It’s also interesting to think about what “sauce” means as a functional part of cooking. Westernised Chinese food tends to have a thick gloopy starch sauce that in China you would only use on specific dishes. Which lead a lot of people to ask me questions like “what sauce do you cook that in?” about stir-fry recipes I gave them and that question makes zero sense to me. But then I realised I just don’t view soy sauce, etc as “sauces” because they're more like salt-replacing seasonings? Hard to explain
It’s also interesting to think about what “sauce” means as a functional part of cooking. Westernised Chinese food tends to have a thick gloopy starch sauce that in China you would only use on specific dishes. Which lead a lot of people to ask me questions like “what sauce do you cook that in?” about stir-fry recipes I gave them and that question makes zero sense to me. But then I realised I just don’t view soy sauce, etc as “sauces” because they're more like salt-replacing seasonings? Hard to explain