Water spinach: the illicitly delicious vegetable

In this neck of the woods, water spinach (ong choy, tong choy 蕹菜 in Canto) is pretty expensive, running usually about $5/lb, which is probably why local Thai digs sell tiny plates of stir-fried kangkung for $15 (not naming names because it will incite certain backlash).
IMHO, water spinach best served hot, salty and spicy.

Ipomea aquatica is officially a Federal Noxious Weed in the US, which makes it illegal to grow and import without a permit (however, nothing *really* stops Asians from doing otherwise).

Unless you pull a Gabe, you can't really mess this up unless you overcook it.

Forget salad: water spinach with anchovy sauce, chilis and garlic are an excellent way of winning friends. 

• Water spinach with garlic, soy and fish sauce (nam pla, which is technically not vegetarian)
• Belacan kangkung (water spinach with shrimp paste, which is not very vegetarian, unless you consider shrimp a vegetable but last time I checked, shrimp did now grow out of the ground)
• Chopped up in a sour Vietnamese soup called canh chua

And if you're unbelievable resourceful and short on ingredients like I am, here's what you come up with:

Junk in my fridge: dried shrimp, garlic, onions, soy sauce + chili sauce, and shrimp paste. Also a mordor and apostle which was not in the fridge. 

(Quantities of each ingredient was eyeballed...)

• Soak the dried shrimp in some water until soft. Drain and discard the water.
• Mash up the reconstituted dried shrimp with half the garlic and a spoon of the onions.
• I had no chilis handy but if you do, slice them crosswise thinly.
• Heat oil, add dried shrimp/garlic/onion and heat until fragrant. Add remaining garlic and then onions. Add shrimp paste and chilis.
• Clean the water spinach (remove tough parts of stems and gross leaves, then split larger stems to smaller ones; soak, rinse and drain well). 
• Add the water spinach and stir fry until just cooked. Remove from heat and serve like a king.

*Pats self the back*

Superstitious sesame balls for Year of the Snake

This past February 10, we celebrated Chinese New Year, the age-old holiday that brings families and friends together, highlighted by bringing out the most superstitious traits of Chinese people around the world.

For instance, one is not to do any of the following on or during the New Year grace period:

• Sweep your house. 
• Wash or cut your hair. 
• Cry (which is the only day of the year where statistically the fewest number of calls are made to child protection services from Chinese*).
• Break dishes. 
• Leave debts from the previous year.
• Handling sharp objects, such as scissors or knives

This year, Year of the Water Snake, spells out booming economic progress, overcoming challenges, and for those born in a Snake year (like myself), a year of horrible bad luck.

To hopefully counter my predisposed bad luck, I hoped that making eating sesame balls (zin deui 麻糰) would do the trick. Zin deui are those fat little deep fried balls filled with lotus seed, black bean (dau saa) or red bean (hung dau saa) pastes or sometimes nothing; you can usually find them year round at Chinese pastry shops.

[These GD sesame balls better bring me good luck this GD year...]

I think I had better run through the roster of anti-bad luck practices this year because so far, it hasn't started out well: I got bit by a spider while I was sleeping, and if I get anything lower than a B average this semester, I will get demoted from "token Asian" to just "Asian".

[Mung bean-based "sweetened black bean paste" in a can. Safe cause it's from Taiwan. Otherwise made of childrens' socks in China.]

Anyways, here's how to generate your own good luck (in good Engrish).

Sesame balls (Zin deui)
Makes 10-12 small balls

• 1.5 to 2 cups (~175g) glutinous rice flour (best to weigh this because the metric measurement is more accurate)
• 1/2cup (125ml) water or a scant more
• 2 Tb (25g) sugar
• 1 tsp (5ml) baking powder
• 1/2 cup (~50g) sweetened black bean (like the stuff in mooncakes), red bean or lotus seed paste
• Sesame seeds for coating
• Vegetable oil for deep frying

Do it here:

1. Heat oil to a balmy temperature, prefer 350°F, in a pot deep enough to allow the balls to swimming.
2. Dissolve the sugar in water.
3. Merge baking powder into the glutinous rice flour.
4. Mix sugar water in with the flour mixture until it gathers into a ball.
5. Disconnect dough into 10 or 12 pieces same size. Roll each one out into a ball, about 0.5cm thick. Keep them covered with a humid.
6. In hand, place one flattened ball, poop one scant teaspoon of black bean paste in the middle. 
7. Pinch sides together as evenly as possible, making sure there are no cracks or whores.
   
