Boujee (not bougie), XO sauce

4 days ago

"Boujee is hip-hop slang for something “luxurious in lifestyle yet humble in character,” influenced by and often interchanged with the slang bougie." dictionary.com"

The above picture is of the 'original' XO sauce which:

"Legend has it, a cook at the Peninsula Hotel in Kowloon developed the sauce and named it after the pricy drink-of-the-moment, XO cognac." The Spruce Eats

You can pick it up at Hong Kong airport (well it's out of stock at the moment) for a mere HK$428 for 220g, which translates to AUD$86.41 - which makes it almost sound cheap. Or you can go to Coles and pick up a jar of Baishanzu XO Mushroom Sauce Five Spices for $4 for 210g of which Gourmet Traveller, in its article on the 5 best XO sauces to buy here in Australia, said:

"With an array of different flavours – from garlic to Sichuan pepper – this vegan iteration offers a heady spiced sauce that packs a flavour punch, alongside shiitake mushrooms and soybean paste."

So not really XO sauce, because XO sauce is expensive because of its ingredients - dried scallops, a special kind of Chinese cured ham and dried shrimp as well as other things of course.

But let me step back a bit. I was initially 'inspired' to tackle XO sauce, by one of those tiny coincidences that occur in my foodie life. In this case that Sheet-pan fried rice with vegan 'XO' sauce that showed up in my New York Times desk calendar, followed a couple of days later by the Ottolenghi newsletter having a recipe for a Cheat's XO pasta for Valentine's Day - and you can see one of his team make it on YouTube if you want to. Neither of these versions are 'authentic'- and I shall come back to that notion.

So I began my 'research' the other day - before going out to lunch, and making soup from decaying fridge stuff - pretty nice by the way, if not amazing - and the scones were yum. Anyway the first recipe that I looked at was from Marion's Kitchen. No that's not quite right - the link is to the recipe she offers, but I actually read an article on her website which was all about the condiment and its origins and where that word boujee appeared:

"XO sauce was first developed in Hong Kong in the 1980’s, probably in the kitchen of Spring Moon at the Peninsula hotel (although other restaurants have tried to muscle in on the XO origin story, so who really knows). The name is actually a reference to XO (‘extra old’) French cognac, a super-expensive drink that gives you lots of status in HK and the reference is because XO sauce contains boujee ingredients, not because it contains cognac." Marion's Kitchen

You probably know by now that I am rather fascinated by words, and boujee was new to me so I looked it up and found the quote at the top of the page. Sucked in however, I read on to find, that bougie (also new to me) - which XO sauce is not - is from 'bourgeois' - a word we all recognise:

"By the 1970s, bourgeois was shortened in slang to bougie, mocking something as consumeristic, pretentious, and suburban, again with a “middle class” subtext. In the 2010s, bougie was further generalized to “undesirable” or “unfair.” ... In 2016, a hit hip-hop song by the trio Migos, “Bad and Boujee,” introduced a new take on, and spelling of, bougie: boujee " Dictionary.com

In this context bad = down to earth and boujee = materially successful) therefore boojie came to mean “self-made wealth that doesn’t mean forgetting one’s humbler roots. So 'bougie' seems to be almost the opposite of 'boojie'. Which is interesting in itself.

But I digress - other than to reiterate that you learn something every day.

Back to XO sauce. I have to say that every article and every recipe I found raved about it - all along the lines of the Marion's Kitchen description.

"There’s saltiness from soy, sweetness from sugar, the richness of shaoxin wine, and a deeply savoury edge from the dried seafood. Once the main ingredients are finely chopped, everything is cooked together in oil in a wok to make things nice and crispy, then the liquid elements are added and the sauce simmers until it slowly reduces down to the correct sticky texture. The end result is a gorgeous balance of smoky, salty, sweet and umami flavours." Marion's Kitchen

And yet that description covers a huge range of options as to what goes into it. Having now perused a whole lot of recipes I think there is a scale between those who are completely authentic - which will cost you a bomb - as Kaitlin of The Woks of Life explains in her How to make XO sauce article:

"My mother was quick to convey the severity (read: $$$$$) of embarking on an XO journey with no clear destination in sight and literally balked and shrieked like a little mouse at how much of her dried scallop stash I used to make it."

