Recipes
I'll put the recipes in chronological order to show the evolution of the dish in English sources and try to glean some commonalities that help us understand the core of the dish.
For cookbook content, I'm scannign the text wtih my phone using Text Fairy to do the OCR. I tried to correct errors in the scan but some errors may persist. If something looks odd to you let me know and I'll verify it if I can.
Hsiang Ju Lin, Chinese Gastronomy, 1969 (my edition is from 1977)
I think this recipe needs some context from the book. He's writing about regional cuisine, specifically Peking(before the pinyin was officially switched to Beijing) He's moved from the street vendors to the low-grade restaurants.
The flavour of Peking was in the cheap restaurants, where tiers of paotse, buns stuffed with pork and porkfat, cooked in a cloud of steam. How good to comin from the freequing cold anwarm oneself, the hot bun warming the hands even before one bit into it. Or to look into a big bowl of steaming noodles, stir itu p with sauce, hunch over it, an dgulp it down in big mouthfuls. The coarse food was full of robust flavour, uncomplicated by niceities. Thick wehatcakes (laoping) wer werapped about raw spring onions and raw garlic, eaten just like that. Do not confuse withthe translucent crepes of Southern China discuss alter. Soutehrners complain that the Norther laoping are too thick, to ocoarse. But they must be like that, or they would not taste right. Li Liweng said: "Southerners cook noodles in a soup containign salt, vinegar, sauces an other ingredients. The soup is delicious, buth the noodles are tasteless. But this is what they lik. They just as well be drinking soup."
Compare the following recipe with the complication of Carp and Noodles discussed in the section on Chekiang-Kiangsu.
Minced Pork Sauce (for Noodles)
1 lb. fresh noodles or 3/4 lb dry noodles
1/2 lb pork
2 tablespoons oil
1 spring onion chopped
2 tablespoons wine
4 tablespoons brown bean sauce (toupan chiang)
1 level teaspoon sugar
1/4 pint water
raw slivered garlic, raw sliced cucmbers, or raw slivered spring onions
Prepare the noodles separately and keep thm hot. Chop ordice the pork fvery finely, and saute with oil, chopped sprin onion, wine and brown bean sauce until the liquid evaporates and the oil separates out. Add sugar and water and saute again until the ater evaporates and the oil separates.
Serve the noodles and sauce separately with a separate dish of raw sliverered garlic, raw sliced cucumbers or raw srping onions.
I think this is a great starting point to discussing zha jiang mian. It's a boldly flavored dish, sweetly accented, lacking subtlety but comforting, delicious even if the noodles don't have any flavor of their own, only what coats them from the sauce. And textural contrast in the garnish.
The toupan chiang seems an odd choice, especially with the light sugar accent.
Is yellow bean sauce the same as brown bean sauce? says "s. Rather confusingly, yellow bean sauce is sometimes called brown bean sauce, but it refers to the same ingredient." It's just calling it toupan rather than huang? I would consider these different sauces. Shortly, we'll see another brown bean sauce version that is not toupan.
Craig Claiborne and Virginia Lee, The Chinese Cookbook, 1972
The following is a famous Peking dish, traditional for birthday celebrations. It is a minced pork and bean sauce dish with noodles as its base. The sauce itself is somehwat spicy and bit on the salty side, which admirabley complements the noodles. Note that it is made and served with what may seem to some Western minds as a large amount of oil, ub the oil may be reduced according to conscience. The sauce, incidentally, keeps well in the refrigerator up to two weeks.
TSA CHIANG MIEN (Noodles with Minced Pork and Bean Sauce)
1 pound ground pork
1/2 cup bean sauce *
3/4 cup peanut, vegetable, or corn oil
3-4 teaspoons sugar
1/4 teaspoon monosodium glutamate
2 scallions, green part included, finely chopped
1 pound fresh Chinese noodles (lo mein) * or one 8-ounce box thin egg noodles
* Available in Chinese markets and by mail order. For more information see Chapter XI
1. Measure out the pork and bean sauce in separate bowls and have ready.
2. Heat the oil in a wok or skillet, add the pork, and cook about 3 minutes, stirring to separate the pieces. Add the bean sauce and cook, stirring, over high heat about 2 minutes.
3. Add the sugar and cook, stirring, over high heat until the oil loses its cloudy look and becomes clear, about 3 minutes or longer. Add the monosodium glutamate and scallions and stir to blend. Spoon out, oil and all, into a serving dish and keep warm. Or, if desired, pour off as much of the oil as you wish.