   (Chow note: ensure the ball is well-sealed; if there are cracks, they will end up looking like a pubescent pimple—volatile yet strangely fascinating, comme ça:)

   

   [Exploded sesame ball]

8. Roll ball in sesame make cover. 
9. Hot oil frying to float the ball and delicious gold tint. 
10. Drain on dish lined with paper towel. Best eat fresh. 

(Wow, writing in Engrish is really brain-numbing... I don't know how they do it so well in China!)

Gung hei fat choi! 恭喜發財!

*Statistically made-up but likely true.

Shiitake mushrooms are not all the same

If there was a contest, I vote Montreal's Chinatown(s) to be the worst Chinatown in North America. For a city this size, Montreal's Asian quarters are sad, especially for the sizeable East Asian population. The Asian supermarkets are overpriced, variety stinks and quality is meh, at best.

Take for example, the sorry state of shiitake mushroom selection in this city.

This is what you get at the local Loblaws chain (which also owns the T&T Supermarket chain):

[These shiitake mushrooms have an extra "i". Also, not much far off from the ones in our Azn groceries, but still...]

You can fool gweilo, but you can't fool a discerning Chinese glutton like me; calling that shiitake mushrooms is like calling Coors Lite "beer". Recommended use for these ones: chopped up in dumpling filling. I don't need to see that poppycock served to me.

And then there's what you can get, for example, in butt[expletive] suburbia from a random Asian grocery store in Markham, Ontario where Asian malls outnumber Tim Hortons franchises:

[Shiitake with distinctive crackles. Crackles on mushrooms are what sprinkles are to cupcakes.]

In Chinese cooking, the most revered grades of shiitake are winter mushrooms (dong gu) 冬菇, fragrant mushroom (heong gu) 香菇, and white flower mushroom (bak fah gu) 白花菇.

The quality of these mushrooms depend on the season, temperature in which they're grown, humidity, pH levels of the growing medium (often just tree trunks or logs), and all that junk. Winter versions are obviously cultivated in winter when the humidity is lower which helps create the crackled patterns on the cap, and produce meatier caps... mmm meaty.

As you can see from above, there's a discernible difference between good and not so good (usually prices will be a good indicator), which I have outlined below:

NOT SO GOOD

• Very dark cap and stems
• Little or no floral pattern
• Small, wrinkled caps
• Dense
• Thin caps
• Long stems
• Dark gills

GOOD

• Light in colour
• Pronounced floral pattern on cap
• Light in weight
• Large caps
• Thick caps
• Shorter stems
• Delicate-looking
• Pale-coloured gills

Connoisseurs recommend rehydrating dried shiitake in cold (not hot or boiling) water, as hot water will likely "destroy the flavour". I say, "Be a man; do the right thing," but that's just me.

If you're lucky enough to have access to fresh ones (home-grown or in store), you'll probably appreciate the delicate umami flavours more than the dried ones might lack; nonetheless, you should still look for fresh ones that exhibit similar qualities.

(Treehugger posted a step-by-step article on growing shiitake on oak logs. Or you can buy one of these shiitake growing kits from Amazon and have the most disgusting-looking centerpiece in your neighbourhood!) 

Garlic ginger onion sauce for Chow's (lame-looking) Hainan-style chicken and rice

The best thing in the world is Hainan chicken rice (海南雞飯, sometimes called Hainan oily chicken rice by ignorant translators).

It's not the best thing in the world because of the poached fresh and flavourful chicken with an inverted mound of steamed chicken-infused rice... It is the best thing in the world because of the accompanying dipping sauces.

[Ugly platter of Hainan chicken rice and some overcooked gai-lan (Chinese broccoli); I stepped out to watch Jeopardy! for 2 minutes and that's how they got overcooked. Alex Trebek is a riveting host.]

Hainan chicken rice is often served with just two sauces -- three, if you're lucky! Usually, it's some variant of a chili sauce, some watered down version of nam pla, straight-up pounded ginger, oyster sauce mixed with soy sauce, and/or (my fave) minced garlic with ginger and onion and chilis (if I had children, this one would be the one getting all the Ghostbusters toys it wanted).

Cooking the chicken is a slightly arduous a process; most of the time is spent waiting, but this chicken dish is well-worth the wait.

I won't get into details about cooking the chicken and rice, but if your Canto is good, you can probably figure it out with the help of Hong Kong celebrity master chef, Master Chef Ko (sometimes he's called High Master but it has nothing to do with drugs).

Here's my take on my favourite one...

