What's the difference between light soy sauce and dark soy sauce? Premium soy sauce, all purpose soy

What's the difference between light soy sauce and dark soy sauce? Premium soy sauce, all purpose soy sauce, Brown cooking soy sauce?
A popular seasoning in East and Southeast Asian cooking, soy sauce is called Jiangyou in Mandarin, Shoyu in Japanese, Ganjang in Korean, and Kecap Manis in Indonesian. Each country has a variety of soy sauces — dark, light, sweet — all of which have different flavors and levels of intensity. But they are all made from the same ingredient: soybeans.

Light soy sauce, 生抽 (Sheng Chou), is one of the most frequently used ingredients in Chinese cooking. The light soy sauce is thinner and saltier and is used most often in cooking and dipping.
Generally speaking, light soy sauce is a flavoring agent that adds nuanced umaminess to the dish. It’s made from fermented soybeans and has a thin, slightly watery texture. It is typically what you’ll find in most grocery stores and is often what a Chinese recipe is calling for when it just says “soy sauce” in the ingredient list.
Chinese light soy sauce (sheng chou) is the quintessential ingredient in Chinese and Taiwanese cooking. Its name translates to “fresh extraction,” but it’s known as “light” soy sauce. Reddish-brown in color, it often has a “floral” and “port-like” aroma.
A subcategory of light soy sauce is “first press,” meaning the first batch of liquid pressed from the soybean mash after it has fermented for six months. It had more “robust soybean flavors” and was “sharper” than the ones brewed for longer. This is a versatile all-purpose soy sauce, great for recipes that call for soy sauce without specifying a certain type, such as stir-fries, stews, or braises. It’s also good in cold dishes, such as chilled tofu and smashed cucumber salad.
But don’t be fooled by the labeling. For example, the all-purpose Japanese koikuchi shoyu is described as “dark” in color relative to the other regularly used Japanese variety usukuchi, but its usage is more similar to Chinese light soy sauce, an everyday type.


Dark soy sauce is thicker, less salty, richer, and slightly sweet. It’s usually added to a dish to give it a darker color.
Dark soy sauce is often thicker and more viscous than light soy sauce, and it can add more coloring to dishes.
It is typically added toward the end of cooking in red-braised pork belly and other “red-braised” proteins. This is a technique called “shang se,” employed because the soy sauce can overly darken the food if cooked too long. Because it’s so viscous and dark, most dishes only need a teaspoon (or less).
Lao chou (Chinese dark soy sauce) translates to “old extraction,” as the liquid comes from soybeans that have been fermented longer than those used to make light soy sauce. Sugar is sometimes used to give it a viscous texture and dark coloring, says Taylor Holliday, proprietor of Sichuan specialty shop The Mala Market.
It’s also a bit sweet, roasty, and winelike. In addition to traditional dark soy sauce, you can find a flavored variety infused with straw mushrooms or shiitake mushrooms—the mushrooms add umami and richness. Both styles of soy sauce are dark brown and more viscous in texture, but less salty, than Chinese light soy sauce.