Healthy Chinese Vegetable Recipes

In this riff on Sichuan dan dan noodles, spinach and red bell peppers are tossed with a sesame-chile-soy sauce and topped with walnuts. If you want to bump up the protein, add tofu, seitan or even chopped egg.

Ma Po Tofu, a classic dish from the Sichuan province of China, inspired this recipe. The original is made with soft tofu and ground pork or beef with plenty of heat from dried chile peppers and Sichuan peppercorns. Portobello mushrooms stand in for the meat in our vegetarian version and convenient jarred chile-garlic sauce gives it plenty of kick. Serve with brown rice.

The bold taste of black bean-garlic sauce mellows into a rich and warming glaze in this fast Asian-style dish.

Crisp on the outside and buttery-tender on the inside, these sweet and spicy soy sauce-marinated pork tenderloin medallions make for a delicious, healthful and elegant entree. Serve with snow peas, brown rice and Sour Mango Salad on the side.

Sichuan peppercorns add a touch of floral heat to this mushroom-and-cabbage-loaded riff on dan dan noodles. Look for protein-rich vegetarian seitan--processed wheat gluten with a meaty texture-- near refrigerated tofu in large supermarkets or natural-foods stores. The actual weight of the seitan in a package varies depending on whether water weight is included. Look for the undrained weight on the label.

Skip the takeout and make this lightened-up, veggie-packed 30-minute recipe instead.

Oyster sauce and rice wine give this speedy stir-fry a rich flavor that balances the clean, sweet crunch of bok choy. Make It a Meal: Rice noodles or brown basmati rice and a Tsing Tao beer will make you feel like you're eating in your favorite Chinese restaurant.

In this traditional Chinese pancake recipe, chives are added for a pretty green hue and savory flavor. Serve as an appetizer with a soy dipping sauce or use like a tortilla for chicken or pork that's been marinated in ginger and soy sauce. The amount of water needed for the dough will vary depending on the type of flour and the humidity.

Napa--also known as Chinese cabbage--is the preferred cabbage in this healthy Asian stir-fry recipe because it's much sweeter and more tender than green cabbage. If napa cabbage isn't available at your grocery store, try Savoy cabbage or bok choy.

Sabrina Gee-Shin uses her grandmother's Chinese filling to make this gyoza recipe. She teaches several folding methods in her Kimchee Mama cooking classes. This one, from a Japanese friend, is quick and simple.

Serve this spicy pork-and-vegetable lo mein for Chinese New Year or for dinner anytime. While some cooks like to cut the noodles into 6- to 8-inch lengths to make them easier to combine with other ingredients, for the New Year the noodles can never be cut because that symbolizes bad luck. The longer the noodles, the longer your life! Be sure to thinly slice the pork and mushrooms so they cook through. And thoroughly dry the bok choy to avoid creating a braise instead of a stir-fry. Read more about this recipe.

Serve this lightly spicy, colorful vegetable side recipe with grilled shrimp or salmon. You can also use snow peas or a mix of the two.

Dumplings are an important part of Chinese culture and its cuisine—the days-long process and painstaking labor that go into traditional dumplings make every poppable one that much more valuable than the gold ingots they're said to represent in Chinese New Year celebrations. In Northern China, where wheat is more prevalent than rice, families gather for holidays to wrap enough for the feast, catching up as they do so. But with modern access to flour, and emigrants scattered across the globe, dumplings have become as common a food as any beloved traditional Chinese dish. Serve with Shanxi mature vinegar—or gyoza, teriyaki or soy sauce—for dipping. Add some chile crisp for a little heat if you like.