liuzhou

Today, I’m being happy. I’m looking at 开心果 (kāi xīn guǒ), literally ’happy nut’, Pistacia vera, pistachio nuts. Native to Afghanistan, Iran and Central Asia, this is another drupe seed, rather than a true nut. Pistachios are members of the cashew family which also contains mangos. They were introduced across Europe by the Romans throughout their empire. In the 19th century low yielding varieties were introduced from Europe to the USA. The United States Department of Agriculture later introduced hardier cultivars to California collected from China and commercial production began in 1929 and now the USA is the world’s top producer, followed by Iran. Ironically, a good proportion of the pistachios sold in China, today are from the USA, presumably grown on those trees and their descendents. Very limited numbers are grown in China. 82,000 tonnes in 2022 compared to the USA with 400,000 tonnes - still enough to make China the fourth largest. American Pistachios As with cashews above, they are mostly eaten as a snack; as an ingredient they are used in hideously garish coloured cakes, for which they are sold as pistachio paste. Pistachio Cake - Helena is a large bakery chain. I’ve also seen pistachio bao buns. No thanks. Pistachio Buns The are used in pistachio ice cream and I’ve seen pistachio milk tea on offer. I can find no evidence of use in Chinese savoury dishes though There are a few recipes for stir-fries using pistachios, but they are all North American. Cake and bun images from Meituan shopping app.

That's interesting. Yet, Googling cashew chicken gives endless recipes for the dish on American websites or other sites claiming it's a Chinese American takeaway classic in Chinese restaurants. Wikipedia's entry for 'Cashew Chicken' says:

I’m almost going nuts. I’d go fully nuts but many of the ‘nuts’ we eat aren’t nuts at all in the botanical sense. Many are drupe seeds; some are gymnosperm seeds; others are angiosperm seeds. However they are considered nuts in a culinary sense. The most eaten 'nut' is actually a legume. I’ll start with one culinary nut which may leap to some minds when thinking of Chinese cuisine. 腰果 (yāo guǒ), literally Kidney Nut, Anacardium occidentale, the Cashew Nut. Native to South America but cultivated mainly in Africa, they are grown in limited amounts in China, particularly in Sanya, Hainan Province. However, Vietnam is the largest exporter and much of what we get here are from there. However, cashews are used far less in Chinese cuisine than most people think (and isn’t a botanical nut; it’s a drupe seed). Although cashews are certainly easily available, they are nearly all eaten as a snack; rarely in cooked dishes. Googling for ‘nut Chinese food’ returns dozens of recipes for cashew chicken, a dish I’ve never seen and which is absent from my food delivery app covering almost all the thousands of restaurants in the city. Using Chinese search engines return a blank. In fact. the delivery app only mentions two dishes containing cashews – 腰果虾仁 (yāo guǒ xiā rén), cashew shrimp and 西芹百合炒腰果 (xī qín bǎi hé chǎo yāo guǒ), cashew with celery. These I have seen here, but not often. There are only two restaurants serving the shrimp dish and a two others selling the celery and lily dish. Fuchsia Dunlop gives a recipe for Gong Bao (Kung Po in the west) Shrimp with Cashews in her ‘The Food of Sichuan’ (eG-friendly Amazon.com link), but as she notes, that is a recent, non-traditional innovation. Cashew, celery and day lily The Chicken cashew dish seems to be a Chinese-American take on the Thai ไก่ผัดเม็ดมะม่วงหิมพานต์ (kị̀ p̄hạd mĕd mam̀awn), stir fried chicken with cashew nuts.

Yes, I realised the dates didn't tally, but it was the best description I could find. But the dish could well have existed long before described in writing. Most things are. But in the end, I don't know.

I came up with this:

This may be the ultimate rabbit hole. New York Public Library’s collection of 17,562 menus ranging from 1850 to the 2000s have been digitised and are available here. They are also in the process of extracting all the dishes from those menus to make a searchable index by dish rather than establishment name. So far, 1,335,578 dishes have been transcribed. The are looking for volunteers to assist with this project.

It's soft as were those I ate in Lombardy, Italy in 1993.

Yes Ciabatta in Italian has the /ch/ pronunciation.

Spicy squid and sugar snap peas plus the usual garlic, chilli, coriander leaf and soy sauce. Usually I add a little oyster sauce but I seem to be out of it. No worries. It was fine.

