jo-mel

A food critic in NYC was commenting on the restaurants in Chinatown some time ago. The places that had received great reviews, because of a good chef, would be the 'in' place to go, and the lines would start. But long after the chef left, the lines remained ---even when the food turned mediocre. Human nature? You see a line, ------- expect it to mean something great, so you join in? Or you remember a great review in the past?

Kent -- the pork looks like a dish at China 46, a restaurant that specializes in Shanghainese food. They call it Ruby Pork, but these are the characters. 醬汁圓 蹄 jiang zhi yuan ti.

It looks like the honeycomb tripe was in one piece? Was it? How does one eat the tripe with a pair of chopsticks? ← With strong chopsticks, a firm hand and little nibbles. You DID say 'one' -- you didn't mention sharing!

Well, Alta vista and NJ Star both give me "Big fungus food germ/ bacterium", but I have a feeling that they are being polite. ← Well... it is some silly "made up" terms by Hong Kongers. And we do it all the time! 細菌 does mean bacteria. 大菌 - not quite big fungus... it just implies human being... meaning that we are giants compared to bacteria, so eating a small amount of bacteria is no big deal. Just a self-comforting self-denial when we happen to eat something that is suspected unclean. ← Something like "Well, we all have to eat a pound of dirt before we die"?? That's the one I grew up with.

Aw -- c'mon! At least give me the characters! ← Okay... you asked for it.... See if you can figure this one out! This is Hong Konger Cantonese! 大菌食細菌 ← Well, Alta vista and NJ Star both give me "Big fungus food germ/ bacterium", but I have a feeling that they are being polite.

hzrt -- one of my wok rings is not a circular sheet of metal. Rather it is made of two firm circular 'wires' held together by vertical wires. The heat is therefore totally exposed. I just found a picture: http://www.epinions.com/pr-Cookware-Joyce_..._Steel_Wok_Ring

Aw -- c'mon! At least give me the characters! Can you imagine if all the shrimp used in a Chinese restaurant had to be de-veined! AAAAGGGRRRR! I always tell people that if you devein, you lose flavor.

Paperclip! Perfect! Nice and firm, won't break like a toothpick, won't slice too deeply and always at hand! Thanks!

Using the wok without the ring is out of the question. The wok wobbles back and forth - very unsafe. I did use medium/low setting on the stove burner throughout frying the fish, from start to finish. I will try to lower the fish slowly next time - maybe hard to do. ← Do you have a couple of sieve/ladles? Get them wet and hot with oil , balance the fish on them and lower the fish into the oil. I'm curious as to how hot your oil gets. Have you ever tested it with a regular oil thermometer? I know about the 'chopstick' test as to how hot oil is, and how hot oil is by the sizzling of a piece of scallion, but a thermometer will tell you an exact temp.

Usually the vein in the medium to large shrimp, used in this dish, is not that apparent or large. The bigger ones -- yes, but not these. However, you can remove the vein without cutting the shell. I tried to find something on a google for it, but the only place I found wanted a membership. BUT I'll see if I can explain it. First I'll explain how to devein a shrimp without the shell but without slicing the back of the shrimp. Simply use the tip of a paring knife or strong toothpick and poke it across the back of the shrmp just as the back meets with the tail. Just stick the tip just under the surface and lift up. The vein should come up with the tip. You don't cut along the back, ----you poke under the surface across the back at that spot where the tail begins. With the shell on (and with the head removed) do the same thing. Use the pointy tip of the paring knife and stick it through that same space between the base and the tail. It is a soft spot on the shell, between hard areas. You might have to poke around, at first, to get the hang of it. I guess if the head is on, you would have to sever the tip on the vein at the neck, first. Once I had a woman in my classes who didn't mind the vein, no matter how big or black it was. What she didn't like was the blood vein that runs under the shrimp! THAT --- she HAD to remove!

OK - My turn!! There are a couple of recipes for la bai cai in Kutchner/Chang's Ency of Chinese Food and Cooking. They both call for Celery Cabbage which they also call Tientsin bai cai / sheo tsoi. Celery cabbage is that long slender cabbage that looks like a fat stalk of celery. It was the first vegetable I used in Chinese cooking way back when I wasn't near a Chinese store to buy bok choy---- but the regular supermarkets all carried this celery cabbage. In the Popular guide to Chinese Vegetables - Dahlen/Phillips, they have 'celery cabbage' listed as "Peking Cabbage" and 'wong nga baak / huang ya bai 黃 芽 白 And they have regular round white cabbage as yeh choi / ye cai 椰 菜 I like that cabbage as a pickle, too, but my favorite is mustard cabbage. The flavor of that cabbage carries over to the pickle taste very well.

