Last summer, after King Tsin Chinese restaurant closed abruptly, Carol Brittingham wrote a plaintive letter asking for the recipe for its baked string beans with pork. Then, last week, a friend told me his new favorite dish at Little Village Noodle House is dried string beans.

Could the two be the same? Dried string beans are a classic Szechuan-style dish also known as blistered string beans, in which string beans or Chinese long beans are briefly deep-fried, then finished in a quick glaze of sauce.

The "dried" title may be because the beans must be very dry before frying or because there's very little sauce.

Of several I tried, this recipe, from www.recipesource.com, was the best, but it's a little messy, as wok-frying always is.

Szechuan mustard green (aka harm choy, sin choy or "jar" choy) is a preserved Chinese vegetable, sold in jars in Chinatown; sometimes labeled "preserved cabbage" or "green hearts." Dark soy sauce, also known as "superior soy sauce" is dark and thick with molasses added; you can use shoyu if you can't find the dark soy

Many versions of this dish are spicy; add 1/2 teaspoon Szechuan chili sauce or a tablespoon of dried chilies.

BLISTERED GREEN BEANS WITH PORK

2 pounds string beans

2 tablespoons preserved Szechuan mustard green (see note above)

1/2 tablespoon dried shrimp

4 tablespoons dry sherry

1/4 cup chicken broth

1/4 cup water

1 tablespoon dark soy sauce

1 tablespoon sesame oil

3 cups vegetable or peanut oil

3/4 pound ground pork

1 teaspoon minced garlic

Rinse the beans and break off the ends; dry thoroughly. Rinse, pat dry and mince Szechuan mustard green.

Wash dried shrimp and soak in sherry 1 hour. Drain, reserving sherry. Pat shrimp dry.

Mix sherry from the shrimp with chicken broth, water, soy sauce and sesame oil. Reserve.

Heat oil in a wok (or deep pan) until a bamboo chopstick sizzles when placed in the oil. Deep-fry the beans in five or six batches, until they develop brown blisters and shrivel slightly. Remove them batch by batch; drain each batch and keep them warm while you remove all but 2 tablespoons oil from the pan.

Heat 2 tablespoons of oil until very hot and add ground pork. Brown, breaking pork into very small pieces. Add minced shrimp, Szechuan mustard green and garlic (and chilies, if using). Stir for 30 seconds. Add the string beans and stir to mix well, 15 seconds.

Add the liquid ingredients, toss until the liquid is reduced to 2 tablespoons. Serve on a warmed platter. Serves 4.