Korean BBQ and hot pot - February 13th, 2008

It was one of those nights where I was getting sick of our rotation of foods at home. How do I take a break from it? It starts with figuring out what I wanted to eat, and at that time, my brothers were craving Korean food. Sure, why not. I started to butter my parents up for it, with the help of my brothers of course. We convinced our dad and my mom was dragged along (not literally). To Bulgogi Garden!

Can't remember our exact order, but we had one of the marinated beef orders (for the grill) and one of the hot pots.

To start, we were each given some miso soup. Mmm..

Next, we were given a bunch of little things to eat with rice and whatever you ordered (called banchan).

I remember that when our waitress brought everything for the grill, she started placing everything on the grill for us. I'm sure she was only trying to be helpful, but it was kinda annoying how she kept coming back and checking our meat.

Our hot pot looked pretty impressive. It looked exactly like the picture in their menu. The bad thing about it all was that everything cooked all at once, when we didn't want to eat it all at once. The pile of meat turned into a cooked meat ball. That wasn't fun. The soup was good. I also liked the thicker and firmer glass noodles they used. If they want to keep the presentation, they just need to keep a platter of veggies and meat separate from the soup.

We found it expensive, but we were all full and it was a warm meal for a cold night.

~*~*~

Address:

Bulgogi Garden

702 Somerset Street W,

Ottawa, ON

613-236-0001

The Making of Xiao Long Bao

I know I'm not finished my posting yet.. but my mom and I tried to make soup dumplings for the first time earlier today, and it was sooo good!

After reading about soup dumplings for so long (probably the past year), I finally decided to try to make it - with my mom's help, of course. My mom can probably make any food out there. How? No clue. But it's almost always really good. lol Almost. I found a recipe online for the dumplings, just as a guideline and made the jellied soup yesterday (by taste), meat filling (I used the filling for pot stickers.. same thing, right?), while my mom made the wrappers from scratch. I didn't take any pictures cause I was busy wrapping, then cleaning, then eating. Here's someone else's picture of soup dumplings though.

Photo courtesy of http://singapuradailyphoto.blogspot.com/

The dumplings just tasted like really juicy pot stickers. =) It was funny trying to watch my little brother trying to pop the whole thing in his mouth. I was expecting a scene like the explosive pissing beef balls in God of Cookery (skip to 7:09 to see what scene I'm talking about.. and watch part 6 to see them start up their business) Hahaa.. I love it!

Happy New Years!

Merry Christmas!

We both wish you all a Merry Christmas and hope you all have an awesome holiday break! This is a time to stuff yourself, so go enjoy the food and eat, eat eat! For those who plan to go Boxing Day shopping, have fun waiting in line.. kekee ^_^

Beavertails!

When you're spending time in Ottawa during the winter, you HAVE to have a beavertail. Have to. Here's a picture of my kilaloe sunrise beavertail I had a while back. Mmm.. I could definitely go for one of those and a cup of hot chocolate right about now. It's not a great picture, but don't worry, I'll get a better picture with my D300 this winter break. Heh.

For those who don't know, it's not a real beavertail. It's a whole wheat bread that's stretched out to look like a beaver's tail, which is then deep fried, then it's spread with butter and covered with cinnamon and sugar, oh, and I can't forget about the lemon juice on top. Check out their site for more information.

~ Christine

Bun bo hue and Guong - January 16th, 2008

According to Wiki, the proper name for guong is 'gỏi cuốn'.

This particular weekend, my aunt decided that our weekly lunch and dinner get together would be held at her place. She was preparing guong and bun bo hue.
I believe that this was the first time my aunt brought out these pink guong plates.. lol. I don't know what it's called. It's pretty much a plastic strainer that was flattened. What is it used for, you ask? Well to make these summer rolls, you need to soften the rice paper. Now if you're serving a lot of people, like we were here, you can soften a lot of them and place them on the pink plate things, to make it easier for people to start the wrapping process. We usually just have a couple of deeper plates of really warm water/hot water at the table to share... but I like this way better, because it saves table space.

Our fillings were some sort of noodle stir fry, vermicelli noodles, shrimp, lettuce, mint, thai basil, bean sprouts and some sort of herb that look like the spades on playing cards, but smelt like fish. Yeah. Weird... I know, but people like it! No, not I, but other people. Anyway, here are the steps to wrapping your very own summer roll. Who needs to order these in restaurants, when it's THIS easy to make at home?

