"Sheldon" > wrote in message
ups.com...
>
>> Absolutely not. Authentic Chinese hot and sour soup gets the hot from
> black
>> pepper. There are no chilis involved.
>
> I don't think so, not unless the Chinese have some kind of secret super
> hot black pepper... or you eat some wussy soup. Every one of the
> recipes I've used call for hot red pepper flakes, and none even call
> for black pepper, not white pepper either. Now if by "authentic" you
> mean from before there were any capsicums available in the Orient, then
> could be.

Sheldon, I don't know where you get your Chinese recipes but I'd question
their authenticity. I just checked my six Chinese cook books. Five of them
have hot and sour soup recipes, and not one of them has any red pepper in
them. (Curiously, "Mrs. Chiang's Szechwan Cookbook" maintains that you
can't really make authentic hot and sour soup in the US, 'cause it's
impossible to get coagulated duck blood).

You can make hot and sour soup plenty hot with black pepper, believe me.
Once or twice I went a bit over the top with the black pepper, and it was
almost too zippy to eat.

Most Chinese restaurant versions of hot and sour soup around here (the
Baltimore-Washington area) are wimpy, lacking in both black pepper and
vinegar. It's best to ask for vinegar on the side (pepper is usually
already on the table) to correct the flavor.

Hal Laurent
Baltimore