KennethT

All six of my kencur plants have now sprouted and moved into some larger homes.

When I grew tomatoes indoors, the needed to be hand pollinated. If I wanted a fruit to set, I vibrated the truss with an electric toothbrush, otherwise the flower would drop off. I had to do similar when growing strawberries - although for that, since there were so many flowers, I used an electric hairdryer only blowing cool air.

when you grow the chilli peppers indoors, do you need to hand pollinate the flowers or do they self pollinate?

Made a new batch of sambal last week. So..... sambal grouper.

South Indian by way of Singapore.... Another try to replicate the fish head curry we had in Singapore (made with mahi mahi). This one came out really good but a lot chunkier than theirs. Maybe I'll just call it rustic. Hehe.... with masala potatoes and cucumber acar (fast pickle).

Other than luosifen, what is characteristic about the food from Guangxi? It seems (based on previous orders) to be similar to Hunan, right? It seems to be located kind of in between Hunan and Chongqing/Sichuan. Also, is the food in Guizhou similar to Sichuan as it is geographically closer?

do you ship to NY?

No, the garlic doesn't get burnt - since the stalks are thin, they don't need much time, plus I don't use very high heat in the beginning. @heidih is correct - Golden Mountain sauce is like a Thai version of Maggi. It's like liquid umami.

I make gai lan all the time. No par boiling required. I do it with a couple of different sauces - either a Thai style or a regular Chinese-ish style. All of them have in common the fact that it's best to remove the leaves from the stalks. The leaves get kind of leathery when cooked for more than a few seconds, while the stems need a bit more time. I slice the stems on the bias about 1/4" thick or so. Large leaves I'll cut in half and leave in a pile. I always cook it with garlic - maybe 3-4 cloves? I'll start stir frying the sliced stalks and chopped garlic using medium heat. Once the stalks are mostly done ( you can watch the cross section to check progress) I'll dump the leaves on top, crank up the heat and throw on the sauce. Toss around till the leaves are mostly wilted (they'll continue on the plate) and the sauce is reduced. Sauce A) 1/4C water, 1/2 t salt, 1/3t MSG, 1/2t sugar, 2/3t chicken powder (mine isn't very salty). Sauce B) 2T soy sauce, 1T oyster sauce, 1/2T Golden Mountain sauce, 1T fish sauce, 1/2t sugar and maybe a dash of water I'll add some chopped Thai chilli to the garlic if using Sauce B.

also, check your dough hydration. I'm no pizza maker but I've read enough about it. Super high temp ovens need a different hydration than regular ovens even at max temp.

I made it - it was a byproduct frying shrimp heads to crispiness before going into an Indonesian sambal. I strain and refrigerate the oil. I've never seen it in a store - in fact, the only time I think I've ever seen it at all was as a menu option for pad thai in Bangkok.

I love shrimp head oil. My belacan vegetable from last night was fried in it!

Nyonya chicken curry with belacan bok choi.

Best surf 'n' turf ever.

A tasty abomination.... Teochew Bak Kut Teh with Argentine red shrimp and mung bean noodles!!!!!

Singapore Nyonya chicken in black nut curry, ayam buah keluak, with a fast acar (Nyonya pickles).

Went down to Chinatown to pick up some pantry items and stopped at Tasty Hand Pulled Noodle.... Pork dumpling soup with fat noodles (hiding). As usual the broth is practically unseasoned but remedied by copious soy sauce, some chilli oil and a splash of black vinegar. Stir fried knife peeled noodles with chicken.

So it turns out that my kencur that I brought home from Indonesia (and now all 6 have sprouted and are growing nicely) have anti-cancer properties!! https://scitechdaily.com/scientists-discover-that-a-southeast-asian-ginger-has-anti-cancer-properties/

Yunnan style bison with 5 herbs (3 from the garden)

Ha! Anyway, my research has been focused on indoor, controlled environment growing... this wouldn't work indoors.... hehe...

Thanks. Are the wires coated in any way? Like stranded wire with the plastic coating? Or is it solid wire?

Wow! Can you go into a bit more detail of what you did, wire wise?

Trying my hand at more south Indian food - trying to get close to that fish head curry meal we had in Singapore. Mahi mahi in slightly sour curry with roasted potatoes. Both made with my home grown curry leaves.

Fascinating. Kind of like a Viet/Thai hybrid. Those sausages definitely look Vietnamese... like nem. I'm glad the bread for the banh mi was good - to me, that's what makes it. Although from my research, they don't use rice flour in Vietnam - it's wheat flour with some kind of "dough improver" built in - some say it's like Vitamin C powder. I think the pale meat like substance is not a liver or chicken but a product in Vietnam called Chả lụa which is some kind of emulsified pork sausage. It's a common component of banh mi in Saigon (along with a few other meats). It's also a common addition to banh cuon: in the upper right.

@blue_dolphin Shiso (the green/red kind @liuzhou mentioned) is commonly used in Vietnamese food as well. In Vietnamese, it's called Tiá Tô. In Southern Vietnam, like Saigon, it's a common part of the bush of herbs served in every pho shop and with things like banh xeo.