Step 1:
You'll need to get your fillings prepared. A stir fry of some sort with noodles and meat, slices of meat, vietnamese sausage (the sweet one that is kind of bright pink), lettuce, thai basil, mint leaves, some fish sauce dipping sauce (it's called nuoc cham), and really, anything you want.

Step 2:
Boil some water in a pan of some sort. It will make it easier when you soften up the rice paper.

Step 3:
Take a rice paper and dunk it into the hot water. As soon as the hot water touches the rice paper, it will soften. Make sure the whole rice paper is softened... but don't let it soak for longer than 5 secs. Place your ready to eat rice paper on a plate or on these pink plate things for wrapping.

Step 4:
Start piling your fillings on one side of the rice roll, in a relative rectangular area. It will help when you're wrapping it. If you want to have an easier time wrapping your summer roll, I suggest you don't fill it too much, because it'll probablt rip on you.

Step 5:
Once you have the filling you want in your summer roll (don't worry, if you wanted more things, you can just make more!), take the end closest to the filling and fold it over your filling.

Step 6:
Fold in the sides of the rice paper.

Step 7:
Roll everything relatively tightly. Tada! This beautifully wrapped one is mine.

Step 8 & 9:
Repeat until you have three or four and then serve with nuoc nam. You should make a couple at a time, because when you eat these, they dissapear really quickly. Dip and eat, then repeat.


I thought this was our lunch, even though my mom told me that my aunt was making bun bo hue, too. I didn't see the huge pot when we were there, so I forced myself to eat the first two rolls I made. You see, I'm usually not a fan of these summer rolls. I was hungry and I thought that this was all we were having for lunch, so I had to fill up. That wasn't too hard after the first two rolls I made. Watching other people wolf theirs down also made me hungrier. Heh. By the time I was on my fourth roll, my aunt told us to stop making them because the bun bo hue was almost ready. Everyone's expression said the same thing: "What? More food?" I guess I wasn't the only one who thought that guong was lunch.

The pot was hiding in the backyard on the burner the whole time. Silly pot of bun bo hue. You can't hide forever! My uncle brought the pot into the kitchen and turned on the burner to let it simmer.

My aunt was making the thick noodles in the meanwhile. The toppings to bun bo hue were: congealed cubes of pig's blood, slices of beef brisket, processed/mystery meat and tendons. The other toppings included onions, green onions and cilantro.

I was really full at this point and couldn't eat much more. But when I had a taste of the soup, my stomach felt half full/empty. Is that a bad thing? I grabbed a small bowl and slurped it all down. Man, I remember the soup to be a bit sweeter. It reminded me of chinatown's pho. The sweet stuff. It wasn't as sweet as theirs and it was definitely an awesome pot of soup.

(Update: BAH! I found out that I already blogged about this... grrr... I had a feeling that I already did. When I was writing this out, I was wondering how I was remembering so much of it.. lol)

~ Christine

Costco - January 9th, 2008

Can't remember what lead us to Costco. It certainly wasn't for groceries. I think it was just a random craving for their cheap eats. Four hot dogs, four drinks and one order of awesome french fries (I'm 97% sure they use Cavendish fries). A nice quick, cheap and filling meal. Mind you, you'll taste garlic for the rest of the day. It's a small sacrifice I'm willing to make once in a while.

Dim Sum - January 8th, 2008

I went to have dim sum with my friend and it was yummy. I've included some other dim sum pics, so that I don't have to write another brief entry.

The end.

~*~*~

Address:

Yangtze
700 Somerset Street W
Ottawa, ON
(613) 236-0555

Home!

I'm now home. I shall get back to posting after another two or three days. Good luck to everyone still writing exams!!

~ Christine

Horrible Night

I ventured out to the Union Train Station to buy my train ticket two days ago, for when I go home in December, and decided to go out for some dinner. I wasn't sure what to eat. It was either dim sum or pho. When I got off of the street car, I decided that if the last digit of the time was an odd number I'd go have some pho, but if it was an even number I'd go have some dim sum. I flipped open my cell phone and the last digit was zero. I took that as an even number. Should I have? Whatever, I went to go to a small restaurant called Rol San. I've been there once before with my cousin, just a couple of weeks ago, and it was a good experience so I wanted to give it another go.