I was thinking the same thing. Using more oil should also help keep the frying temperature up. I'll have to try this some time. Don't most restaurant dust the shrimp with cornstarch first? ← Sheetz -- I was thinking about the cornstarch, too. I just checked thru my recipe folders and I DID dredge the shrimp in either cornstarch or waterchestnut powder.

Just some musing thoughts. Oil is oil. Heat is heat. The difference between the high heat stoves and the regular ones is timing in getting the intensity of the heat to that point where you can fry and get a crisp shell. With a low heat stove, the oil cools off quickly when food is added and by the time the shell would be crisp, the flesh is tough. So what if you added only part of the shrimp at a time? The same principle as stir/frying with meat. Don't allow the oil to cool off when the shrimp is added. Again --- the aroma went from your kitchen to mine, Xiao hzrt! Just looking at the pictures an the scent of that garlic and hot oil came wafting to NJ!

Xiao hzrt -- have you tried using the wok without the ring --- so as to have total contact with the flames and maybe higher heat?? With the fish -- I've lowered the fish in the oil -- slowly, so the skin seals before it touches the sides. You can hold it by the tail; or by the tail and balanced on a sieved ladle. If you use a ladle, let it get nice and oily and hot in the oil first, so that the fish won't stick to it!! Too bad that chopsticks float. They could make a bed for the fish. Could you tie a pair in an X and balance the fish on them as they are weighed down? Or am I up the wall on this one?

All of the ones I've used have used vinegar, usually in equal amounts to the sugar, but I guess any acid is fine. I like a little more ginger, myself.

Have you tried nuking the conpoy? That's what I've done when I've used it. I nuke other things too, like dried mushrooms or ears or whatever. They soften in a very short time.

Really? Tell us the story anyway! My wife and I joined a packaged tour visiting Guilin. We did the Li River cruise like everybody else. But the meals were pre-packaged. Just common stuff... stir-fries... little bit of meat, lots of vegetable kind of dishes. It is typical of those tour packages run by Hong Kong companies. I am trying to have one of those tours in the future where we can take advantage of the low transportation and hotel rates (collective bargaining), but we will get our meals on our own. I wonder if that would be possible... ← Well -- it's not that long of a story. There was another tour group that we kept bumping into on that trip. They were a group of professionals and their wives from Texas. They were getting tired of the food, and when they saw us getting a special dish, they said that they missed having steak and potatoes. In Yangshuo, their guide asked the Banyan Tree Hotel if they would prepare steak and potatoes for them, and the hotel cooks kindly agreed. Wellllll -- they got this large slab of beef that I guess was not aged. It was grilled and I understand, pretty tough. Their potatoes were boiled and placed in a large bowl. These were large potatoes and when you boil a large potato, by the time the center is cooked, the outside is falling apart! I don't think this is what that group expected! Lesson -- When in Rome-----------! The dishes we had on that trip were: (aside from our steamed carp) White cooked chicken with soy dipping sauce / Braised green Chinese cabbage / Sliced roast pork with peanuts / Stif/fried cuttlefish with bean sprouts / Bean thread soup / Deep fried fish in crispy batter. On another trip we had deep/fried whole shrimp with salt-pepper dip, which is one of the boat specialties. Among other things I have a note about leafy greens with what I detected was a butter sauce? Also deep fried breaded taro slices which I also noted as being 'hot and good!'. I don't know if each boat has their own specialties, but on my 3 different trips, the food was all different. Some pretty mundane (scrambled eggs with tomatoes) but on the whole, I was quite surprised at what they could turn out from that small stern galley!

Looking at the picture, I thought it was because of the shape of the dish, with a cozy, safe spot under the shell! Again, Wickipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Typhoon_shelter

According to Grace Young: "This expensive condiment is sometimes called 'The caviar of the Orient' The XO in the name pays homage to XO brandy, which is revered by the Chinese (there is no brandy in the sauce, however)." Here is what Wikipedia says: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XO_sauce I kinda like it, I think. When I've had a dish with it, I never marveled at it, but it does have nice flavor. A little in fried rice is nice.

From what I've read, the heat used to make the peppercorns 'legal' is only 140'. Just enough to neuter any offending canker they may carry. That small amount of heat is not supposed to affect the heat of the peppercorns that much ---- especially when you think of the heat used to toast the peppercorns before grinding -- that some recipies ask. That is heat!

