CFT

Yes, my mother wraps them in rectangular pillow shapes. I don't like peanut ones either. I like the pork belly ones with green mung bean and salted duck egg yolks (been ages since I've had one so the duck egg might be a false memory). I think chestnuts would be a good addition.

It is a mis-spelling. The common transliteration is 'tuina', a form of Chinese massage. 'Tui' means push, 'na' means grasp.

You can use an adjustable speed strobe light to measure rpm: http://www.ehow.com/how_5021934_use-strobe-light-measure-rpm.html Basically adjust strobe frequency until the blade appears stationary.

Read Fuchsia Dunlop's book: "Shark's Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A sweet-sour memoir of eating in China" Best to sample the food culture for yourself in the native environment and form your own opinions.

Pollock in the style of Pollock. You've got to love it!

Don't rely on daugther & s-i-l to deal with the leftovers!

Those quesadillas look mighty fine!

I've never heard of washing fruit and vegetables to this degree. I usually just rinse with cold water. I must be ignorant, or lucky, or both! How do you cope with mushrooms?

I like that too. Do you chop the egg up or slices? I like an egg between soft and hard boiled. Yolk not runny but also not 'paste-y'.

I like my toast well done too but with a soft/chewy middle. Some more porous bread get very crunchy, such that it is impossible to cut into smaller pieces for children without shattering into a zillion bits. I think the reason why people might prefer cold toast is so that the butter doesn't melt and hence spoil the total crispness of the toast.

What was the dim sum?

Dejah, that looks lovely. What is your soup base? Chicken stock?

Check out origamicrane's posts from page 2 on this thread: Siu Yook (Roast Pork Belly)

Check out Hiroyuki's blog for posts about okara: http://hiro-shio.blogspot.com/

There are different 'classes' of soups served in the home setting though. One which is a quick boil of the ingredients, like tofu, leafy veg. etc. Then there are those which require low heat, long simmer like the medicinal ones (yerk choy). Oh maybe even 3 classes if you consider those which are steamed inside a separate container like dong guai.

How on earth can chicken, butter and grapes look so luscious?

Isn't it just 銀絲炒麵 (Silver thread stir fried noodles). The silver threads being the beansprouts.

Is that why my can openers don't work on some cans?

That's just porridge with Chinese accompaniments right? That looks like a heck of a lot of extras!

Mjx, a tip to fishing shell fragments out: use the empty shell halves as a scoop.

My son is allergic to milk and my wife chooses not to eat dairy for health reasons. I was quite excited (I need to get out more) when I noticed lots of signs in cafes in our regular holiday haunt offering soya milk lattes. I didn't realise until much later that it was appealing to the "healthy eating" (calorie counting) crowd. I just thought, in my blinkered viewpoint, that they were catering for dairy intolerance/vegans. Most free-from products are inferior to the originals in my opinion.

Oven gloves and safety glasses.

I thought ice creams and sorbets might be the extent of it. I'd like to know what else you could do with it too.

I think there is a distinct possibility your refigerator might go KAPOW!

I used to use LN for my graduate research (characterising semiconductor materials at low temp). There used to be a big pressurised tank of it in the basement of the building. Every so often I would trundle down with a large spherical dewar (polystyrene stopper) in a wheeled mount that allowed it to be transported and allowed tipping out. This was my "stash" - can't remember how long it lasted - maybe a week or two. On a "per experiment" basis, I would fill a big polystyrene bucket with as much LN as I needed to fill a small cryostat. I was aware of the oxygen/air displacing properties but the lab was sufficiently ventilated.