Xiang Chun at The Schoolhouse

As must be clear from earlier posts, a big part of the sustainability program here at The Schoolhouse is to use as much home-grown food as possible. Now it’s time to write something about Xiang Chun, the first edible plant to be harvested this spring here at The Schoolhouse. Xiang Chun is called Chinese Toon in English, with the official name of Toona Sinensis, or Cedrela Sinensis. Whatever the name is, it is a species of Toona trees native to eastern Asia, especially China. It is a deciduous (drops leafs seasonally) tree growing up to 25 meters high with a trunk up to 70cm diameter. The young leafs of this tree are extensively used as a vegetable in China, in fact it is one of the most popular vegetables here. However, as popular as it is here, it is not used in culinary purposes in other parts of the world. This species is really cold-tolerant and beautiful, though, at is grown in various parts of the World, even in northern Europe – indeed, it is used as a street tree in the boulevards of Paris. Anyway, we are interested in it for culinary reasons and we are going to use it in all of our three restaurants, as we have many Xiang Chun trees in our properties:

-The Xiang Chun of Roadhouse (1kg/year)
-Jim’s Xiang Chuns (2) (8kg/year) (pictured above and below)
-The Xiang Chuns of Piviteau’s House (2) (15kg/year)
-The Xiang Chuns of The Pavilion’s Gate (2) (15kg/year)

So, as can be seen above, we have seven trees of Chinese Toon around the village with the estimated total yield of almost 40kg/year. I am, however, a little sceptical whether the amount will be this large in kilos – they are leafs, after all – but the point is that there will be rather lot of this Chinese delicacy for us to use.

The leafs of this “vegetable tree” have a kind of onion-like flavour, and apparently smells a bit like fried onion flakes. It can be used in many ways and is really popular in northern Chinese cuisine. Just for your information, the young read leafs are considered better than young green leafs, so if you are not going to use all the leafs, pick the red ones. The fresh young leaves and shoots of this plant contain 84% water, 9.8% protein, Vitamin C, Vitamin A, Vitamin B1 and B2, and are rich in aromatic substances. So, from the health point of view, Xiang Chun is an ideal dietary vegetable with natural antioxidants – which is good news bearing in mind that a part of sustainable foods is to serve healthy food at the restaurant. Xiang Chun leafs are uniquely aromatic and therefore excellent for stir fry (especially with egg), salad, fry, pickling, seasoning, etc. Popular Chinese dishes where Xiang Chun plays a major role include for example Stewed Tofu with Xiang Chun, Fried Fish with Xiang Chun, and Xiang Chun Omelet. There is also healthy aromatic tea made out of it. Xiang Chun grows fruits as well, but those are mostly used as a medicine.

Today and yesterday, we have been planning with Randhir, our executive chef, how to use Xiang Chun, how this delicacy could best add value to our restaurants. We are going to use Xiang Chun in all of our three restaurants - The Schoolhouse, Roadhouse and Xiaolumian. We decided that about 70% of the leafs are used in The Schoolhouse restaurant, 20% in Roadhouse and 10% in Xiaolumian. At this point, there are basically six things we are going to do with Xiang Chun:

-Deep fried Xiang Chun, served as complimentary appetizers in The Schoolhouse
-Xiang Chun to top up The Schoolhouse Salad
-Pickled Xian Chun, used with the Working Man Noodles, with Rice Congee (breakfast) etc. in The Schoolhouse – many possible uses
-Xiang Chun omelet, served as a special in Roadhouse (traditional Chinese delicacy)
-Sweet bean paste in Xiaolumian – Xiang Chun an important ingredient - served with noodles
-Xiang Chun tea, served in all restaurants - season's special (we'll try first to see whether it's worth serving...)

Xiang Chun should be all used fresh (or pickled, obviously), as it is not good dried or freezed. It is still to be planned how the actual harvest works in practice during May – we probably won’t be taking all the leafs at the same time, but for example one-two trees per week. We are going to keep track how much of Xiang Chun we get this spring in reality, and document all the information for coming years. It will help the manu planning in future.

Next month we are going to serve our own fresh Xiang Chun in our restaurants, feel free to come and have a try!

Stay tuned for new posts.