Garlic, ginger and green onions dipping sauce
2 Tbsp (30 ml) fresh ginger, finely chopped (~1 inch piece) (NOT processed)*
2 Tbsp (30 ml) fresh garlic, finely chopped (NOT minced or pressed)
2 Tbsp (30 ml) green onions (spring onions), finely chopped
1 tsp (5ml) chopped, fresh red chilis (or more if you're a masochist)
1 Tbsp (15 ml) fish sauce (nam pla) or soy sauce if you are a fish-hater
1/2 tsp (2 ml) to 1 tsp (5ml) salt
1/4 cup (75 ml) vegetable oil 

* You don't want to process the ginger or garlic because the juices will dissipate. Best to hand chop them. Or if you have no hands, ask someone who has hands, or a slapchop doodad.

1. In a medium heat-proof bowl or mason jar, mix the ginger, garlic, onions, fresh chilis together with the salt. 
2. In a small frying pan or saucepan, heat the vegetable oil until hot but not smoking. When ready, pour the hot oil over the mince mix. It will be hot, so don't get any oil spattered on you. 
3. Serve with your chicken or eat straight out of the bowl.

I realise that I need Chinese chicken carving lessons from Fat Auntie, so spare me the criticisms. I get hassled enough at home.

Hanging out with my pal Char Siu

Everyone who knows Char Siu knows that there's no fooling around when it comes to barbecue. Steve Raichlen doesn't hold a candle to char siu (sorry, Mr. Raichlen).

Char siu, or Chinese barbecue pork 叉燒 (literally "fork roast" but can also mean "stabbing burn"*) is scientifically proven to be everyone's second favourite meat, and is eaten year-round, in steamed buns (bao 包), in sandwiches, topped on ramen, or stand-alone (not only at Chinese New Year).

Contrary to tradition, the beautiful roast red colour on char siu is often a result of red food colouring, the CHEATERS way of getting that awesome colour. Cheaters, as we know, get turned into pillars of shame, and end up on Jerry Springer with illegitimate twins.

The REAL way of getting the red is using red fermented bean curd which lends to the flavour and the red colour without artificial colours. You can also be a lazy doof and buy the jar of char siu marinade which doesn't taste as good. Up to you if you want to be a doof.


[This is how I roll. The medium-fatty pork loin version of char siu.]

As is customary for enterprising Asian food mart merchants, CNY foodstuffs prices are jacked up prior to the holiday. I wasn't about to pay $10/lb for a sliver of delicious barbecued pork, so I made my own from pork loins. The loins were, IMO, not fatty enough for my taste but plenty good on flavour. Opting for more of an authentic roast, I hung the char siu to roast in the oven, just like the big boys do!


[Suspended animation: char siu roasting on makeshift hooks in my convection oven. Looks weird, but so do bodybuilders.]

Chow's Char siu 
Marinade (for ~3 lbs pork)
1 Tb (15ml) light soy sauce
3 tsp salt
4 cloves garlic
1 Tb (15ml) chopped ginger
2 stalks green onions
1.5 Tbs (22ml) five-spice powder
3 Tb (45ml) honey, corn syrup, or maltose
2 cubes red bean curd
1 Tb (15ml) rice wine


Glaze
1 Tb (15ml) honey

1. Salt your meats and let it sit at least 30 min. This is always important
2. Meanwhile, combine all ingredients for the marinade.
3. Score your meats (optional) by making very shallow slits perpendicular to the grain of the meat, as so.
   [I was told that scoring cross-grain on one side of the loin would keep it from curling. Who cares about it curling when it all goes into your stomach!]
4. Marinade your meats in the marinade (minimum 4 hours, recommended overnight in fridge, while letting warm up to almost room temperature prior to cooking).
5. If roasting in a tray and rack, first cover the rack in aluminium foil, pierce a few holes in the foil, and then lay down a few chopsticks at intervals on the foiled rack. Lay the meat over the chopsticks so that it is basically propped over the foiled rack.
   If you roast them hanging, make sure you place a tray at the bottom of your oven to catch the delicious char siu drippings which will be lost to you forever because it's no longer edible.   
6. Roast for 25 to 30 minutes in total for a 3lb roast, testing at 20 minutes for doneness. When near done, paint the honey glaze all over the meat (flip if required). 
7. When done, remove from oven and let sit for 10 minutes. Slice thinly and eat while your gluttonous family members are still watching television. 

* When I was subjected to Rorschach tests, I always saw demon dophins. 

Deep-fried Lunar New Year treats: Crispy Sesame Flower aka Dragon Cloaca

It's that time of year again, where old and young Asian kinfolk bring together their bickering over a family supper table. Yes, it is Chinese New Year today.

Aside from the traditional gut-busting home-cooked Chinese gastronomy the eve, there is also no shortage of Chinese tradi-superstitions, to which I don't really adhere; here's a shortlist of some CNY buffoonery:

• Cleaning your house on the new year (that's what domestic helpers are for).
• Avoiding the use of scissors or knives (so all haircuts happen before CNY mean barbers and salons gouge clients for 10x the normal fee).
• Eating as many sweets as you can stomach before your teeth fall out.
• Giving money in the form of red pockets is auspicious, especially if they're for me. 