The restaurant was pretty packed when I walked in just after 6:30. I saw that there was one free table that had 4 chairs. I also noticed that there was an older couple just finishing up their meal so I waited. I waited some more. I stood there foolishly for about 10 minutes, without a word. I got looks from some of the waiters, on waiter even brought a huge stack of menus and placed in at the front desk, where I was standing, without even asking me if I was being helped out. I was getting impatient and showed it by purposely taking one of the menus and "looked through it". Just then, a group of three ladies came through the door. A waiter immediately greeted them. They asked if they still served dim sum and were told that they stop serving it at 4 in the afternoon. Well, that helps me a bit. They talked amongst themselves for a couple of seconds and chose to eat there instead of going to find a place that served dim sum. They were showed to the free table that had the 4 chairs. I watched as the older couple took their time finishing their dessert for a moment before I was fed up with being neglected (not just because they didn't serve dim sum). I left the restaurant and decided to go to another place that I knew served dim sum all day.

On my way to the Forestview Restaurant, I remembered that I wanted to take Lucy to eat at a place called Asian Legend for some soup dumplings (xiao long bao). I've read great things about their soup dumplings and was curious as to where the restaurant was located. I remember that it was on Dundas W, but couldn't remember which way. I walked past the House of Gourmet blah blah blah, past the Forestview Restaurant, past the bubble tea place, and a couple of hot pot places. I was ready to turn around and just go and eat, when I saw the place. The restaurant is almost at the end of the Chinatown section of Dundas W, I believe. Anyway, there was a huge line up inside of the restaurant. I was surprised at first, but then the more I thought about it, the more I wasn't. Cool. I headed to the Forestview Restaurant while still debating whether I should go for pho instead. Nah, I'm already here.

I went up the stairs and was seated right behind the table that the manager and another lady were eating at. I noticed a couple of things right away: the restaurant was setting up for a small wedding reception at the back of the restaurant, two large tables beside me were reserved for a large get together (which was about the same amount of people that we have in our family when we go out for a special occasion), there was a large table of white uni/college students having dinner and there were two large tables in the corner that were in the middle of their meal. Not too bad, I guess.

I ordered some phoenix claws, siu mai, har gow, dumpling in soup, a crab claw (which is a deep fried shrimp ball formed around a crab claw), and some soft tofu for dessert. The soft tofu came out first. I was confused. Are they stupid? Why would you serve a dessert first? If you thought that was bad, I had to wait over 10 minutes while my next dish came. I was sitting there with my soft tofu before anyone from the two large tables beside me even showed up. I watched a waitress carry a bunch of spring rolls for the white students, while I was sitting there with my dessert and tea. I was STILL sitting there with my tea and dessert when the two tables beside were full and getting food.

At one point, a waitress was carrying a bunch of things which included a steamer of har gow. My waitress noticed that I still had nothing and was thinking about giving their har gow to me. She held the steamer for a second and said something to the other waitress and then let the white people have their stuff. Damn them for teasing me! Damn them for not timing the orders right! Damn them and their shitty service!

Just as I was waving down the manager to complain about waiting for over 10 minutes for my food, I saw, out of the corner of my eye, that one of the waitresses was carrying two steamers and some other stuff. I looked over and sure enough, it was my stuff. My crab claw, ha gow and siu mai. The only thing I was missing was my dumpling in the soup and the phoenix claws. While I was eating, I noticed that the male manager wearing a pink dress shirt kept staring at the food at all the tables. He even stood right behind someone at the large table beside me, watching people eat. Creepy, much? He almost looked like he was close to drooling at one point. I thought that was weird, because he just finished eating when I got there.

While I was munching on my stuff and waiting for the other stuff to come, I pretty much watched the two full tables beside me get all of their food. I saw that they pre-ordered their stuff, as their soup arrived not even 5 minutes after the last person arrived. They even ordered a plate of chow mien, because the kids were hungry. Their table reminded me of my large family and how we usually take over two large tables. This family/party had more kids though. Anyway, they had soup, the chow mien, peking duck, a sizzling plate of sweet and sour pork, veggies and pork, deep fried fish, ginger and onion lobster, ermm.. and I can't remember what else. I can't remember what we usually order, but they seemed like they ordered more than we usually do. I wanted to mention this, just because this made me miss my family even more. It didn't help that I was having a shitty night, either.

