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While good, I don't think that Prego is on the same level as Marche Moderne or some of the other places mentioned. ← Sorry I don't eat out much. I thought I would mention something "nice" in the Orange County area closer to Magic Kingdom. I didn't realize "nice" means must be in par with Patina, Chinios on Main, Spago and such.

I found the old instruction card for how to cook the shark fin, FYI. (Starting from dried shark fin) 1. Place shark fin in water for one hour. Boil it in water for about 1/2 an hour. 2. Change water. Boil the shark fin together with ginger and wine (ShaoHsing) for 20 minutes. Remove. 3. Cook (simmer) shark fin in soup with chicken, ham (referring to Chinese ham) and other ingredients for about 3 hours.

Chicken. Definitely chicken. A whole chicken would do. But you need to use the "double boil" technique to get rid of the suds in the soup (from bones). And skim the fat. I have made shark fin soup from scratch only once following a recipe that comes with the shark fin package. If I remember it correctly, the shark fin needs to be boiled (simmer) for a couple of hours. Need to put ginger in the broth and go heavy on ShaoShing wine. "Superior" broth and shark fin. Nothing else is needed (or maybe some shredded chicken meat). Use Chinese red vinegar as a condiment when served.

Prego Ristorante. Great Italian food. Koll Center. Irvine. http://www.pregoristoranti.com/index.html

Thanks for your response, everyone! (Hi Karen the Duck! Nice to see you too!) I think kids at that age may not have the concept of "being American". To them, their home is their home. They wouldn't know America is only one of the countries (cultures) in the world, let alone trying to be patriotic. What many said make sense: kids are driven by the desire to have fun. And fun, at that age, is not derived from the pleasure of eating good food. Eating is eating. Just a necessity. Playing has better value. And McD is just doing hell of a job targeting these young minds. Many parents go to McD only because the kids want to. Talked to a Chinese mom at a restaurant. Her two sons would cry and cry to go to eat at McDonald's whenever they go out. Her routine is: take the two boys to eat at McDonald's, then she comes and eats at the Chinese restaurant for her dim sum and wonton noodles and lets the boys play video games at the table. What a compromise!

Well, it is only bound by your imaginations. Tofu puffs can be used in many recipes that use tofu. Tofu puffs are the fried "skin" of tofu. In Cantonese home cooking, tofu puffs are used in steamed fish (with fermented black beans and ginger) and vegetarian stir-fries (e.g. with napa cabbage, mung bean threads, black mushrooms, dried lily buds, cloud-ear fungi, etc.)

I have a few nieces and nephews aged from 6 to 12. They are American born Chinese raised in the USA. Take them out to have a meal from time to time. Where would you like to go? Have dim sum (or other Chinese food), or McDonald's? MCDONALD'S!!! The answer is always the same. *sigh* **double sigh** Kids at that age seem to prefer hamburgers more than Chinese food. I don't know why that is. Is it the playpen thing more than anything else? Or the toys that come with the happy meal? While these kids don't refuse Chinese food, they didn't seem to have developed a liking of it either. When I was a kid, I ate whatever my father took me to (not that I have a say anyway). Back in the 60's we didn't have any hamburger places in Hong Kong. So I grew up without eating hamburgers. And I have never quite developed a craving for it either in my adult life. Kids today are different. Full of choices. Even my sister's kids prefer McDonald's over Chinese food when they were small - and they live in Hong Kong all their lives. Why is that? Perhaps to kids, food is just for filling hungers and nothing more. It won't matter to them whether it is ground beef in sesame buns or shrimp dumplings. Play is the most important agenda. And play things - McDonald's has plenty. Will these kids ever discover the value of their roots one day? That they will one day, out of their own will, visit a wonton noodle house instead of McDonald's?

Ce'nedra: I think the brownish thing near the rim is some cut fried yao zha kwai. What is the brownish thing in the center? Fried shallot?

I suppose that living in a first world that you are, there are some kind of lemonade products? Non-carbonated sweetened lemon juice? If not, well, squeeze 3 lemons and mix the juice with equal part of water (bring to a boil) and add plenty of sugar? No fresh lemon? Oh, deer...

I will venture my guess: 1. Lamb/mutton too "soh" (gamey) 2. Spices used (e.g. cumin) are overpowering

Fabulous pictures, Jennifer! I look forward to viewing more from your trip. Like many other metropolitans, visiting Hong Kong can be as inexpensive as can be, or as expensive (five-star everything) as can be. Once you get a plane ticket over there... some people stay in "hostals" such as those in the Chung King Building - a place to sleep on a bunker bed basically - for as little as US$20 a night? Something like that? There are many eateries that offers day to day meals quite inexpensively. Unless you want to have seafood dinner every night or eat at Yung Kee every day.

Well... how can you do a good chopping job if your MIL insists to place the chopping block ON THE FLOOR and you have to kneel down to do it... because FIL thinks chopping chicken on the kitchen counter will ruin the ceramic tiles?

I just saw an old episode of "Martin Yan's Chinatown" [2003] series, in which he visited a chef who illustrated how to make "salt baked chicken": - First marinate the cavity of the chicken with five spice powder and salt mix. - Wrap the whole chicken in a large sheet of parchment paper. - Place the chicken/paper-wrap in a large clay pot. Fill the whole pot with table salt. - Put the clay pot in an over and bake for a couple of hours. (My guess is about 325F) That's it! Seems quite easy!