I’m donning my carpet slippers despite having no carpets and getting into ciabatta. It started last Friday when I went searching my online shopping sources for ciabatta buns. I certainly found some – too many, but soon narrowed them down to three. But one type wasn’t what I was looking for – a small ciabatta loaf with olives, cheese and bacon embedded within. I found that interesting so ordered a couple. I had one for breakfast yesterday as mentioned on the Breakfast topic. $2.75 USD per bun but and extra $1.11 for delivery. How the cheese didn’t melt in the baking, I don’t know. Then I was left with what I really wanted – plain ciabatta buns. First up are a set of seven buns (the minimum order) at $0.66 per bun. Delivery free. Second a set of three (again min order), $0.92 per bun and despite coming by far the furthest, again free. There wasn’t much flavour difference between them but the set of seven were cheaper per bun. However I think I preferred the set of three buns; they had a nicer texture. They came from all over China. The olive variety from Jiangxi in Eastern China; the seven plain from Henan in Central China; the three plain from the far northern Liaoning province. I’m in South China. Despite being from different destinations and being ordered at the same time, they all arrived yesterday morning. The reason for my interest was a desire to use the plain buns as subs for burger buns which I always find too sweet, especially here. Never done this before but have seen them recommended for burgers several times.. Anyone tried? Another question. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, the American pronunciation of ciabatta has an initial /s/ sound as opposed to the /ch/ in both the British. Is that universal in America or regional?

On a recent day trip to Hong Kong, I came across these fellows. Alba Truffles. Those prices are Hong Kong Dollars; not USD. 7,950 HKD = 1,022 USD 8,160 HKD = 1,048 USD Did I buy? Of course! Both! Well, I had fun imagining I did.

Certainly not. I haven't eaten margarine since the 1950s. I try not to eat industrial effluent! Never seen margarine in China. Finding butter is hard enough.

Yes. I always nuke poppadums. Have done for decades. Much cleaner and crispier.

When I first came to China in 1996, olive oil was impossible to find. I first found a bottle on August, 23rd 2005. I only know the date because I took my first ever selfie holding the bottle to send to family and friends, some of whom had lamented my serious deprivation. Since then it has become commonplace but not of great quality but great expense. This one is the best I've found but is even more expensive, being imported from Italy. It's also from a cooperative rather than a massive multi-national distributer of oils which could be from anywhere. Much of the olive oil sold here is used for skin care by my lady friends, I think. No one I know cooks with it. I never use it in Chinese dishes. Totally unsuitable, but I use it in western food, of course. I've never seen it here in bread before except when I've baked the bread myself. My olive bread and its oil

I ordered this olive, bacon and cheese ciabatta loaf online (actually I ordered two) and they arrived at 8:30 this morning when I was setting up my coffee machine for my morning fix of caffeine. Perfect time for breakfast to turn up. Lovely bread infused with olive oil flavour. I just ate it as it came. Got through half a loaf. Here's one slice.

I hope you mean 'gourmet'. 😂

Tonight, I made an experimental dish of fried rice with prawns and shailan ham from Hunan. I described that more in this post back In September. It also contained garlic, chilli. Shaoxing wine and Chaoshan fish sauce. Finished with coriander leaf/cilantro and Chinese chives. I slightly over-salted it because I forgot the ham and fish sauce are a bit salty, but didn't ruin it. I'll certainly repeat. The shrimp and ham nicely complemented each other.

The person who posted about the aprons is no longer a member and hasn't been for around for 16 years so is very unlikely to answer. Perhaps someone else may know.

My machine doesn't work if I don't. But it sounds like you are speaking from experience?

黄豆酸笋焖鱼仔 (huáng dòu suān sǔn mèn yú zǎi) - Soy bean, pickled bamboo and rice paddy fish. Also, pickled chillies and garlic. Served with rice.

... get up in the morning and wash the jug for the filter coffee machine, get the coffee from its cupboard, fill the water reservoir and switch it on while I wander off to do some routine tasks, return five minutes later with my favourite cup and attempt to fill it, only to find out that, because I had forgotten to actually put the coffee in the filter cone, all I had was a jug of hot water.. But I have an excuse! I hadn't had my morning coffee yet!

This one goes into more detail.

No.

Yes. That's why Chinese cuisine uses white pepper much more than black but much less than chilli. In fact, it almost always only uses black with western food (or their re-imaginations of western food).

Have you considered aloo bhorta? That's what I call it and I'm definitely not your mother!