Anyway, the dumpling in the soup came. The last time (and first time) I had this, was when I ate at Rol San's. I remember the soup tasting like sweet broth mixed with the sweet juices of siu mai meat. Sounds gross, but I enjoyed it the last time. When I was sipping some of the soup from my spoon, I realised that some of the soup was still jelly. It wasn't cold or anything, but that just meant that it wasn't heated through properly. I stopped eating it and just finished the crab claw.

Another waitress came over and dropped off a dish of spare ribs on my table. I told her that I didn't order it and that I ordered the phoenix claws. I think she misunderstood me when I was pointing at the dim sum menu. Whatever. She went to the manager and said something along the lines of "She claims that she didn't order this, but she pointed at it. She said she wanted the phoenix claws instead." The manager replied something like "yeah, just give it to her." He came back, took the spare ribs away, then he continued to stare at the tables and the food at the other table.

My stomach was getting full with all the tea I was drinking. I was probably had two more cups of tea left in the tea pot before realising that I needed to eat at least one of the phoenix claws before bringing everything back home and finishing my tofu dessert that patiently waited with me for the 40 minutes that I was in the restaurant. While waiting for my phoenix claws to arrive, I looked over at the table of uni/college kids and realised that they didn't have any food left on their table. They were getting their food sporadically as well. I think they got more spring rolls and it looked like they didn't order it. They all had that expression that can say "is this ours?" or "wow, it took them that long to make this?" I can see that I was not the only one in the restaurant that was unhappy.

My chicken feet/phoenix claws finally came. I ate one and asked to doggy bag the phoenix claws, siu mai and har gow. As the manager was doing that, I finally dug into my dessert. I used the spoon that they gave me with tofu (just another soup spoon), because my spoon still had some of the soup and a bit of the phoenix claw sauce on it. My first taste of the tofu was weird. I couldn't put my finger on the taste, but I knew one thing: it didn't taste right at all. The second spoon I had revealed the taste - soap. It tasted like someone either put the soap in my tofu somehow, the dish was dirty, or the spoon was dirty. I smelt the bowl of tofu and I didn't smell the soap. I smelt the spoon and it smelt of soap. Wow, can they fuck up anymore? I wiped my dirty spoon with my napkin and with a bit of tea and then used it to continue to eat the sweet tofu. I asked for the bill and it came up to a total of $22 something. I gave them $22 + some change from my wallet. It wasn't more than two dollars, I can assure you all of that.

I should've complained about the service, the soup dumpling that had not been heated through properly, the soapy spoon, the bill and maybe, if I was really on a rampage, actually complain about the creepy manager staring at everyone's food. I didn't though. Could've, should've, would've. I was just not in the mood at all. There are no pictures, but I will substitute it with other pictures that I've used in the past (or future pictures) later.

I did not make any of this up. This is how bad my night was. I was neglected by the Rol San staff, pretty much neglected by the Forestview Restaurant staff as well, and suffered the horrible service at the latter restaurant. Would I go to these restaurants again? Yup. Why? Well, let's just say that next time I go to Forestview, it'll be with my uncle that knows their owner or whatever. Oh and now I know not to go to Rol San's by my lonesome after 4, even if I did want to order some dishes to eat.

I just feel like I needed to share my experience with you all (aka Angie). Just as a heads up. ^_^

~*~*~

Addresses:

Union Train Station

65-75 Front St W

Toronto, ON

416-393-4636

Rol San

323 Spadina Ave,

Toronto, ON

416-977-1128

Forestview Chinese Restaurant Ltd.

466-468 Dundas St W,

Toronto, ON

416-597-0319

Asian Legend

418 Dundas St W,

Toronto, ON

416-977-3909

Dim Sum and Hot Pot - December 28th, 2007

So here's a little reminder about what was going on back then.

My aunt from Hong Kong was still over, which meant that we'd go out whenever we didn't feel like cooking - we, as in the large extended family. I didn't mind at all, because we usually don't go out as a family often. That wasn't the case as of late, because of our family visiting from out of the country (my great aunt from Paris, France, visited for the month of October).

