aznsailorboi
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Posts posted by aznsailorboi
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Ok a new spin off......we always talk of auspicious symbolic food but nobody's talking about foods you should avoid during some of the days(talking about the full length extended 15?? day celebration) of the CNY.
I saw one of the post said that they'd rather had jook with century eggs and grated ginger...something like that for CNY. And i was like "WHAT SACRILEDGE!!!"
That's one of the no-no-oh-no foods that my family dont eat during the eve and the day, coz its said that jook is what poor people eat back in the times of hardships so if you eat it, you're claiming to be broke and being broke( literal or metaphorical ) during the first of the year will cause you to be broke the whole year.....well aint that a b*tc*!!! have you guys noticed? we put focus on money with a lot of stuff like symbolism in food, couplets, customs, etc. , I personally don't have a problem with it, hey the more prosperous the better.
but what other foods should you avoid during this time of the year?
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(Gastro888... where are you??? Where is the Gai Mo Soo???
)HEHE I remember seeing that on quite a few occasions on that thread.
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Guys, you better believe it.....soon enough all types of meat are gonna be illegal to eat. First they start with foie gras, now they're tackling lobsters. (they started a thread about the subject today 1-20-06).........can't imagine all those yummy stuff gone.....GONE!!!!
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OKAY these animal rights people are getting way out of hand!!!!! First, they started pestering foie gras manufacturers in California, then tried banning( still is ) the selling of it here in Chicago.....and now LOBSTERS???? This is exceptionally ridiculous!!! Obviously these people need to get a life for crying out loud. Know what, as a matter of fact, I'll eat lobster tonight just for the hell of it! ughhhhhh makes me mad
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honestly not very sure about the specifics of the tea composition. thats how my mom called it. whatever we had at home.. silver can with kwan yin image embossed on the can, me thinks its a brand. but it is oolong tea. havn't seen one in the stores here in the US. My mother would usually have food stuff at home from asia that nobody's seen before sent by my uncles and aunts from HK and the Phils....and it never fails that she shows them off to her non-asian guests whenever they're around...either amazes them in a good or bad way( I swear one of these days her friends would think she practices asian vodoo on them using her rare herbs and deer horn slices and a splash of soy sauce lol)
oh BTW I started reading the thread you suggested, very informative....as to deciding if I wanted to go all out traditional vs compensating with american-familiar food to compensate for my non-asian guests, I think I will go traditional, shoot I only get to eat those great food once in a while as the ingredients are quite pricey...sea cucumber(thnks to Tepee for the soaking technique link), dried scallops, abalones and things like that. What I hate to see is precious food get wasted, so I also carefully planned all the people going to my sit down dinner for CNY at home.....and I will post pics as well. That thread from last year's CNY got me all motivated!!!
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aznsailorboi: Welcome to eGullet! And Happy New Year! Well, the solar new year first...
There had been a long threaded discussion on Chinese New Year banquet menu last year (and lots of fun
). You may find it here:http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=60810
I happen to like mooncake. But I wouldn't know what to do with "neen gou" (not that I ever received it as a gift...).
Don't get me wrong with the mooncake, I love mooncake, prefer the one with lotus paste and double yolk myself. but when the boxes pile up you just have to start giving them away, otherwise the stale ones will get staler( if there's such a word lol), and the only ones we eat are from my uncle who's living in HK, and its Maxim's brand, very popular, seems like everyone on the mooncake thread knows about this too.
Back to Neen Gou/ Nian Kao/ Ti Koy now that I know they're all but the same. it's a very simple rice cake made of ground sticky rice, sugar( sometimes light brown, white, palm, or dark brown sugar) and water, enough to make a not so thick batter almost like a pancake batter consistency then they steam it. after steaming they're taken out of the mould which is a plain seamless circular cake pans about an inch and a half in thickness. Flavoring is sometimes added, I've had ones with banana essence, almond essence, and sesame flavored ones. and then after steaming it gets packaged. And then you get it from friends and family, you never really buy your own, unless you're intending to give it to others as gifts, coz it just comes by. Here's the fun part. keeping it or giving it away. we keep a small one for our family, and give the rest away. It starts to harden once packaged, its actually better that its hard, its easier cut into 1/4inch thick rectangular pieces like the radish cake/ turnip cake which is sometimes also a part of our CNY spead. Like Mochihead said its best served toasted or fried, we dip ours in egg then fry but same concept( i think the egg makes it not stick to the pan if you're not using non stick), its good, but personally I can only have three slices max , serve with strong Ti Kuan Yin Oolong<<good stuff to wash away the greasy mouthfeel afterwards.