Thanks for posting the pictures Adam! What I saw in the 99 Ranch market looked the same as the ones in your second and third picture. The fruit in the first picture seemed to be of a different variety? I read the Chinese label said "Dung Zho" [Cantonese], which translates to winter date, and not "Hung Zho", which translate to red date. I am intrigued to just buy some and try it out. Unfortunately they sell these fresh jujubes in bundles (over 30 in a bag). "What if I don't like it?" it would be too much of a waste.

In due time, yes I think it will. But that's only to one individual. Typically the way these things work... the newly "rich" will waste and waste and waste like there is no tomorrow. And when the sources of the wealth dry up, be it real estate, stock speculatilons or from his/her own business, he/she will just drop off. Disappears. But there will be other newly "rich" come in and take over. Maybe this is a rebelious thing? Just waste while you still can. The general rule of "1 dish per person" is a pretty good guideline in ordering the right quantity of food. Or maybe "1.5 dish per person". Anything more would guarantee left overs, wasted or not.

Remember that congee (jook) is a Cantonese specialty! If you ever visit Hong Kong or Guangzhou, you will find a variety of congee being offered beside the staple beef, pork and century egg. Others include: - pork liver - "sampan style" (dried squid, pork skin, shrimp, a mix) - pork blood - pork stomach - goose intestine - fish filet I know some of these ingredients don't sound too appealing to western cultures, but they are quite popular and loved in that region. I for one love pork blood in congee. Too bad very few Chinese restaurants in the US seem brave enough to offer it. The peanuts that are fried and with salt sprinkled on top are indeed quite common as congee condiment.

In Chinese, they are called Hung Zho [Cantonese], which loosely translates to red date. Dried ones: same name.

I think there are two sets of mentalities, which are common among Chinese (the younger generations especially) but are against the traditional value of "not wasting food (for any reason)". 1) Buffer food waster: The thought is "Hey, I have already PAID for the food, I can do anything I like. If I don't like the food, that's too bad!". Each trip to the bar resulted in a small-mount high plateful of food - half of which left untouched before they go for another round. 2) Showing off: "Just because I can! Can you make as much as I do? You can do that too!" This set of mentality is common among those who "got rich quick", such as by speculations in the stock or real estate market. There was a common saying in Hong Kong back in the 70's when the stock market was extremely bullish... that some people ordered the shark fin soup just to use it to rinse their mouths...

Yesterday I saw, for the first time, some FRESH ju ju be on sale in the Milpitas 99 Ranch market. I never had the fresh ju ju be before, only the dried one in Chinese soups. I didn't what to expect so decided not to pick up the whole bag (more than 30 in all). Have you eaten fresh ju ju be? How would you describe the taste and texture? Are they crispy like fresh pear/apple?

I hypothesize that this may have to do with geography. Vietnam and Thailand have very long coastlines. Fish is abundon... therefore the source material to make fish sauce. Soya beans on the other hand might not be. (I don't see a whole lot of tofu products used in those cuisines.) In China, the majority of the population live away from the coast. Soya beans are the staples.

Sichuan pickled vegetable. In Cantonese it is "zha choy". In recent years, they sell these pickled vegetable already cut and packed in small quantity, ready-to-eat. No need to cook. I like to rinse off the liquid that comes in the package, and cut up the picked vegetables (from thin threads to tiny cubes).

Sometimes it's hard to avoid wasting food. For example: when you go to a Cantonese style restaurant and order "something over rice" (e.g. beef stir-fried with water-down eggs over rice). As typical, the restaurant will give you a big plate of rice. When I was younger, eating the whole plate of rice... no problem. As I age, I don't really want to or have a need to finish the whole plate of rice. It's really not much you can do about the half plate of rice (soaked with sauce) that you can't finish. Do you tell the wait staff to "give me less rice" when you order? They just look at you with funny eyes. It's more trouble explaining (to them, and they to the chef) than it's worth. "It's just rice!" The Asian grocery stores sell cilantro in a bundle (not by weight). Every time I buy a bundle, half of them will be un-used - they will eventual turn mooshy in the frige...

browniebaker: thank you for your inspirational note. That is being resourceful. You see the items not as they are, but as what they can become! BB: I also like your comment. Making the mistake of getting bad food is already enough. Shouldn't have to prolong or proliferate the suffering! I think our older Chinese generations have developed their "nothing goes to waste" mentality because they had, in their lives, lived through some dark ages. The younger generation, like myself, is fortunately enough that we haven't seen dying people due to famine such as in times of WWII or the Big Leap Forward or Cultural Revolution, that we don't have the same view as our parents.

My Chinese up-bringing says: Never waste food. When I was grewing up, my father would force me to finish everything laid before me on the dinner table. I have never brought to the sink a bowl that still contains even a spoonful of rice. I would finish whatever's left - even though I may not like the food... But... when will this "virtue" end? I bought something during my trip last night: an order of potstickers and a pineapple bao. With the pineapple bao, the crust is okay but the bread is hard! With the potstickers... the wrapper is hard and dry. I did the most sinful thing for a Chinese - I ate just the top crust of the pineapple bao. I ate only the fillings of the potsticker left over. The rest is nicely buried and is waiting for the hotel maid to pick up. What about you? When will you draw the line between resourceful (or unwasteful), which may mean finish eating everything that you have bought or cooked (and just not buy it or cook it next time), and being trueful to your inner self that says: Life is too SHORT for lousy food!

10 minutes or so will do. Bear in mind that the pork inside lap cheung is cured. Kind of like meat jerkies.