4. Prepare the noodles. If Chinese noodles are used, bring a large quantity of water—at least 2 quarts—to a boil. Add the noodles and cook 3 1/2 to 5 minutes. Or cook the thin egg noodles according to package directions. In either case, drain and put the noodles into a large serving bowl.
5. At the table, serve the noodles in individual bowls and pass the bow! of pork and bean sauce. Each individual tops his noodles with a spoonful or two of the sauce and oil to taste, and mixes it thoroughly with chopsticks.
YIELD: 4 to 8 servings
This seems like a lot of bean sauce compared to what I usually see anymore, at least until Mike Chen in 2020. Also a fair amount of sugar, but without the tianmianjiang that makes some sense. The oddest thing to me is the big range in serving sizes.
No specific kind of bean sauce is called out so I consider this evidence for the argument that it doesn't have to be only yellow bean sauce.
Calvin Lee, The Gourmet Chinese Regional Cookbook, 1976
Brown Bean Sauce Noodles (Cha Chiang Mein)
This robust noodle dish has no pretensions whatsoever; it is inexpensive to make, quite filling, and very tasty indeed. This makes a satisfying single dish meal or late night supper.
1 pound Chinese egg noodles
1/4 cup brown bean sauce
2 tablespoons hoisin sauce
2 chopped scallions
1/2 cup chicken stock or water
1/2 teaspoon sugar
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper (optional)
1 tablespoon peanut oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 pound ground pork
Garnishes
1/2 cucumber
10 radishes
4 scallions
2 tablespoons minced garlic
Preparation
Boil the noodles for 7 minutes, stirring occasionally. They should be drained in a colander under running water when they reach the al dente stage. Place in a serving bowl
Shred each of the garnishes and place each in its own bowl. Mash the brown bean sauce with the handle of a cleaver or the back of a spoon. To the brown bean sauce add the hoisin sauce, chopped scallions, chicken stock, sugar, and cayenne. Set aside.
Cooking
Heat a wok or skillet over high heat until a drop of water immediately sizzles into steam. Add the oil, salt, and garlic. When the odor of the garlic has become pungent, add the pork and stir fry for 1 minute or until the pork has become gray.
Add the brown bean sauce and chicken stock mixture. Blend well with the pork. Cover and lower heat to medium. Cook for 5 minutes more. Remove to a separate serving dish.
To serve, let each guest help himself to some noodles and then to some sauce. If he or she prefers a salty dish, then a lot of sauce should be taken. The proportion of sauce to the bland noodles determines the degree of saltiness. Your guests may then garnish their noodles with as few or as many of the garnishes as you have provided.
Yield: 4-6 servings.
Not much wrong with this one. I like the heavier vegie garnish and extra aromatics in the sauce.
Irene Kuo, The Key to Chinese Cooking, 1977
This is frequently seen as a significant Chinese cookbook, especially given the time of publication. I think it holds up well generally, though there are some translation preferences and pinyin changes since then.
I can't be sure that is supposed to be zha jiang mian. But it looks more like it than not I think, particularly where described as a one-dish northern meal and with the heavier vegie garnish. She never mentions or uses tianmianjiang in the book.
NOODLES WITH BEAN-PASTE MEAT SAUCE
Served with an array of crisp raw vegetables, this is a typical one-dish northern meal. Although it involves the preparation of three separate components, the noodles, ganishes and meat sauce, each can be done in advance,
serves 6-8 generously.
1 pound noodles, boiled (page 432)
Garnish:
1 large firm, slender cucumber
2 cups fresh bean sprouts
2 cups shredded romaine lettuce
1 1/2 cups shredded celery
4 large cloves garlic, minced or mashed
1 teaspoon sesame oil
1 pound ground pork
4 tablespoons oil
1 large whole scallion, finely chopped
1 tablespoon dry sherry
SAUCE:
5 tablespoons bean paste
2 teaspoons sugar
1/2 cup water
1 tablespoon sesame oil
Noodles
Cook fresh noodles or spaghetti or linguine according to the instructions. Rinse, drain, and set aside. When ready to serve, plunge them into a pot of boiling water to boil briefly till hot. Drain them well.
Garnishes
Cut off the ends and peel the cucumber; halve and deseed it. Cut the halves diagonally into 1 1/2-inch-long slices; then shred them thin.
Rinse and drain the bean sprouts. Parboil them in boiling water for 30 seconds. Drain into a colander and spray with cold water. Drain well.
