While Nyonya and the Peranakan are born and raised in Malaysia and Singapore, they mostly observe Chinese lunar calendar and celebrate numerous Chinese festivities. The year-round Chinese festivals call for festive foods—dishes that are significant to the festivals, for example: jiu hu char or fried jicama/yambean with shredded cuttlefish and loh bak.
In my family, jiu hu char is an indispensable dish that is prepared for all festivals: Chinese New Year, cheng beng (qingming/清明), month of the hungry ghost, winter festival (tang chek or 冬至), and prayers to our ancestors. I remember vividly my childhood days when I had to help cut the vegetables for jiu hu char. Let me just say that it wasn’t fun as my family believes in the most traditional way of preparing Nyonya food, hence no graters or slicers were used. Coming from a huge family, we would make a big batch of jiu hu char, which means lots of jicama/yambean. So patiently, all the women in my family would help slicing and cutting the jicama manually to fine thin threads–a requirement to make a killer dish of jiu hu char…
The special ingredient in jiu hu char is shredded cuttlefish or jiu hu see. From what I gather, shredded cuttlefish is mostly used by Nyonyas to make jiu hu char. My mother also used them for flavoring soups, which is awesome.
Jiu hu char is wrapped with fresh lettuce leaves with tee cheo (sweet sauce) and chili sauce. They can also be eaten plain and go extremely well with rice. Jiu hu char is also one of those dishes that gets better overnight and after multiple reheating. In recent years, jiu hu char is gaining popularity and it’s one of the must-order items at Nyonya restaurants.
Here is my family’s jiu hu char recipe, and this dish was prepared by my sister-in-law in Penang.
Ingredients:
3 tbsp cooking oil
200g pork belly
3 cloves garlic (chopped)
60g shredded dried cuttlefish (rinsed)
400g jicama/yambean
80g carrot
150g cabbage
1 onion
3 dried shitake mushrooms (soaked in warm water)
1-1/2tsp salt
1 tsp sugar
A dash of pepper
Method:
1. Peel the skin of jicama/yambean and carrot. Slice and cut yambean, carrot, cabbage, mushrooms and onion finely into thin strips/threads.
2. Boil the pork belly until it’s cooked. Cut the meat into fine strips and set aside.
3. Heat up wok, pour in cooking oil and add in garlic. Stir-fry the garlic until aromatic, add in the dried cuttlefish and continue to stir.
4. Add in the vegetables and meat. Stir-fry until the vegetables are soft.
5. Add salt, sugar and pepper to taste.
6. Dish out and serve immediately with fresh lettuce leaves, tee cheo (sweet sauce) and chili sauce.
{ 23 comments… read them below or add one }
The dish looks delish. What about it makes it a festival food? I was just reading a book on Chinese customs where a lot of foods and other things have appeal because the way the are pronounced is similar to lucky words. Is that the case here?
I am not sure about why this is always a festive dish. It doesn’t have any “luck” or “fortune” significance, I think it’s just because jiu hu char is so great.
The dish reminds me of my grandmother^_^
I’m also a penangite, the fact that u wrote the name as Jiu Hu Char makes me feel extremely close the my hometown again.
By the way, the dish tastes even better when you keep it overnight and warm it up again the next day.
AmyS – yes, jiu hu char is the best overnight, that’s why in my family, we always cook up a big batch of them. They will be gone the next day. :)
you were so right.. about the article u have wrote. Probably we came from the same town :) Miss my mom’s jiu char… yum yum yum… how can you find the jiu hu? u bought back from malaysia? can we buy here..? i am from new jersey.
Looks really great, but why it is “vegetable” dish, if there is cuttlefish there? It is a little bit confusing
It’s a vegetable dish because the main ingredients are vegetables. Cuttlefish is to add the flavor to this dish.
if i cant get the good jicama( usually is too big or too old)… can i use white turnip instead? what do u think?
Hi Rachel – you have to use jicama. If you use white turnip, then it’s not jiu hu char.
Hi Bee, where can we find jiu hu see? thank you
You can’t find it here in the US but you can try getting dried cuttlefish and shred it yourself using scissors here. Good luck.
My mom only makes this once a year for our reunion dinner on Chinese New Year eve. We eat it with a dollop of sambal belacan and wrapped with letture. YUM! BTW, this is more of a Penang nyonya dish, not Malacca.
In – thanks for the information. Good to know.
hi,looking at your recipes it often calls for tamarind powder/juice or from fresh tamarind which is hard to find.can i substitute tamarind soup base mix (sinigang) w/c is a filipino soup?
I am sure you can find tamarind paste in PH. I am not familiar with sinigang.
What is jicama or yambean?
I had never tried this dish & it looks interesting with the cuttlefish & I really wanted to try cooking this.
Many thanks.
Bangkuang.
Thank you so much.
Now I know, similarly used for our spring roll filling. I guess the difference is the shredded cuttlefish.
Everytime mom cooks this, i’ll have to jaga api. Hahaha, not to mention tumbuk sambal belacan as well ;)
Unka – your mother is Nyonya?
Nopes, she’s hakka..But grandma used to cook a lot of nyonya dishes and I guess the recipes got handed down from grandma to her to me :) BTW, grandma’s hokkien ;)
This is definitely a Penang nyonya dish. My sis made this once for a CNY dinner. We used lettuce to wrap around this dish as the filling. Yummy!
My home town is Taiping. This dish is made and served in every festival as well. Jicama is also used in po-piah. When I grow up Taiping is famous for Taiping Po-piah.
Taiping and Penang has a very strong tie I think? I live far away and I lose much connections and memories, is it fair to say that Penang Nyanya food is typical of the cuisine for nyonya or local born Chinese in northern region of Penisular Malaysia? My grandma has picture of herself dressed in nyonya costume when she was a teenager.