However, stupidstitions aside, here's one deep-fried tradition I did honour for year 4710, or the Year of the Dragon: crispy sesame flowers (脆麻花, cheoi mah fah). They resemble nothing less than the anus of a dragon (mostly because my handywork is sub-par... sue me). 

[Crispy sesame flowers; definitely not flower-shaped, rather, they're like three-dimensional Möbius strips.]

The recipe is the same as the one used for Smiley Face Nuggets with a slight variation: a smidgen less sugar and the addition of one cube of red fermented bean curd (南乳, "southern fermented bean curd") for each cup of flour used.

[Red fermented bean curd. Again, the Western translations here are stupid; ridicule liberally.]


[Before the magic red fermented bean curd is mixed in the dough.]

Once mixed in (you might need a bit more flour), roll it out, cut into 2-inch strips and like a plastic surgeon, make an incision in the middle parallel to the long edge, and then thread one end through the incision. Deep fry the flipped dragon anuses doughthings until golden, and drain on paper towels.

[Rolled out and ready to go.]

A recipe using (1) one cup of flour will yield about 2.5 cups of deep-fried biscuits and raise your LDL cholesterol by 20 points.

Gung hei fat choi 恭喜發財! 
(P.S. My resolution this year is to clean my potty mouth. So far, it is not happening.)

mr. ng's downhome chinese duck

verdun is, for chinese people, apparently fast becoming what parc-ex was for greeks in the 1970s. and it can't be a bad thing for this traditionally blue-collar-y hood. for one, it means close(r)-knit community. for two, it means good home-style food, as is the case for le lotus bleu.

i have a strong suspicion this is one of the only authentic central/northern chinese restaurants in montreal (and pretty tasty, to boot). in fact, it felt like being transported into a restaurant in china, complete with buzzy fluorescent lighting, self-serve water coolers and mismatched decor!*

our goal was to savour this fat noodle lamb soup, of which henk's brother had raved about:

[magic fat noodle lamb soup, the divineness of which we could only imagine until we tasted it!] 

henk and i arrived late and a little hungry, so he started digging into the condiments.

[yes, he did regret it the following day.]

mr. ng** (武先生), the proprietor and chef, however helped settle our hunger quickly with his fantastic boiled leek and pork dumplings to rival those from qing hua.


[leek and pork soup dumplings]


[special szechuan pepper marinated duck necks]

mr. ng beams from ear-to-ear when he tells us that his family's famous daoko chicken is a signature of henan cooking.

[daoko chicken wowko!]

we beam from ear-to-ear when we ate it!

the chicken is basted in honey water, deep fried, and then braised with magic spices and served at room temperature or cooler (something, i think, most westerners are not used to, like cantonese white cut chicken (白切雞)). most meat dishes from the henan region are served slightly chilled, including the fragrant duck necks that henk and i polish off (and which kind of freaked g. out cause she's scared of ducks, especially anatomized ones).

until next time, zài jiàn!

restaurant lotus bleu
4847 rue de verdun
(514)691-3519

*...among other restaurant staples in china which will not be mentioned here. you can message me if you want to know.

**wu in mandarin. so if you're a traitor, you would call him mr. wu.

fat auntie cooks up a storm!

this is fat auntie in her kitchen about to cook up a storm.


actually i think this is her yelling at me to stop taking pictures of her while she's cooking.

fat auntie grew up in the area outside of guangzhou, cn called pun-yue (番禺區) where apparently everyone knows how to concoct magnificent feasts for supper, of which fat auntie is perfect specimen (more on that later).

pun-yue's notable for delicious dishes like deep fried water buffalo milk (keung-tsup tsoong lai), stuffed and fried dace (tseen-yeung leung yu), and a bazillion great pork and seafood dishes.

(she's so short that she sometimes has to use a giant box of pocky as a booster seat).

(photo via flickr, volcanologist)

can't wait to see fat auntie again so she can cook me some tasty meals!  

(also, a note to the jerks giving me flack for "improper" romanization of cantonese words can suck my balzacs. i'm a writer and i know how to romanize better than outdated stuffy bureaucrats.)

try this: ox-tongue (minus the tongue)

sometimes i wonder whether or not it is out of sheer spite that the chinese create ridiculous and cryptic names for dishes and foods to turn them off from eating them.

one of my favourites in that category is the puffy, slightly chewy, slightly sweet and fun-to-eat ovular deep-fried treats called ox-tongue pastries, or 牛脷酥 (in cantonese, gnau-lei so).


