Just as with soy sauce, Chinese cooking wine is equally as important. It’s made by fermenting grain with a starter of molds and yeasts. There’s a vast range of styles from light to dark and sweet. It also includes spices such as cinnamon and nutmeg, and here are its benefits:
Nutritional Value
Chinese cooking wine is rich in amino acids that the human body requires, including isoleucine, methionine, and threonine. Among them, lysine can produce neurotransmitters in the brain, which improve sleep quality.
These amino acids are also beneficial to children’s physical development. Others help in promoting appetite, helping digestion, relieving summer heat, refreshing oneself, promoting blood circulation, and moisturizing skin.
It’s Delicious
Chinese cooking wine also has sweet, sour, astringent, and umami notes. These notes have a rich and complex aroma. All these qualities will carry through to your final dish with a faint trace of alcoholic sharpness. While alcohol itself is an excellent solvent, it bonds to the aromatic compounds in the dish, enhancing the fragrance of the finished food.
Reducing Gaminess
Chinese cooking wine effectively reduces fishiness or funk and gaminess in marinades and dishes with lamb, fish, or any fermented products.