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Thank you for the welcome hzrt8w
glad to be a part of eGullet, and thanks for the link, I will definitely check it out this afternoon at work, my concentration at home is different when I'm at work. haha I tend to pay more attention there. adult ADD? 
but thanks again. and HAPPY NEW YEAR to everyone here!!!!! 
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Gosh...no...don't peel off the skin.....just give it a good scrub.
Pls scroll down for soaking instructions.
thanks for the site Tepee. seems like this method is ok, have you tried this method? I just hope the slow simmer won't melt the sea cuke. but thanks again, will start the process tonight and I will be back with the results.
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hahaha so do we Deja, not really very fond of it, but we end up with piles and piles from family and friends. We end up giving them away.... just like mooncakes in September, recycled gifts, I always wonder how many times its been passed around.LOL
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sourcethe dried product needs to be boiled at high temperatures for up to 20 minutes at a time over the course of a week to reconstitute it for use in cooking.thanks for the site Gifted Gourmet. But it says there that the skin needs to be peeled before the soaking process.....uhmm I think it's gonna be hard to do that without losing significant amount of "meat" from the whole creature, coz this thing is as hard as a brick.......pretty lethal when hurled at someone.
and considering its covered with the skin all over.if you've seen fresh ones that are ready to cook, they have the same skin as the one dried, same mottling and all, and I'm assuming that thats the only skin it has since, once you get past that skin its meat is almost opaquish transluscent.
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Hi all, I bought a dried sea cucumber the other day, hoping that my mom would know how to prepare it, I left the store without asking for directions on how to reconstitute the creature...went home then called mom....alas, she doesn't know either.
She said we always bought ours ready to cook. GUYSSSS I NEED HELP!!! Pleeeeeezeee! I tried looking it up on line and all it says that its tedious preparing a dried one, but none of the sites bothered putting it to detail.
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In the Philippines we have this sweet sticky rice cakes for CNY called TIKOY. Usually given as gifts to families to symbolize togetherness. They are sliced about 1/4 inch thick rectangles, dipped in beaten eggs and then pan fried till golden brown. From my research and description, I think its the same as the "Nian Kao", but im still not sure, coz I havn't seen one labeled under that name. Can someone verify?
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Po-Po insists on fu jook tong with dried oysters, fun see with dried baby shrimp, siu jook, dong goo, steamed chicken, Buddah's Delight (with fat choi, dow lam, dow see, roasted soya beans, fun see, fried tofu, siew choi - so good wrapped in lettuce leaves
), sesame glutinous rice flour balls, steamed rice flour cake, etc, etc. My s-i-l does all this for my Mom. I don't get to partake as I can't visit until the second day of the new year, so I will have to cook my own... 
The most important dishes at my Mom's table are the chicken with head and feet intact, siu yook, and good temperment!
yummmyyyyyy.......wow Deja all of those sounds good. bad timing when I opened up eGullet, I'm currently starving, but now I think im beyond that.LOL
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Hi everyone!!!! I know new year havn't even passed yet but I'm more excited about Chinese New Year, Lunar New Year for other SEA nations celebrating it on the same day(Didn't want to offend no one
). Anybody have an idea for their menu's yet? I do but it's still very incomplete, I wanted to do a nine course banquet, and I need help with ideas. Auspicious symbolic dishes. So far the only thing I'm definitely serving is 8 treasure chicken (pa po kueh), coz its been served on my family's CNY spread every year since the 1930's when my family moved from XiaMen to the Philippines, dunno how my grandparents managed to make that happen during WWII, but thats irrelevant since they survived and the recipe survived and we still continue that family tradition. Our version of Thanksgiving turkey asian style. heheheThis yummy chicken deal is stuffed with sticky rice, chinese sausage, shallots, lotus seeds, chestnuts, black mushroom, black wood ear mushrooms, the rice mixture is seasoned with dark mushroom soy sauce, xiaoshing wine, star anise, and a small piece of ginger. All of this goodness is slow baked or double steamed for a few hours, till the chicken is tender melt in your mouth. collect the juices at the bottom as there will be alot, add young corn, button mushrooms, leeks, more soy sauce if needed(use light soy so it doesnt turn black) and a little bit of sugar to balance all the flavor, thicken with slurried cornstarch and pour all over the chicken. (I'll post a more detailed recipe form if requested)
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I have to agree Kent, I can "taste" the metal in the spoon, specially with hot soups and more so on the areas of the spoon that has scratches...or maybe its just me
. But I didn't taste anything funny when using the porcelain spoons growing up and it doesnt heat up as much as a metal spoon would that leaves an owwie on your lips. -
hmmm comfort food for me is ....Cabocha squash in coconut milk with bits of ground pork and shrimps served with piping hot rice.