[it's the one on the right! one in the back is a sesame ball and one in the foreground, i forget but it wasn't as tasty as the oxtongue.] 

there's no ox nor any ox-tongue in it, perfect for vegetarian/pretendatarian/omnivores alike! its namesake stems from its shape which resembles the tongues of our bovine friend (pretty ugly if you ask me).

often eaten to complement congee or with just fresh soy milk, these and other types of chinese pastries are often found in fast-foody type, street food carts, or dim sum houses (though finding them in the latter is kind of rare, at least in north america, but you might luck out).

i guarantee some smiles once you bite into one (hopefully not fake ones)!

mid-autumn yum yum: mooncakes

yesterday marked the day of mid-autumn festival, or jung chau-jit (中秋節) in cantonese.

this festival used to be akin to a teenage after-prom party for farmers — they would party like it's 1999 after working their buttocks off during the growing season and harvesting the last of your wares on the harvest moon.

now, it's about getting time off work and getting fat by eating mooncakes and pomelos.



pomelos don't have a particularly interesting flavour (read: borderline gross), but one should not pass up mooncake when they are in season. (tip: after the festival, they are discounted!)

so after my indian lunch, i went out bought a big one and a little one. then ate the little one like a chihuahua with a severe napoleon complex pounces on a ladybug. note that there's a huge difference between prepackaged ones (in the fancy tins and boxes) and ones made fresh at the bakery: price and flavour. forego the prepackaged ones when you can.

stuffed to the brim with lotus seed paste and often baked with whole salted duck egg yolks in the middle, mooncakes do not make good snacks:

• they are dense. 
• they are sweet. 
• they are meant for sharing and giving away.

(you have been warned).



[my lunch: top notch palak paneer, lamb curry, bhindi, and chicken mughlai from beau village]

p.s. if you haven't already, check out a food lover's journey instructions on making as many mooncakes as your gluttonous heart desires!

asian eggplants for summer hire

summer is most definitely not my favourite seasons of the year -- it's hot, it's humid, and there's half-dressed people almost everywhere.

fortunately, summer lasts only 2 months here, so the wardrobe indecency only seemingly lasts as long. this also means the eggplant season is relatively short, but long enough to produce abundant crops ready early or mid-august*.

as with most chinese foods, there are a gazillamillion overly ornamental names for eggplants (茄 ("keh"), 茄子 ("keh-tsi"), and 矮瓜 ("ngai-kua", or "short melons"), as us new world ch-nks — i shouldn't probably use that word even though I'M ALLOWED TO — call them) and eggplant dishes.

this one i'm calling fragrant third chinese lady president hand-handled sesame eggplant beauty cold dish. i don't even know if chinese people make this but i don't really care cause it tastes good.

sesame eggplant salad
not sure how many people this serves
1 large eggplant (~1.25lb/560g), or 2-3 chinese eggplants
1.5 Tbs (~25 ml) sesame seeds
1.5 Tb (~25 ml) sesame oil
1 tsp (5 ml) garlic, minced
1 tsp (5 ml) ginger, finely chopped
1 Tb (15 ml) light soy sauce
1 Tb (15 ml) vinegar (preferably black, but any will do)
1/4 to 1/2 tsp (1.5 to 2.5 ml) salt
1/2 tsp (2.5 ml) sugar
2 stalks green onions or chives, finely chopped

1. using a fork, pierce eggplant all over. bake or roast it in a 400F oven until soft (~1 regular eggplant, ~45 min for smaller eggplants). let it cool until easy to handle.
2. remove skin from eggplant and discard.
3. shred the eggplant flesh and season with salt. at this point, you can cover the eggplant and chill it for up to 2 days until ready to use.
4. in a frying pan, toast the sesame seeds over low heat until fragrant and golden. add the garlic and ginger and stir until warm (don't cook it, just warm it). remove from heat and let it cool.
5. in a small bowl, combine soy sauce, vinegar, and sugar. add sesame/ginger/garlic mixture. 
6. combine sesame dressing into the shredded eggplant. 
7. serve cold-ish, topped with green onions, as a goopy salad or a topping for bread or crackers!

