the oil into the mixture or just pour it over the top? Thanks!
Hi Brain,
You will need to stir the oil into the mixture and then pour some over the top to isolate the air.
Hi Elaine,
thank you for putting up this recipe.
There are a few parts I have questions about, which I don’t think have been asked yet.
1. To clarify, when you write hard liquid for the wine, do you just mean alcohol? Do you recommend a particular kind of white wine (dry, sweet?), or is cooking wine ok?
2. In the part when it’s sitting in the sun the first time, and you say to “turn it over” every 24 hours, does that mean to stir it (I hope since it’s only covered by gauze and would dump out, if actually turned over)?
3. After drying out in the sun the final time (after adding the aromatics), do you then store it someplace dark again? Does it get covered with anything more than the gauze, or is it left exposed to the air? In other words, how is it stored?
Final question (sorry I have so many), if the oil is what makes it keep longer, as you’ve stated, do you think oil could be added to the store bought pixian version, for an equally long shelf life? I know it’s a small amount to be saving, but I’m unsure how often I’d use it and I’m just curious if that’s the only difference.
Thanks Again!
Hi Kit,
Sorry for the late recipe. For your questioins
1. hard liquid means High alcohol(alcohol content higher than 65) so cooking wind cannot work for this recipe.
2. Turn over completely not just stirring. You need to turn the bottom to the top.
3.For the storage, store them in air tighter container. If you can see the jar on my picture, it has a perfectly cover.
And for the last one, there is no need to add oil to pixian version. I never tried to do so since Pixian doubanjiang can be saved for quite a long time.
Hi Elaine,
I am excited to discover your website. I love spicy food and I can’t wait to try making this paste. I’m not sure about step 4 though – “Capped fresh pepper and dry the water on surface in the air.” Appreciate if you can help explain, please. Do you mean I’m to add fresh pepper and then leave out to air-dry at that step? Uncovered? For how long?
Many thanks!
JC
Hi JC,
The only requirement of this step is to remove the raw water on the surface. So they should be uncovered and the time is really depending(usually we will leave them dry for at least half a day.)
hi! awesome recipe!
i just had one question, after we soak the beans in the wine do we take them out of the wine when we mix the flour etc or do we keep the wine and mix with the wine?
Thanks in advance!
James
Hi James,
There is no need to discard the wine. Just mix the flour directly.
Good evening! I have a few questions.
WIth the herbs mix, how much of each do you use, and do you grind them to powder or use them whole?
By alcohol content of 65 do you mean percent or proof?
Have you ever made this with Sake’ instead of wine?
Do you have a recipe for the pixian version?
Have you played around with using dried peppers?
Thank you. I enjoy making Gochujang once every year and using it on everything. This doubanjiang is very interesting way to use favas which grow like mad here.
Hi Shaun,
For Alcohol, I mean proof. I have not try with dried peppers but personally I do not think dried ones can work as they may be quite hard for fermentation.
And I am sorry that I cannot privde Pixian version because that’s too complex. The doubanjiang is stored in large jars and then ferment under sunshine for several months.So it is not practical in home kitchen.
thank you so much for this recipe.
i do have a couple of questions:
one – the wine – grape-based white wine in europe/n.america is not usually much higher than abou 12 percent (24 proof). there are some rice or barley wines, like sochu, that might be about 35 percent (70 proof). could you advise what type of wine you are referring to? is the wine sweet or dry?
two – what type of chili peppers are you using – small bird-type or will any size pepper be all right as long as it is hot?
many thanks in advance.
Hi! This is so cool- you have a recipe for dou ban jiang! I will have to buy some fava beans so I can make it sometime. I’m nuts about making stuff at home, and I have often wondered if people actually make sauces like 豆瓣醬 and 醬油 at home, and how common it is to do. thanks!
Hi Megan,
Usually in Sichuan province, we make our own Doubanjiang. But the version is slightly different from store bought version. My mom makes doubanjiang at home every year and we will give it to other relatives as a gift. However we seldom make soy sauce at home now, as it requires long time sun exposure. But the weather condition is unpredictable and quite hard to control for housewives. So we just buy soy sauce from qualified brands.
Thank you for sharing this recipe. I recently acquired some doubanjiang that was brought back from China just for me! As it turns out it is soybean paste. Can you describe the difference in flavor, is it markedly different? I am considering using your recipe.
Yes, they are different things. But you can also use your soy sauce version like real broad bean doubanjiang (no wasting), producing slightly different flavors.
Also..I had a question- can you explain why the wine is? I’ve made other fermented things before (for instance, 酸白菜）, and I only used salt (and some water) for that. Does the wine just sanitize/sterilize the beans?
Hi Megan,
For fermented vegetables, only salt can work fine. The wine is mainly used to soften the beans for following fermented.
Since there’s oil and garlic in the homemade version, how do you mitigate the risk for botulism?
Hi Rayna,
Oil is used to separate the ingredients with oxygen and we have used alcohol in previous steps. So I do not understand why botulism will happen?
Botulism thrives in anaerobic environments – oil promotes this environment – that’s why there’s a special risk of botulism when you use garlic in oil – because the botulism spores from the garlic can grow in the oil.
As for alcohol:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm6205a3.htm
That’s a study that shows how botulism can thrive in alcohol.
—
I feel comfortable using Pi Xian Dou Ban Jiang because it’s a fermented product, it seems fundamentally different than the homemade version. Whenever my family makes La You, we use it up pretty quickly.
The only reason why store-bought garlic in oil (like Lao Gan Ma) is safer is because they pasteurize the oil at a far higher temperature than home cooks can.
Really, I don’t think this recipe is unsafe, but I really advise against storing it for, what you claim, years. I think a week or so in the fridge is the most safe. Obviously, chances of botulism happening are not too high, but there’s always a risk. Also, you use raw (?) garlic? Cooked garlic would be a little bit safer – in fact, cooking the entire condiment mixture would a bit better in general.
Hi Rayna,
Thanks so much for the information about the botulism. I have no ideas about the specific fact that botulism from garlic can even spread in oil. You are right as we should be very careful concerning about food. I have removed garlic from the ingredients and will continue find a real recipe when I return back to my hometown. Usually we make doubanjiang after autumn when the fresh peppers are harvested, the process only last for a limited period.
We store the homemade Doubanjiang for at least 1 or 2 months before eating, stored in airtight ceramic jars.
Sincerely thanks for the information.