Separate the lettuce leaves; rinse and shake dry. Cut the larger leaves in half lengthwise; then shred them crosswise thin. Cut the tender core diagonally into thin slices and then shred these.
Wash, scrape, then cut the celery stalks diagonally into thin slices; shred the slices thin. Rinse in cold water and drain well.
Crush and peel the garlic; then either mince it or mash it in a garlic press. Mix with the sesame oil in a small dish.
Put each vegetable in a separate serving dish. If doing this step in advance, cover the dishes and refrigerate. Bring out just before serving.
Meat sauce
March-chop the pork a few times to loosen its formation. Place it with the with the finely chopped scallions on your working platter. Combine bean paste with the sugar and water and stir well.
Heat a wok or large, heavy skillet over high heat until hot; add the 4 tablespoons oil, swirl, and heat for 30 seconds. Turn heat to mete meat add the meat, stirring briskly in poking and pressing motions until meat Separates. Scatter in the scallions and stir a few times: then add the sherry and stir rapidly to mingle. Give the sauce ingredients a big stir, pour over the meat, and stir to even out the contents.
Turn heat low to maintain a gentle simmering, and simmer for 10 minutes or until the sauce has thickened, stirring now and then. At this point add a little sugar if sauce needs it—it should be on the salty side with a subtle sweet aftertaste.
Turn the heat high, add the sesame oil, and give a few fast folds before pouring into a serving dish. The sauce may be made ahead of time, covered, and chilled. Reheat over very low heat just before serving.
Serving
Place the vegetable garnishes in a circle in the center of the table with the hot meat sauce in the middle. Pile the hot noodles on a platter or in a deep bowl. Serve the noodles to each person and let him or her spoon on a little sauce and a sprinkling of vegetable garnishes. The mixture should be tossed well before being eaten.
The bean sauce is still a bit high, but more in line with ratios I tend to like best. Sweetness might be a bit light for my taste. The fresh vegetables are essential to cleansing the palate between the strong noodle and sauce bites and really make the dish work to my taste. I like the variety and volumes of vegetables we don't see again until Mandy Fu's version in 2017.
Kenneth Lo, Chinese Regional Cooking, 1979
--there are multiple versions and titles of this out there, Chinese Provincial Cooking and so on. It's really quite different from other cookbooks focusing on food in hotels and restaurants in China. Seems written for the UK audience.
Quick-Fried Diced Pork Cubes in Peking Soya Paste
450 g (1 [b) leg of pork
22 ml (1 1 /2 tablespoons) cornflour
90-105 ml (6-7 tablespoons) vegetable oil
Sauce
15 ml (1 tablespoon) soya (yellow bean) paste
7 ml (1/2 tablespoon hoisin sauce (optional)
5 ml (1 teaspoon sugar
22 ml (1 1/2 tablespons) ginger water (boil 3 sliced root ginger in 45 ml (3 tablespoons) water until the water is reduced to half, discard ginger)
Dice the pork into small cubes. Sprinkle and rub them with cornflour.
Heat the oil in a large frying pan. Add the pork cubes and spread them over the pan in a single layer. Stir-fry them over a high heat for 1 1/2 minutes.
Remove and drain the pork and pour away the oil. Add all the sauce ingredients to the pan. Reduce the heat to low. Stir the ingredients together for about 30 seconds until they constitute a shiny, brownish paste. Return the once-fried pork cubes to the pan. Stir and mix them with the thick sauce in the pan, for about 45 seconds. Transfer them to a well-heated dish, and serve immediately. Serves 6-8.
This is a popular and favourite Pekingese dish which, like its chicken counterpart (see page 34) is served in most Pekingese eating establishments. A variation is Quick-fried Three Delicious, in which half the pork is replaced by diced cubes of pig's kidney and liver. The cooking times are exactly the same as above but quite often a couple of finely chopped cloves of garlic are fried in the remianing oil just before the sauce ingredients are added.
I'm pretty sure we're talking zha jiang mian here with the sugar and hoisin use and the Peking soy paste name. The lack of vegie garnish is perhaps a reason to think its not. the ginger water technique is interesting, and that the instructions are jammed in the ingredients list. I also like seeing the offal variation. That's not something you see in writing for western audiences much even today.
I also think the 2::1 bean sauce sweet sauce ratio is right where I like it, though I enjoy more of each. As we'll see in his 1985 version, he's light on the bean sauce in his preferences.
sonofchina.com
Zha Jiang Mian These two sources seem to quote each other in a sort of plagiaristic way, Maybe they both used the same printed source or something. I'll be referring to the sonofchina link again. 