~*~


We went to have dim sum at Chu Shing and it okay. Just an average dim sum outing. Actually, thinking back, it was a bit better than average because we sat a couple of tables away from the doors to the kitchen. That meant that we'd pretty much get the first picks. I love when that happens. Erm. Yup. We had two large tables, one with most of the adults, my grandparents, and the other table with the "kids", my uncle and my aunt (from China).

Before I show some pictures, I would like to mention that when we were pouring our first pot of tea, my uncle got a dead bug in his cup. It looks like a fly or something. (Crappy photo, I know). When we mentioned it to the staff, they just took his tea cup, dumped the crap, and gave my uncle a new tea cup. They didn't even change the tea pot, until we pointed it out. Like, come on, it doesn't take a genius to figure out where the bug came from. If there was a bug already in the tea cup, I'm sure the people setting the tables up would've noticed. Also, we would've noticed it when we first sat down and definitely wouldn't poor tea into the cup that had the dead bug. I wasn't impressed with that at all. What do you think?

Here's the turnip cake that tastes like congee (in my opinion). But you know what, it actually looks good pretty tasty in this photo.

Here are the balls of deep fried shrimp. We didn't need the sweet sauce.

I believe the dish in the front is stewed tendons? Behind that is the chicken feet. I can't make out the other two dishes behind the chicken feet.


Finally, here's the bug I was talking about. How appetizing...

We ate more things, but I just didn't take pictures of them.

(Edit: I just realised that I've already posted about this, lol. You can see what I wrote here. LOL I can't believe this was the time Lucy was violated by the chicken feet.)

That night, we had hot pot for dinner. We made a quick broth using Campbell's Chicken Broth, water, napa cabbage, dried scallops, chicken bones and some other things.

The fixings included tofu, beautifully marbled beef (cut into thin slices by my uncle), enoki mushrooms, squid, bok choy, beef balls, and the green stuff at the top (I believe they're called watercress). As a dipping sauce, we mixed satay sauce and hoisin sauce, with Sriracha sauce on the side. Some of my relatives like to use fish sauce mixed with Sriracha sauce as their dipping sauce. I think it's too salty.

We also had glass noodles as a choice. Erm, we had rice too.

The only thing I really remember of that night, was the beef. Because my uncle sliced them very thinly, it only took a second to cook them medium in the hot pot. The beef just melted in your mouth. It was so good that no one touched the frozen beef. Oh, I didn't mention that we also had that? Well, we did, because I remember that once the beautifully marbled beef was gobbled up by everyone, I tried a couple of the frozen stuff, and it was just not the same. Not at all. So I remembered two things from that night. Woops.

For dessert, we had a coconut cream pie. Not sure where it was purchased, but it was pretty yummy.

As we drove home, it started to snow. It was still snowing when we got home, so I snapped this pic.

~*~*~

Chu Shing

691 Somerset Street West

Ottawa, Ontario

613-233-8818

Missing Entries

I've looked through some of my pictures - my digital pictures, and I realised that I haven't posted about a bunch of things. Here's a rough outline of the posts coming up: 

December 28th: Hot pot

January 3rd: Pho

Jan. 4th: Eating out

Jan. 8th: Dim sum

Jan. 9th: Costco

Jan. 12th: Another time we went out

Jan. 16th: Goi Cuon

Jan. 21st: Beavertails

Jan. 23rd: More dim sum

February 13th: Korean BBQ

Feb. 16th: Winterlude

I'm not sure if I'll be posting about ALL of these, but we'll see. 

Finally! Toronto Pho! - November 2nd

My friend and I went back to Chinatown to take pictures for some assignments and to.. uhh.. scout... yes.. scout... for our upcoming assignment in Digital Photography class. The assignment will be a documentary-styled shoot and yes. That's pretty much all we've been told about it. But yes. 

It was a particularly windy day when we went. Quite chilly, actually. That is why I decided to go and find a pho place. I remember seeing pho restaurants around chinatown, but couldn't recall where they were. And so we walked around and found the Pho 88. I'm sure a lot of people know where it is. It looks really nice. Too nice for a pho place, if you ask me. Honestly, all you need is good food and a decent interior. Meh. Points for trying to hard.. lol. When we walked in, most of the tables in the restaurant were being occupied. It's funny, because when I was explaining 'pho restaurants' to my friend, I mentioned that there's always people there eating. Always. And during lunch, people always go in and out. That's what I love about pho. it's so quick. Come in, sit, order, eat, pay the bill, and leave. Some people wolf down their bowls sooo quickly! It's nuts. Anyway, yes. The restaurant smelt good. It smelt like a typical pho restaurant. 