In America where she lives she said the price of those dried scallops was around $100 a pound (around 500g)! So I doubt that many of us will be doing this. And to be truly authentic the particular Chinese cured pork is banned in America - and probably here as well. Which makes the jar of Spring Moon XO sauce at $86.41 look cheap. Well sort of. The picture of the sauce gives you something to aspire to though.

Sasha Marx of Serious Eats, also goes pretty authentic for her recipe for XO sauce but in the style of Serious Eats, gives us lots of information along the way, as well as a generalised comment about the importance of condiments:

"Condiments are something that we care deeply about. They are ready-to-use flavor-boosters, as vital to restaurant kitchens as they are to home cooks. In fact, if you were to open a restaurant cook's home fridge, odds are you'd find a wide array of jarred condiments, deli containers of pickles, and pretty much nothing else."

I do have a lot more than condiments in my fridge, but I have to say that my top shelf is now pretty much covered in jars of this and that - things that could loosely be described as condiments I guess - not to mention those hiding in my pantry. I just don't use them enough.

Then you have those who make cheaper but perfectly adequate substitutions. After all I'm guessing that most Chinese families can't afford either the expensive jars or the expensive ingredients to make their own, and so they must have experimented with substitutes. I offer here recipes from two of our top Asian chefs, Luke Nguyen whose recipe is not accompanied by a picture and Adam Liaw who makes a pretty good looking Home made XO sauce. However, now that I look at them properly I see that they both do indeed use those dried scallops as well as other dried fish. Maybe they are not as expensive here, because I can't really see either of them encouraging their general readership to expend vast amounts of money on expensive ingredients, although Adam Liaw does say:

"It was named after XO cognac – a status symbol of decadence and sophistication in Hong Kong at the time. The dried scallops are a little expensive, but that’s kind of the point."

Then there are the vegetarians, and the vegans and the quick and easys of which I give two examples - there are plenty more on the net - Mushroom XO sauce with noodles - Meera Sodha and Lazy XO sauce - Rosheen Kaul - not really a picture of the sauce, more of some of the ingredients.

Last but not least however is Jay Rayner's attempt at an XO super cheat that he experienced at a restaurant called XO Kitchen in Norwich - Charred hispi cabbage topped with crushed Scampi Fries and Frazzles:

"It was described on the menu as BBQ hispi with salad cream, black bean dressing and XO seasoning. I asked the chef Jimmy Preston what was in the golden rubble of XO seasoning. “Well,” he said slowly. “You need a pork element for XO, so that’s crushed-up Frazzles. And then you need dried seafood so that’s Scampi Fries.” He paused. “Monster Munch might also have been involved." If you’re reading this outside the UK and have no idea what I’m going on about, you can look these great and vital snack products up online. Just know, it’s genius." Jay Rayner

So there you go. Another must have condiment. Maybe one should start with the cheap mushroom version in Coles - or visit your local Chinese supermarket - and see what they have there. That Gourmet Traveller article mentioned a couple of others.

And when you've got it, what do you do with it? Well dollop it on practically everything it seems, though pasta seems to be a popular option. That Ottolenghi dish for example was not really an XO sauce, it was scallops in a kind of XO sauce. And Marion's kitchen advises:

"XO elevates any dish that leans Southern Chinese and you don’t need to use much, either. In fact you shouldn’t use much as the flavours are really intense and could easily overpower."

Which might mean that your expensive jar might go a long way.

S - lots of things begin with S of course - so I've just picked out two from today's walk - swing seat and shadows. A beautiful day for a walk. Others were sky, spots, sleepers, shed, statue, smile (the statue was a smiling Buddha), seat, shadecloth, solar panels, sticks and stones, steps, signs, shadow (me), signs, and shade.