Great pictures, Kent! Thanks! Those 'furry things' in the cage. Did they move? Was there a front and back? It is amazing what they can do on those galleys on the river boats! I just looked at my food logs on those boats, and the menues were pretty good! On my first trip there, I was on a culinary tour with Hugh Carpenter (teaches, writes cookbooks and knows his Chinese food). As we were going down the pier, there was a fishing boat with some caught fresh fish - Li River Carp. Hugh bought some and asked the cooks on the tour boat if they would cook them for us. They did -- steamed with tomatoes, scallions and ginger. Couldn't be more fresh! There was another group on the boat and they were annoyed that we had the fish. (long story there)

Mmmmm -- if there is anything that can match the aroma of frying garlic, it is the combo of garlic and black beans! I usually like to just coarsely cut the black beans rather than mash them. I like the feel of the bean piece. I don't suppose it would change the dish much if I did it that way -- in flavor, I mean. Looks like a great dish. Altho, asparagus went to China late, it seems like a great vegetable for stir/frying, in that it cooks quickly and keeps its texture.

11- 蒸 Zheng - A form of steaming Steaming is a very common way to prepare day-to-day dinner entrees. From my collection of pictorial recipes: Steamed Ground Pork with Salted Fish (鹹魚蒸肉餅) Steamed Pork Spareribs with Plum Sauce (梅子蒸排骨) Steamed Shrimp with Garlic (粉絲蒜蓉蒸蝦) Steamed Egg Custard with Conpoy (瑤柱蒸金銀蛋) More pictures: 蒜蓉蒸扇贝, Steamed Scallops with Shells Click through the Google image search page to view the picture: (Sample 1: 蒜蓉蒸扇贝, Steamed Scallops with Shells) 蒸鱼, Steamed Fish Click through the Google image search page to view the picture: (Sample 2: 蒸鱼, Steamed Fish) 金针云耳蒸牛肉, Steamed Beef with Cloud Ear Fungi and Lily Bud Click through the Google image search page to view the picture: (Sample 3: 金针云耳蒸牛肉, Steamed Beef with Cloud Ear Fungi and Lily Bud) 荷香蒸排骨, Steamed Sparerib in Lotus Leave Click through the Google image search page to view the picture: (Sample 4: 荷香蒸排骨, Steamed Sparerib in Lotus Leave) ← #11 蒸-Zheng / Zing 'Zheng' is a form of steaming. There are two accepted forms of steaming in China: steaming in an open bowl or plate, and steaming in a closed receptacle. 'Zheng' is 'open steaming' ---- here the bowl, plate, or basin is usually placed on a wire or bamboo rack, set inside a large pot, with the water kept at a rolling bowl some inches below. Or the process can be carried out in multi-layer baskets with enclosed sides which fit on top of each other in a top-hat fashion, and which are placed on top of the rice-boiler. Thus the dishes can be cooked while the rice is being steamed or boiled. In 'Zheng' the food to be cooked is usually pre-marinated or treated with all the necessary seasonings, garnishes and decorations before being placed in a steamer. Sometimes the food is given only a short blast of vigorous steaming. 'Zheng' is most often used when the food to be cooked does not require prolonged cooking -- indeed, a short, sharp blast of steam is one of the few ways that certain foods may be cooked in order to retain their original freshness, flavor, and juiciness. Fish, being usually tender in flesh, is most often and best cooked in this manner. Because of the prevalence of 'Zheng', we Chinese have been recognized as expert fish and seafood cooks. (Kenneth Lo)

My first thought was to steam the steaks and give them a black bean sauce, but the thickness of the steaks bothered me, so I thought of cutting them in half. That Mao 'spicy ground pork sauce' sounds intriguing! Is this fish a light or a dark oily fish?

This Squirrel Fish dish requires a lot of mastery. The goal is to criss-cross on the fish meat without separating the meat from the bones (for presentation purpose). Then the fish is deep-fried. The meat will curl up like a squirrel's tail. I think that's how it got the name. It's much harder to do than it seems. I believe the criss-crossing is done on the inside of the fish meat and the skin is used to hold the meat together. ← Xiao hzrt -- the meat IS separated from the bones. You fillet the fish from the bones, while keeping the two sides of the fish still connected to the tail and keeping the skin attached. Then the flesh is scored. I wish I could find a pictorial of it on-line. It is really not difficult. If I can do it, believe me ---- anyone can do it!