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Those threadfin salmon looked very different from "ma yau" that TP showed in her picture.

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Looking at their list on Chinese restaurants, I am disappointed to not see Koi Palace in there (The "BIB GOURMAND (Under $40)" catagory). Instead, it was Hong Kong Flower Lounge and Yank Sing. I don't know how these lists are composed. It seems to me as if someone just took the list from last year (or every year) and transfered everything over. Hong Kong Flower Lounge used to be good but has degraded (and more than a year or two). For my money, I would much rather give to: Fook Yuen (Milbrae) Zen Peninsula (Milbrae) Koi Palace (Daly City) May Flower (Milpitas)

In my version, I would add some chicken stock and a bit of sugar. Egg Foo Yong is basically an omlette. Fried eggs with some meat ingredients. In North America, Egg Foo Yong is definitely one of those Americanized Chinese food entries. I think it is comparable to dishes like: - Chicken chop suey - Chicken "chow mein" (or "lo mein") - Shrimp with lobster sauce - Sweet and sour pork Yes you can trace something similar done in Mainland China. But the way these dishes are cooked seems entirely different. In the US, I have eaten egg foo yong made with bean sprouts in it. I thought it was unusual. The term "foo yong" in Chinese implies "eggs" when used in menus. A prettier name.

Thanks nibbs for the interesting and humorous read! I agree that sweet and sour pork/spareribs are offered seemingly everywhere in China and usually are quite good, and are quite different from those one gets in the USA. In my travels I liked their sweet and sour fish a lot. Hey... the Japanese learned it from us!

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I don't think tomatoes are widely used in Chinese cooking. Not Cantonese any way. Tomatoe eggs and tomato beef are common, though tomatoes did not seem to be used in too many recipes.

From my shopping experience, I have seen both dried salted fish and salted fish in jars (it's oil in the jar) about equally in the USA's Asian markets. In Hong Kong, I tended to see only the dried ones available. Maybe I haven't shopped around enough. It is a personal preference. I love the ones in jars of oil. To me the salted fish in oil is softer and seems more fragrant. No need to use too much salted fish in one setting. A little goes a long way in adding flavor.

I looked at all the images in the link and read some of the essays. It seems that the term 盐鱼/鹽魚 is the name of one species of fish. It is not salted fish (fish preserved with salt) that we are talking about in this thread.

Thanks for sharing your experience Evan. The cooked shark fin looked very nice! Glad to see you enjoyed the benefits of your catch.

liuzhou: I am afraid this is not the term for salted fish. The word "鹽" in Chinese means "salt", a noun. The term that we are talking about is "鹹", an adjective, describing a taste being salty. Salted fish in Chinese should be: 咸鱼/鹹魚

How important is "threadfish" in this dish? I think "salted fish" is important for this dish but it may not have to be threadfish. Sometimes we don't pay attention to what fish is used in making salted fish. I am sure the taste would be a bit different: salted fish made from one species to another. But we may need to cook with what's available. For example, where I live (Sacramento, California) I can find plenty of salted fish in jars (oil-filled) made with mackerel, and some dried ones (no name fish). But not much else. I don't know what the salted threadfish would look like. The Chinese term "ham yue" [Cantonese] only means salted fish, with no reference to which species.

I like eating the Cantonese style "Salt and Pepper" dishes: Salt and Pepper Shrimp, Squid, Fish Filet, Tofo, etc... Basically they deep-fry the slightly battered shrimp/squid/fish or tofu, then stir-fry quickly with a mixture of fried garlic, chopped green onion, chopped chili pepper and salt under intense heat. Recently, the S&P dishes I had in many of these neighborhood restaurants just seemed to be overdosed with salt. When I bit into the food, it seems extremely salty. The salt actually made my tongue jump! And the taste of the mixture became bitter. It's less enjoyable than it could have been. So I started telling the waitstaff when I ordered: Salt and Pepper Fish, but HOLD THE SALT! Does it sound strange? I mean... salt is one of the only few ingredients making this dish. After all, it is "SALT" and pepper. But I request to hold the salt... Any way, I would much rather sprinkle the salt on the dish myself using the small salt jar on the table. May be my taste preference has changed with age? Now that I got older, I can't take as much salt as I used to? Has anybody done something similar? Do you feel in general that these dishes seem overdosed with salt? Is a lot of salt needed to bring out the taste for this style?

