jo-mel

I have to go with Tropp's Modern Art of Chinese Cooking, also. She seems to be standing right behind you, instructing you on every move. A tribute to her explanations was given by a chef who said if you want to know how to steam, just read her instructions. She is a bit wordy, but that is what makes her instructions so clear. Not as many recipes as in many other books, but the book is a classic. Also, I'm with Dejah ------for recipes, substitutions, menus, how-to, soaking information, and every possible way to make a dish,--------that wonderful stand-by "The Thousand Recipe Cookbook" (Bley Miller). The new editions seem to have edited out some of the sections, but even then, it is a good basic Chinese cookbook. One of the first in my collection and I still refer to it.

Hi Kent! You might find more by googling the name 'Su Dongpo' or 'Su Shi' - that's the Pinyin versions of his (two) names. He was really into food, poetry, calligraphy and all the good things in life. You might have heard of the famous Hangzhou Dongpo Pork dish (东坡肉). which is one of the great celebrations of belly meat as we know it That's supposed to be named after (or some say he invented it!) the man himself. His poetry is REALLY good and well worth reading!! and it wouldn't surprise me if he did eat so many lychees! BTW, the ones we are getting here in Beijing are flooding in now - boy! are they lovely!!! SOooooooooo juicy! ← I love Su Shi's poetry. One of my books on Tang and Sung poetry does have a poem on Lichees by Su Shi (Su Dongpo) entitled" "A Lament for Lichees" (Just the first verse) "Every ten li is a station swirling with dust, Every five li a post t urge couriers on; Men die like flies, their corpses line the road, So that lichees and longans may be delivered to court." This refers to all the lichee and longans delivered from south China to the northwest --- just for the Lady Yang a favorite of the emperor. The cost of this in lives was one of the reasons for his downfall. Here are 2 links to parts of the poem (with a different lilt to the translation) and to a connection of lichees to durian! http://www.chinese-forums.com/showthread.php?t=1033 http://www.saltshaker.net/20061222/three-torches-of-fire

They look great sheetz! When the shells are really crispy, they have a flavor that fried shelled shrimp just can't match. I never thought of using Sichuan papper. I'll have to keep that in mind.

Add me to the medium grain rice list. I LOVE it because of the texture AND the taste. Converted rice is OK and makes me feel better because it has a pretty good glycemic rating, but brown rice just leaves me cold --- inspite of its so called goodness. In a small Cecelia Au Yeung cookbook, I once found a recipe for a steamed rice dish using long grain AND sticky rice , plus a lot of garlic and diced chicken fat. What a wonderful dish! I just loved the combination of the two rices, and of course all the garlic was wonderful!

Here are some 'google' pictures of it: http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=ba...ch+Images&gbv=2 Did it taste like mushrooms taste?

My girl scout leader always told us bugs were just Extra Protein tracey ← Extra protein! LOL! That's what I said one time during a cooking class. A spider dropped right down, from an overhead light, to right above a wok when I was stirfrying something!! About the mushrooms, one time I saw some flying pantry moths in the jar that housed my dried mushrooms. It was after that , that I read about bay leaves keeping pantry moths at bay. (play on words, there) Sounds like you have a different bug, tho. As Ben said, freezing dried stuff usually kills anything that has come with the drys. 24 to 48 hours should do the trick.

3 whip? what does it mean jo-mel? some animal inside I'm guessing it's not the alcohol with lots of snakes inside is it? ← LOL! Whip (鞭) = male animal organ 3 whips... 3 different kinds of animals used. The Chinese male-enhancement liquor. ← That's it! It has all kinds of things in it -- sea horse, stag, some kind of bird head, and mountain medicine Actually that 補 is 'bu' ---- as in remedy. (not pu as in grape) My mistake. I had it when I was in Beijing, one time, but I don't remember the taste --- something like an after dinner wine.

Bamboo rat tastes like chicken. I have a nice bottle of San Bian Pu Jiu (三鞭補酒) that I bought in Beijing. Good conversation piece.

Another example of man's inhumanity to man -- ageless and world-wide. One of my language teachers (from Shanghai) was sent North in the relocation/reeducation program. She tended sheep and lived in a hut with others. They used to sleep with the dogs for warmth and you could see the frostbite spots on her cheeks from those terrible living conditions. I use to look at little old ladies who had had their feet bound, or little old men who would play chess (when I first went to China in the early 80s) and wonder what they had experienced and seen in their lifetime. Now I look at those who went thru the Cultural Revolution and wonder the same thing. When I hear or read these stories, the one food that always comes up is the sweet potato. I know it is considered a poverty food, but thank goodness its cultivation was wide-spread.

Ditto!

