Chinese 5 Spice Recipe (2024)

FAQs

What makes up Chinese 5 spices? ›

What is five spice powder made of? Five spice is a blend of star anise, cloves, cinnamon, Sichuan peppercorns and fennel seeds. If you don't have Sichuan peppercorns to hand, you could substitute them for black peppercorns – the flavour will still be nice, although it won't have the same heat.

Cinnamon and star anise are among the common spices to find in a grocery store that can help you make the closest substitute to Chinese five spice powder. You can swap Chinese five spice with a mix of ground cinnamon and ground star anise.

Warm, sweet, and wondrous, Chinese five spice is a favorite for barbecue, braised dishes, roasted veggies, quick stir fries, noodle dishes, and even desserts. This blend creates a shortcut into authentic Chinese flavors, but you'll soon find yourself fusing it into all types of cooking.

Most commonly, Five Spice Powder is a mixture of cinnamon, cloves, fennel, star anise, and Sichuan peppercorns. However, many recipes may also include other ingredients, such as ginger, nutmeg, licorice, orange peel, and galangal.

In the culinary arts, five spice (also known as Chinese five spice) is a blend of ground spices used in Chinese and Vietnamese cooking.

Cinnamon + Star Anise

To use the cinnamon star anise mix as a substitute for Chinese five spice do the following: Mix an equal amount of ground star anise and ground cinnamon. Add the same amount of the blend as what the recipe calls for Chinese 5 spice. If you want to add ground black pepper, use a dash or two.

At first glance seven spice powder may sound like a variant on Chinese five spice powder, but they couldn't be more different. Or rather, they're exactly as different as their native cuisines.

Known as Wu Xiang Fen (五香粉) in Chinese, five spice powder is a type of ground spice blend commonly used in Chinese cuisine.

Green onions, ginger, and garlic are the three most common Chinese herbs and spices, which are commonly used together to cook all kinds of vegetables and meat, especially in stir fry. Also known as scallions, green onions can also be substituted with spring onions and similar herbs.

McCormick Culinary Chinese Five Spice is a premium, culinary-grade blend of anise, cinnamon, star anise, cloves, and ginger that come together to create a warm, spicy-sweet flavor. Specially made for chefs to inspire extraordinary menus and deliver consistent recipes.

Can I use Chinese 5 spice instead of allspice? ›

The warm, spicy-sweet flavor of allspice is very similar to that of five-spice powder, a blend of cinnamon, star anise, fennel, cloves, and ginger or pepper. Use equal parts of five-spice powder in place of the ground allspice called for in a recipe—it's great for both savory and sweet applications.

One of its best uses is as a spice rub or marinade for fatty meats like pork, duck, or goose. Chinese Five Spice is integral to any traditional Peking duck recipe. But it can work surprisingly well with lamb, beef, and meatballs too.

Unlike the name suggests, the salt and pepper spice mix usually consists of far more than just salt and pepper. It's often a mix of salt, white pepper/Sichuan pepper, Chinese 5 spice, MSG, and sugar.

Ingredients. The key ingredient of hoisin sauce is fermented soybean paste. Some hoisin sauce ingredients include starches such as sweet potato, wheat and rice, and water, sugar, soybeans, sesame seeds, white distilled vinegar, salt, garlic, red chili peppers, and sometimes preservatives or coloring agents.

The Thai equivalent of the Chinese five spice or the Indian garam masala, this is an all-purpose seasoning blend which is used in Thai style stir fries to bring out the full flavour of the food.

To start with, Chinese five spice is Chinese in origin. Seven spice powder is Japanese, and also called shichimi togarashi. Unlike Five Spice, Seven spice's foundation is comprised of chilis, dried orange peel, sesame seed, dried ginger, and seaweed, as well as Sichuan peppercorns.

At first glance seven spice powder may sound like a variant on Chinese five spice powder, but they couldn't be more different. Or rather, they're exactly as different as their native cuisines. Five spice, fragrant with sweet and spicy anise flavors, is the perfect compliment to meaty Chinese braises and barbecues.

Garam Masala

I was surprised how similar the Indian spice blend Garam Masala is to Chinese 5-Spice. Both contain fennel, cinnamon and cloves but Garam Masala includes carraway seeds and cardamom. And is missing the star anise. Given they are so similar just substitute 1:1.