Red fermented bean curd (nanru)

Tofu fermenté rouge (nanru)

What it is

Nanru is bean curd cured under salt and huangjiu with red yeast rice, which dyes it through to the centre and pushes the ferment towards wine rather than towards sharpness. Cantonese and Hakka cooks reach for it as much for the colour as the taste: the red on nam yu pork ribs comes from the cheese itself, not from any added dye.

In the kitchen

Mash a cube with a spoonful of its own brine before it meets the meat — dropped in whole it never disperses and leaves pockets of salt. Two cubes season a kilo of pork belly, and no further salt is needed.

Goes with

Pork belly Taro Peanut Lotus root Shaoxing wine Star anise Garlic Chinese rock sugar

Same species

Chunjang Dark soy sauce Doenjang Douchi Edamame Fermented bean curd

Also used with

Red yeast rice

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