KennethT

I assume the shrimp were deep fried in order to become crispy. Were they still crispy after the time in transit and covered in sauce? I find that the crispy fried shells become kind of leathery over time, hastened when covered in sauce.

Do you know the cultivar name of the chillies you grow? I was looking to grow something like them.

@Chris HennesThanks for this. I share your love of really good gumbo. Years ago, my wife and I used to go down there once a year or so. I would get gumbo at practically every meal!

Are they raw or precooked? I've only seen them in wet markets, already deep fried and salted, ready for snacking.

Thank you - you've cracked me up. I can't tell you how many times I've looked at a classic recipe and said, "you know what this needs?? Furikake!!"

I just saw this! Thank you very much for posting your travels. Lithuania (and the other Baltics) is somewhere I may never get to. Do you speak any of the local language or do you find that English is widely spoken?

I had to use up the remaining elk from last night and keeping with the Chinese theme.... mapo tofu

I haven't done any serious cooking since before we went on vacation.... soooo sick of takeout and delivery (ours doesn't look nearly as good as @liuzhou's).... I haven't made this dish in a long time - Yunnan style elk with herbs, with 5 different herbs (2 from the garden). With sticky rice and cucumber salad. BTW - the CSO is probably the greatest tool for making sticky rice!

For me, it was vegetables. One evening, my mother decided she would make the (dreaded) spaghetti squash. I was wearing jeans, and since I found the spaghetti squash vile, I decided I'd be clever and bit by bit, put it in my pocket. I then excused myself to go to the bathroom and emptied my pocket into the toilet. Unfortunately, my pants were soaked in the pocket area in the process so I thought no one would notice when i changed pants on the way back to the table. I also wasn't very thorough in getting every bit of string out of the pocket or off the toilet rim....

I wish you and Moe were my parents! I can't say how many times I sat at the dinner table as a kid, for hours, because my parents wouldn't let me leave until I finished everything. I could have sat there all night!

Yes, that medication is no fun.

If you take a medication called methotrexate, the next day, 1 shot of anything will provide the Mother of All Hangovers. Don't ask how I know....

I don't know about this garlic, specifically, but mine lasts a LOT longer than normal when I keep it in the wine fridge. It's got the temp and humidity just like an old school root cellar.

Is it common to mix other grains with rice? I don't know if I've seen that before, other than in parts of Indonesia where they will have a few different types of rice, layered in a cone - but they're not intermixed with each other.

What are the bits of yellow in the rice?

When I was young, they would always give me flat ginger ale when I was sick. Probably why I'm not a fan of ginger ale now!

Just for completeness, the reasons I added quite a decent amount of sugar were two-fold: 1) When I'm not feeling well, I find that slightly sweet is soothing, but 2) sugar can help ease nausea, according to the Cleveland Clinic. You need to scroll down quite a bit, but the essence is:

It seems like they made a large flat slice and steeped in boiling water in a teapot. The slice seemed to be about 3 inches long, 1 inch wide and maybe 1/8 inch thick or so. Let it steep like 5 minutes. It should make a couple cups. I made sure to add maybe 1.5 teaspoons of sugar to each cup.

Thanks. Yeah, unfortunately we're 2 for 2 of our most recent trips for getting sick! However, I will add that I am pretty sure that when we were sick in Penang over Christmas, we actually brought it with us from home so I don't know if that counts... But there is no remainder of the trip - we've been home now for about a week. Like all of our trips, it's way too short! I'm back to normal, or maybe 95% and my wife is getting back too. Last night was the first time we considered eating anything with any kind of flavor! Hopefully I'll be able to get back to cooking soon, but jet lag is still kicking my butt a bit, so between work and trying to go to bed early, we're just ordering in this week.

That pipian dip looks similar to the dip used for calsots in Barcelona during the season. Also, does the infrared grill give you that kind of smoky grilled flavor at all? I remember reading in Modernist Cuisine that the grilled flavor came from burning aerosolized fat that would drop off of foods as they approached the hot coals. I don't know if those infrared lamps get nearly hot enough to do that though.

those noodles are in the refrigerated section

What is sweet ham?

This is what I get - I get them at my local HMart... https://www.sayweee.com/en/product/Havista-Shanxi-Planed-Fresh-Noodles/11183?sales_org_id=16&region_id=000007&campaign_id=MOFU_e-GLOBAL_t-Shopping_l-EN_r-Broad_src-GADS_o-dweb&utm_source=gads&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=MOFU_e-GLOBAL_t-Shopping_l-EN_r-Broad_src-GADS_o-dweb&cam_id=20034217573&utm_adgroup=149235472500&keyword=&ftu=popupall&ftuflags=48&gclid=Cj0KCQjwqs6lBhCxARIsAG8YcDgujUbpZ56ZL7ap5PQZqaVohAn8DYj9XsZq732dIaKe_-FoziERMesaAtrhEALw_wcB

First time back in the kitchen in a long while... My wife is finally getting ready for some real food again, so I thought a good intro is Singapore style Bak Kut Teh with lots of slow cooked garlic and Sumatran black pepper, and Argentinian red shrimp (with knife peeled noodles).

What are the rice paddy fish like? It's hard to tell from the photo - how big are they? Seems about 3-4" long. I assume you eat the heads as well?