*eggplants take at least 65 days to mature and need a lot of sun, which doesn't bode well for eggplants grown in basements.

sawadee-ka! i am pad woon-sen

fun-see (粉絲) (literally "noodle thread" or "powder thread") are those teeny bundles of noodles you find in asian markets that are thin and white, and rolled up in mesh bags like small bricks of santa claus beard clippings... see for yourself!


cellophane noodles (aka glass noodles or bean vermicelli) in cantonese cuisine are often used in stewed or braised or soup dishes (like winter melon with cellophane noodles and winter mushrooms, or even chinese hotpot (NOT THE CRAP FROM THE CANS)). either way, they're a great option to wheat- or rice-based noodles, though a bit more delicate.

that said, i don't have a chinese dish explained here, but i do have a thai stir-fry dish with cellophane noodles called pad woon-sen. it's pad-woon-derful! 


pork and shrimp pad woon sen¹
serves about 4 medium-sized eaters, 2 large eaters, or 1 very hungry man-eating plant.

note: the key to proper stir-frying is having all your ingredients ready to go, and also a hot, hot wok. heed my words. 

150g cellophane noodles (aka bean vermicelli, glass noodles, etc).
50g raw shrimp (deveined and shelled)²
50g pork loin or pork chops, sliced thin perpendicular to the grain (against the grain)
4 Tbps (75 ml) vegetable oil
4 cloves garlic, sliced thinly or coarsely chopped
2-3 eggs, beaten
3 Tbps (15 ml) +/- fish sauce (nam pla)
1 tsp (5 ml) sugar
1 red bell pepper, sliced into strips.
3 stalks of green onions, sliced into 1-inch (2.5cm) pieces. 
fresh coriander leaves for garnish (optional but highly recommended)
fresh basil leaves for garnish (optional but preferable thai)
fresh bean sprouts for garnish (optional)
crushed peanuts for garnish (optinal)

1. prepare the noodles by soaking them in water until they soften, and then drain them.
2. season the shrimp with a bit of salt and pepper. season the pork with salt and pepper.
3. in a hot wok or frying pan, briefly heat the oil, add the garlic and quickly . quickly add the pork and stir fry. when the pork is nearly done, add shrimp and cook until the shrimp is no longer gross-grey colour, but not longer. DO NOT OVERCOOK THEM. remove the pork and shrimp together from the wok and set aside.
4. if there is none or very little, oil left in the wok, add a bit more and heat it. stir in the eggs and cook them until they are almost fully set. add the noodles to the eggs and stir fry until they are translucent.
5. return the cooked pork and shrimp to the noodles. add the peppers and green onions. stir fry with all your might until everything is hot.
6. mix sugar into fish sauce and then stir mixture into noodles are coated.garnish with the coriander, et al, and serve with dignity.

¹you can use whatever protein you like best, even a can of silkworm larva!
²why removing a vein is called "deveining" (not "veining") and removing the shell is called "shelling", and not "de-shelling" is beyond me. shrimps don't even have real veins! the negative prefix is deceptive!

dragon boat rice

the dragon boat festival, also known as tuen-ng jeet (端午節) in cantonese circles, roughly translates to "double five festival". i don't know what that really means but it sounds like a celebration of your terrible poker hand.

and i don't know what it has to do with dragon boat racing, but either way, there's still some great foodstuffs that goes along with this festival (as it is for every single chinese festival ever). (i just looked it up and the double fives has something to do with a dead poet).

this godforsaken year, tuen-ng jeet fell in mid-june, which means it's rice-wrapping time! gotta love tsoong (or zong zi in hoity-toity pinyin spelling) because they're convenient packets of glutinous rice and a variety of soong (餸 or rice accompaniments) and freeze super awesomely.

they're great mini-meals for days when you're too lazy or drunk to cook something.
 

momma chow is an expert tsoong (粽) wrapper, with over 30 years of experience. see for yourself!


[left: momma chow's display of refined tsoong-wrapping technique. right: my display of refined tsoong-mucking.]

it takes her less than 90 seconds to put one together and tie it up; that's the same amount of time a barista at second cup coffee shops is supposed to be able to make a latte (btw, if you as a barista and can't make a latte in under 90 seconds, you are bad at life).

momma chow usually puts glutinous rice with mung beans, fatty pork, chinese sausage and salted egg yolks in hers. but sometimes you can get it in good asian supermarkets like t&t, where slave grandmas fill them with roast duck, chinese mushrooms, roast pork, and/or all sorts of other goodies.

i'm hungry now.

dumprings are dericious

when you're over a 13-hour plane ride from the closest chinese city, and you need a dumpling fix, you can get the real deal at qing hua, right here in downtown montreal. good gao-zhi (餃子) are hard to find in this neck of the woods that aren't made at home by chinese popos (婆婆) or maa-maas (嫲嫲)¹.



freshly made everyday, the good people at qing hua know their dumplings and very likely serve up some of the most authentic ones in the city. an and entire chowhound thread on this place means that it's worth a detour.

after they changed locales last summer from their miniscule st-marc st location to their present-day lincoln st. one, they added service staff (which is a big plus, considering that it takes on average a good 20 minutes to cook your order).