The ones I saw in the 99 Ranch market, where the workers labelled "Fresh Jujube" (they actually wrote it as "Fresh Ju Ju Be"), were reddish brown with patches of yellow in color not like the ones shown in the post you linked to. The ones I saw looked the same like those in the picture Adam Balic provided.

I don't think watercress is the same as "tong ho". Watercress is "sai yeung choy" in Cantonese, which has a literal meaning of "The Western Vegetable". Tong Ho is a different vegetable, which has a strong taste (a bit like celery). Unless my memory has completely failed me... I need to go back and live in Hong Kong for a few years...

Welcome back, TP! We need your Chinese cookings with a Malaysian twist!

Both your roast porks looked lovely! Do you marinate the pork (on the inner side)? What do you use? Salt? Five spice powder? I think the skin of a suckling pig from that of a matured pig, in that the suckling pig's skin is much thinner, "babier", and the underlying fat is much thinner. I think it is easier to roast the suckling pig's skin to crispy than regular pig/pork.

If you go to an upscale Chinese restaurant, you will most likely find people serving shark fin in chicken soup only. Not thickened with corn starch. There is no need to. Maybe with a few thin threads of Chinese ham (Yunnan ham). That would be it. Shark fin is the main feature of shark fin soup. You eat it for its texture, and get the flavor from the superior chicken broth. Why are ingredients like egg white, crab meat, etc. found in some shark fin soup? I think they are used as space filler by some restaurants. Note that obviously shark fin is the most expensive ingredient among them. Like... ordering an "abalone" stir-fries - only to find 3 small, thin slices of abalone in a whole plate of vegetables. If I pay US$40 for two tiny bowls of shark fin soup in a Chinese restaurant, I would not like to see all kinds of other ingredients in the soup. If I have such a fully formed, hugh size shark fins like yours... consider honoring the main feature for what it is instead of adding all kinds of other ingredients?

Chinese food is not very children friendly. For one thing, Chinese restaurants do not offer "kid's menus". Being a culture that shares dishes in a meal (so we won't have three dishes of Kung Pao Chicken at the same table), kids eat whatever their parents/guardians order. But at McDonald's, they can eat what they want! Wow! The other thing is serving style. Chinese food: no carving knife. Chicken is cooked whole then chopped into (big) pieces - with skin and bones. Fish is steamed whole - with skin and bones! Okay... I bet you can't cook a cow with skin and bones. Kids (as I observe my nieces and nephews) have a really hard time to dealing with Chinese food. A piece of chicken is usually too big to chew. And I am sure many of us have painful memories of getting fish bones stuck in our throats when we were small. At McDonald's, chicken comes in a nugget! Fish is a patty! So is a cow! No more whole gai lan to swallow down! Hell, no veggie period! It is a pretty easy game to win over millions of kids' minds. McDonald's it is... Is there any way to lure kids to come along for Chinese dim sum? Maybe a reward card? Like... 5 times to eat dim sum instead of McDonald's, you will get a new video game?

I think it is the general belief that the thinner the skin (mooncake) the better. As you can see when some shops advertise their mooncake, they would emphasize "thin skin". I think one of the reasons is the thinner the skin, the harder it is to make. It takes a lot of mastermanship (did I say this right?). A lot of "see fu".

Ahhhh! Finely chopped spring onion! Brilliant! I thought I saw some pesto sauce used.

It may be easier to nominate a dish to be the most unhealthy than to generalize and say a cuisine to be most unhealthy. For example, in Hong Kong it's common to find boiled gai lan with oyster sauce. Is this healthy? (Okay, perhaps skip the oyster sauce.) Or steamed tofu with some minced shrimp, with a dash of light soy sauce. Is this healthy? In Beijing it's common to drink a bowl of plain soy milk in the morning. Is it healthy? (But it got balanced out by eating an oily fried dough...) Most cuisines have both the healthier side and an unhealthier side.

liuzhou: did I see some spotty green thing in this dish? What is that? (Or is my computer screen too dusty? )

Is Manchurian cuisine very close to modern day Korean food? When we toured Beijing a few years ago, we were treated with a "so-called" Imperial feast (touristy thing), which was supposed to be based on the imperial dishes in the Ching dynasty. It was my impression that the setting and the food were very close to Korean banchans - many small dishes, a little bit of this and a little bit of that.

I agree with Dejah Dai Ga Jeah. It's just a classical Chinese recipe: chicken soup and shark fin seem to go well together. I suppose you can try other combinations if you like.