Don't forget to floss: why gung bon is crucial to Asian cooking and more

It looks like cotton candy but is actually key to many Asian dishes, says Susannah Butter
Tasty topping: Som Saa’s aubergine with prawn “floss” and egg
Adam Weatherley

Do you floss? This isn’t a personal question about toothy matters but something you might want to consider when ordering your supper. Floss is like savoury cotton candy. It looks delicate and insubstantial but is adding backbone to dishes across the capital. The Chinese name for it is gung bon.

“Floss is both a seasoning and an ingredient in its own right,” says chef Andy Oliver. Think the new sriracha sauce — an original flavour, easy to put in dishes but with a big impact.

At his restaurant Som Saa, which is next popping up at Fitzrovia’s Newman Arms, it is a key ingredient in the aubergine dish. Good quality dried prawns are either pounded or whizzed up into a flossy confection and dotted along the smoky slivers of aubergine, with egg providing rich depth and mint and coriander freshening everything up.

Oliver says floss is hard-working: “It adds saltiness and yet has enough substance, texture and taste to be thought of as an ingredient too — it adds a hit of salty umami, a subtle fishiness and an interesting texture. Plus it looks fun.”

Floss doesn’t have to be fish-based. At Chinese-inspired hot pot restaurant Shuang Shuang, opening next month, the floss is called seaweed but is actually a combination of finely shredded greens such as bok choy and kale, with salt and sugar, deep-fried and infused with spices.

Owner Fah Sundravorakul says he “likes the ethereal lightness of the floss”. “It is deceptively simple and can be used as an alternative to heavy batter: I have experimented infusing fish floss with deep-fried chilli and thinly sliced really good fish fillets. This means we don’t have to batter and season the fish so heavily. Just serve it flour-dusted and deep-fried until golden and crackling. The ‘floss’ and the chilli that are added to this mildly seasoned fish provide instant flavour.”

He also eats it “as a nibble, as a nice alternative to deep-fried salted peanuts” and says it is “great with a pint of beer”.

It is breaking out from being an exclusively Asian ingredient. Prawnography fans say the tang of the crabmeat floss in one of the Old Street food joint’s tiger prawn sliders is what makes them such a hit.

Chinatown Bakery makes it the headliner in its chicken floss bun — a pillowy, freshly baked roll that yields to gooey, ultra-fine minced chicken with a spring onion topping. Such thinly shredded chicken means more surface area for spices and texture. The pork floss at Keu has a similar effect, adding joy to a meaty bahn mi filled with mortadella, house chicken liver pâté, spiced pork belly and ham terrine.

Meanwhile, at A Wong, they call it lava floss — a potent creation made from secret ingredients that brings fire to a sticky rice roll.

For a more lo-fi meal, Oliver says “it goes perfectly with a soft cooked egg, or can be used to add depth of flavour to chilli relishes or dried fish paste”. The Heron near Edgware Road puts it on a catfish salad — it looks and tastes excellent. Flossing just became enjoyable.

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