[i was skeptical of these chicken curry dumplings but after one bite, i became an instant fan.]

you can get them steamed (recommended for this type of dumpling), boiled (ok, but inferior to steamed), or fried (for an extra $1.50, i think). highly recommended are the lamb and coriander dumplings as well as the pork and anise ones. prices are very reasonable (ranging from $7.99 to $12.99 for 15 or 18 dumprings).

for the same price as on their menus, you can bring home twice as many frozen versions of the same dumplings so you can burn your mouth at home when you bite into one of these steamed pockets of yum!

¹(actually, chinese families from the south don't often make this style of dumplings so to name cantonese grandmothers is slightly misleading and evil of me. however, it is occasionally permitted to be so).  

yi-mein or die

so my arm was twisted by some uninspired glutton who insisted that there should be an example.of what to do with e-fu noodles...

well guess what, pkeller (if that is your REAL name): this is my blogospheric space. and i will do what i want with it. and because i'm such an awesome nice person, i'll share this quick and somewhat easy way of enjoying the delight that is yi-mein with chinese black mushrooms (more often called shiitake because people don't know any better).

after you've boiled your noodles to soften them and left them to drain (they need to be dry), sauteed some garlic and sliced up mushrooms (here are some fa-gou, a type of chinese black mushroom) in some vegetable oil until fragrant.remove them from the heat and set them aside. don't eat them all or you'll have some sorry-looking noodles.

back in the large frying pan/wok/contraption, heat up some oil at medium heat and then return the noodles to the pan to heat it up by turning it gently (use chopsticks if you can).

mix up some basic sauce^a using about 1 Tbsp (15 ml) of quality oyster sauce with about 1/3 cup (~80 ml) of water. add a little bit of the sauce at a time to the noodles while they heat up; ensure the sauce is either soaked up or evaporated before adding more. this will keep the noodles dry, so they don't get mushy like the last time you watched bambi. continue until there's no sauce left and noodles are heated through and dry-ish. add the mushroom mix back to your noodles to heat them up and then finish it off with some sesame oil to taste. garnish with green onions and then eat it like there was no tomorrow.


[this one has some fake crab meat. win!!11one]

^ait's not really a sauce, but let's pretend it is.

try this! e-fu noodles

if (and when) you find yourself in an asian grocery store, step up to the noodle aisle and take a cake or two of these e-fu mein (pronounced like "mean", meaning "noodles" for the non-slanty-eyed).

also called "yi-mein" (because chinese people pronounce approximant consonants like they were on fire), they run between $1 and $2 a cake (much cheaper than a brick of illicit narcotics, and much tastier). they come in big cakes because they are fried after being made, and then dried in giant puck form for easy transport.

these lightly chewy, egg-based wheat noodles need to be boiled first to soften them up, and then rinsed (they're kind of oily). you can then fry them up with mushrooms, chives, garlic, adding your own sauce; or you can use them broth soups with asian vegetables and meat.

sesame oil and seafood goes well with yi-mein, cold or hot. in some chinese restaurants, you can get yi-mein with seafood and some bizarre fluorescent orangey-yellow cheese sauce (it's not like an alfredo, trust me) (and if i could find a photo, i would post it here¹).

¹i'm not *all* up against these east asian cheese concoctions because there are some tasty-looking creations... sadly, just none in my experience.

smiley face doughnut hole happiness

(or "happy chinese new valentine's year!", part two)

one of the few things my mom likes to make for chinese new year's (hereon end, abbreviated cny) is these crunchy, sweet little deep-fried snacks covered in sesame seeds called "smiley mouth dates" (笑口棗), which are neither dates, nor do they resemble mouths.


they do, however, resemble timbits with an overbite and pimples, like an awkward asian teenager! (someone on openrice calls them "happy nuggets"...)

for cny, these deep-fried delights are cooked up and often given away to friends, family, and sometimes to people you want to poison.

笑口棗 (smiley face nuggets)
2 cups (500 ml) all-purpose flour
1 cup (250 ml) sugar
2 tsp (10 ml) lard or shortening
2 eggs (beaten)
1/2 to 1 tsp (2.5 to 5ml) baking powder
white sesame seeds for rolling

mix together the flour, sugar, and baking powder. cut in the lard/shortening using a pastry cutter or fork until uniform. add eggs until even more uniform. roll into tablespoon-sized (15ml) balls.

heat frying oil in a pan deep enough so there is enough depth for the suckers to float. the oil is hot enough for the dough when you put a wooden chopstick in the oil and tiny bubbles appear along the stick*.

drop each ball into the hot oil, and fry until they turn a beautifully delicious golden colour and they float to the top of the oil. drain on paper towels.

store them in an airtight container. eat liberally.