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Hello guys I've been wandering around these threads for the past couple of weeks!!! finally got approved today!
But back to the topic, on the meat, I usually get the fattiest brisket I can find, and cut it in large cubes. I opt for the fatty brisket because most of the fat melts as you cook it. i slow cook my beef in a clay pot for 3-4 hrs along with a stick of cinnamon, 5 star anise, a tablespoon of dark mushroom soy sauce for color, a splash or two of xiaoshing wine, a thumb size piece of smashed ginger, 2 tbsp sugar and water enough to cover the beef and additional water in the clay pot just enough to raise the water level inside to about half an inch more.........ayahhh!!! all this food talk making me hungry. and for the noodles I use shanghai noodles as well.
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It's been forever since I've had BKT, well coz first my mom always makes them at home, but since i moved out i havnt gotten the chance to cook it myself(been about 4 and a half yrs now). Although the herbs she uses are quite suspicious as they look like they've been sitting on the asian grocery shelf since the store opened......i wonder if the herbal properties have decreased in time, and some of them have been treated with sulfites as a preservative.
Tepee- do you have the scientific name of the herbs? at least I won't have to bust out my half decent mandarin in chinatown
....and made fun of by the old chinese lady behind the counter heheheAlso, anybody heard of Si But/ Si Wu (hokkien/ mandarin) before? I'm not sure if thats the version of CKT. The soup literally translate to "four things soup" the herbs are as follows: Angelica Sinensis root, Astralgus bark/root, Rhemania Glutinosa root, and White Peony stem slices/root, they almost smell like BKT after simmering in the claypot for half a day on just below boiling and we use chicken(the one with black skin), but can also use pork, mainly the hocks and some meaty soup bones. My mom makes this soup once a month for her and my sis....so sometimes twice...hehe, she said its a post PMS food, so me my brother and my dad just go with it....trust me WE DONT MIND!!!
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Bumpity-ump.
I found a source here for these clams, which I've never had before. In a previous eG thread, folks mention cleaning out "the poo." Ahem. Anyone want to enlighten? What's "the poo"? Daniel, did you clean them, or just steam them like, well, steamers?
I dunno if its the same deal as how my mom prepares the clam( any type ), she just let them sit in a bowl of fresh water for about 2-4 hrs change water every 2 hrs. you'll notice at the bottom of the bowl would be sand and errrrr
....poop, and also takes away the excess saltiness from the clams, as they start "vomiting" stuff out, you should see them squirt too once in a while, and plus the dead ones usually float if they dont ever open. -
hehehe ours don't grow to that dog-eating size either, I guess coz they really don't have a chance to grow that big before they get caught and off to the frying pan.
Austin
so it's called plaa chon in Thai?
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Snakehead Fish is very good when prepared the right way. Filipino recipes calling for a fish called "Dalag", they're referring to this fish. The texture of its meat seems like a cross between a crab and a lobster, depends on how its cooked. When perfectly done, the meat is juicy and chunky like lobster, but if overcooked, it tends to flake more like a crab. The fish is not flavorful at all, although it absorbs all the flavor of the broth its cooked into, and usually blends well with dipping sauces when broiled. The only bad part is when its caught in a pond or small lakes with no inlets or outlets, the fish tend to render a foul mudlike taste and smell similar to the water its been taken out of. This is usually an issue back in the Philippines after it rains, I dunno if its the same here.
Thai people use it alot since its indigenous to that area as well, its also called Mudfish.
Chinese New Year 2006
in China: Cooking & Baking
Posted
Whats Ham ha(Cantonese)? Can you explain further? I might know it under a different name (speaks Hokkien=ok and Mandarin=a little better)