You beat me to it! I was going to say -- shred them and deep-fry them. But -- as to the original question about what to do with leftover roast pig?? Just fast-ship it to me, and I will take care of it!!

The piles of green stuff in the market ---- Could it be a form of stem lettuce/asparagus lettuce? (萵筍 - wo sun) The stem to the left, the tips in the middle and the whole thing on the right. (But the leaf tip looks different)

Isn't it mostly about the "feel" of the dough? Isn't that why it takes an apprentice months (or years) to master them?

Absolutely fascinating account, Peter! Brought back lots of memories. Back to Fang Shan for a moment. Those 'suppositories' are little corn bread/cakes I believe. Did you have any of CiXi's fav pea bean cakes? I can't imagine why she liked them. Her eating habits were a wonder. All she had to do was look at a dish, and the eunuch would put the dish before her. Bon Appetit use to have a feature -- asking a celebrity what 3 people from history, they would like the have for dinner, and what would you serve. If I had been asked, I would have said, CiXi, Madam Mao and one gentleman from The Cultural Revolution (forgot his name). I would have a great meal, and it would all have been poisoned. (nasty person that I am) Also -- in Beijing, did you have any street food -- like Jian Bing? Squirrel Fish is one of my favorite ways to serve fish. One restaurant here makes "Pine Cone Fish" which is a take-off of Squirrel Fish and looks something like the "~~~~~odd internal organ plucked out of an alien chest.~~~~~" you had at Fang Shan. Thanks for the trip!

Are you looking for something cold? Or hot? Hot could be lettuce packages. For cold, I like making a salad of blanched vegetable slices and dressed with a soy, vinegar, sesame dressing. Par cooked carrots, broccoli stem slices, snow peas, celery cut on a diagonal and arranged on a plate with the dressing on top is tasty and pretty to look at. If interested, I can give you more complete directions. Candied walnuts are nice too.

Calling Duck---- I was just quicker with the clicker finger! Dessert? Plain icecream with a sweet ginger sauce --- and almond cookies? Can you but those cookies in bulk? I wish chocolate was Chinese. I always cross the twain and make orange - ginger brownies.

Chicken wings? Red cooked or braised in a Sweet/Sour or Oyster, or Hoisin sauce?

My first thought was a form of Lions Head Meatballs (pork or beef meatballs braised with cabbage.) I've made them for groups of 40, BUT instead of having the lion-sized meatballs, I made them small regular meatball size. They can be braised in the oven rather than on the top of the stove. Bok choy or napa cabbage could be braised rather than the strong aroma of round cabbage. Or some sort of Sweet/Sour Meatball. The meatballs can be made way ahead and frozen, or a few days ahead and refrigerated. A sauce can be done ahead, but thickened at the last minute.

Probably don't want to ask the servers if they're serving a new horse. ← HeeHee! Wo bu xihuan chi ma!!

I wonder if 'they' ever examined the food that the Chinese owners and workers eat in those restaurants.

Studies like this annoy me. I am angry that their point is taken as fact by so many. The sheeple don't look beyond the written word on the paper. Maybe more annoying is when I read a headline that says "Studies now show ------". Previous evil foods are found not to be so evil -- in NEW studies. That's why I take all studies with a grain of salt. (oops -- salt is bad) I wouldn't be surprised that the use of soybean or peanut oil in Chinese cooking will have a study that says, "Studies now show that the use of blah blah oil in Chinese food ------"

AHA! Always look to the source and an agenda! Thanks for that tidbit.

That jumped out at me --- the one dish they singled out. Sure the entire dish is going to have high anything, but Chinese food isn't eaten like that. And they mentioned Mexican food as an aside, but kept right on pulling Chinese food apart. A pox on them! Did they ever think to check out other dishes or were they bent on using a bad dish as an example of Chinese food?

Anzu --- OOPS! {{{{{{Batting head}}}}}}}} I DO know 馬 - 嗎 - 瑪 - 媽 - and 罵! (slipshod on my part) Plus xin xian is better than just xin. And about mei you 沒有 --- I swear it is the most popular word/ phrase in the Chinese language!!

I just bought it, and looked it over, but haven't tried any of the recipes yet. Lots of beautiful pictures and side comments on all the dishes. I like that side color. It didn't have a dish that I've had there several times --- Dry Shredded Beef (Gan Bian Niu Rou - 干煸牛肉) -- darn! I see that the Twice Cooked Pork used pork butt rather that the traditional pork belly, but they do use pork belly in a Hanzhou dish. There are some yuppie Shun Lee originals like a Hot and Sour Bouillabaisse. All in all, I can't see that they would have any flop dishes as they have a reputation to uphold and Michael Tong takes his food seriously.