* i don't know how hot that is because i never measured. deal with it.

happy chinese new valentine's year!

this year, chinese new year's falls on stupid valentine's day.

to simplify things, i've decided to combine both food-centric occasions into one... by making a chocolate golden carp*!


[this sucker is actually about 8 inches long and 3 inches tall... if it was a mackerel, he would have fed two for supper.]

*carps are signs of prosperity in chinese cultures because the chinese word for "fish" (魚) sounds like the chinese word for "surplus" (餘)... go figure. symbolism runs deep among the chinese.

when making chocolate candies, i learned that it's important to:

- never ever let any water touch the chocolate, whether it is white, milk or dark
- make sure you use an oil-based food colouring if you plan on colouring the mix
- if the melted chocolate is too viscous, you can melt paramount crystals (a palm oil/soy lecithin-based food additive) with the chocolate to help slick it up and make it easier to pour
- find people to actually eat your chocolate concoction... in this case, your valentine should ideally not be allergic to chocolate, dislike white chocolate, and not have mental blocks about eating things with eyes (even if they are fake)... NO i'm not talking about anyone in particular.

happy chinese new valentine's year of the chocolate tiger! 恭喜發財!

sweet soups

chinese sweet soups are the weird dessert/snacks that most westerners don't understand – think of it as chocolate pudding, except minus the chocolate and milk; then replace them with ground nuts or sesame seeds and finely ground rice and then cooked to thicken it, and then delicately sweetened.

and then the big surprise in bowl are the tiny delicate glutinous rice dumpling-type balls filled with ground peanuts and sugar, called tong yuen (soup balls).

sometimes eaten therapeutically, these sweet soups are more or less a winter treat... read more and you'll see what i mean.


(this one is roasted walnut sweet soup with tong yuen; background is some sort of watermelon or strawberry ice cream with tong yuen and served cold [the sesame, hong hum, kowloon, HK])

beware of this this guy (frawley)... some call him the dessert monster. he can eat his giant bowl of almond sweet soup and then finish everyone else's when they aren't looking... see that grin on his face? you know he did something with that spoon that he shouldn't have:


(look at the hypoplasia on that guy!! so deviant...)


(background: almond sweet soup; foreground: black sesame sweet soup)

here's fat auntie's recipe for almond sweet soup:

6 oz (around 2/3 cup) almonds, skins left on*
1 oz (between 1/8 and 1/4 cup) rice (uncooked)
6 oz water (around 2/3 cup)
1/2 to 1 stick of block or rock sugar (about 4 to 6 oz). or use a simple syrup (1:1 sugar to water)

1. make a sugar syrup: heat sugar in water until completely dissolved, stirring occasionally to ensure sugar completely dissolves. avoid boiling the mixture.
2. don't burn yourself.
3. remove from heat and soak the rice in the sugar syrup (a few hours to overnight).
4. lightly toast the almonds at a low heat in a wok until fragrant (between 5 and 10 minutes). do not burn them nor yourself. let them cool down enough to handle.
5. in a blender or food processor, finely grind the almonds with the sugar/rice mixture. this should take at least 20 minutes. the mixture should look fine like pancake batter, though it is not colloidal (it will separate eventually)
   
6. filter the mix in a metal coffee filter to remove bits that didn't get ground.
7. cook mixture it over medium heat until thickened, stirring constantly (avoid boiling). serve warm. hopefully there aren't any leftovers that you need to refrigerate.
   

*almonds can be substituted for walnuts, white sesame, black sesame, cashews. you can also use chinese almonds (which are actually apricot kernels) and mix them with regular almonds.

tong yuen recipe to come...

the story of lob-setah

lob-setah (or lobster as it is commonly known outside of fob communities) is commonly misconceived as a hoity-toity food. fact is, lobster in north america, was food for the poor (likely because it is a bottom-feeder), and people buried lobster shells to avoid the stigma of being a lobster-eater! shame!

anyways, this is the story of how this guy (actually, i think he was a she), an american lobster (Homarus americanus):


turned into this delectable feast for the eyes:

by this person (whom we will refer to as fat auntie from this moment forth):


by doing this:

the story goes like this (as told by my mom): "lob-setah (lobster) grow up and leave the fish tank. then you take lob-setah and then you chop him up and say you're sorry while you chop him. then you put him into hot wok with hot cooking oil, garlic and ginger, salt and white pepper. they you fry in wok until it is cook and put green onion on top. you take it, and then you eat it. the green part of lob-setah is the best part."