While Ben was trying to wrap his mind around all of the menu choices, I suggested that he get either a bowl of pho, like I was going to have, or the vermicelli salad with spring rolls and the BBQ pork. Attracted by the small picture of the vermicelli salad on the menu, Ben decided to order that. 

I was excited for pho. The last time I had it was back when I went to Ottawa over the Thanksgiving long weekend. Oh, and I've never had pho in Toronto. Wait, that's a lie. Never mind. This is the third time. It's pretty rare when I eat pho in Toronto. Crazy, eh? Well, I guess when you have the best noodles (my noodles) being made here in Toronto, there's no need for pho. Plus, you know what? Homemade pho is better. I'm sure it's healthier, too! Alrighty.. so back to our late lunch/early dinner...

We were both excited about what we ordered. Ben's dish came out first.

Now the picture doesn't really show it, but it was a huge spring roll. Man, looking at the picture now, it looks really REALLY good. Back then, I didn't think anything of it because only pho was in my mind.

My small bowl of pho came not long after Ben's dish came out. It's not a good picture of it, but whatever. It's a picture for you all to see - it's better than nothing!

So our early dinner came up under $20. It's expected. That's with Ben's strawberry and banana milkshake. lol

That is the first real food entry in a very long time. Since what... February? Yikes.

[Update: Wow. So much trouble uploading these damn pictures. Be happy that the pics are up... BE HAPPY!!]

[Update 2: I tried to upload the pictures again into a medium sized picture, just to see if it'll work.. AND IT DID!  I'm very happy.]

Mmm.. Almonds and Chocolate

We had an assignment earlier this month, in Commercial Lighting, to show texture. I chose to shoot almonds, chocolate chips, and chocolate almonds. See the theme? I'm not sure if you can tell from the picture, but I tried to shape them into a yin-yang. I spent almost 20 minutes trying to shape the whole project into a yin-yang, when I realised that I was a bit short on everything. Now I know not to snack on my assignment when I'm doing it. It also took me that long because the chocolate almonds kept rolling off. As you can see in the top left corner of the picture, I outlined the yin-yang with the chocolate chips. What do you guys think? 

Okay, I'm having issues with uploading my pictures onto the site. I can only upload my pictures as small ones, and not medium sized. It says that there's an internal error when I try uploading it a size larger.  =(

 

Chinatown? Pictures?

Good news: I finally went to chinatown!! Yaaaaaaaay!

Bad news: I didn't take any pictures though...

Why? Shock? lol I don't know. I had my camera with me.. we went to the House of Gourmet blah, blah, blah, restaurant and had my noodles, too! I'm thinking back to it, and it's pretty sad how I didn't take ANY pictures. You know what's also sad? I don't think that I've eatten there since... my day trip to Toronto. That's over a year ago! Man.. that's tragic.

I went to Kensington Market as well. What is Kensington Market? Well, it's probably two small streets with little shops. It's pretty cute. Since I've been going to school here, I've heard about Kensington Market sooo many times, but I've never known where or what it was. When some friends told me that it was right beside chinatown, I couldn't recall seeing a non-asian market in the area... so when my friend and I walked down to the market, I was very surprised. It's very close to the restaurant. I'd estimate that it takes about 5 minutes to walk from the House of Gourmet restaurant to the market.

I have an assignment that I have to do next week, and I'll have to go to Kensington Market again... so I'll have pictures up FOR SURE. I'm so excited.

Hope everyone is enjoying the weather out ^_^  Here's a picture that I took for one of my location shoots. It's to remind everyone that it's still fall, despite the cold weather and, in some parts, snowfall.  (Edit: hmm, it wouldn't work when I tried to upload this medium sized. Meh.)

~ Christine

A Great Tutorial for Photographers

Lucy sent me a link to the VeganYumYum blog which had a great post about taking pictures today, so I checked it out and was pleasantly surprised. This sums up almost everything that I've learnt in all of my photography classes up to now. I recommend that every beginner/amateur photographer read this and make their own notes, as a checklist for when they go out and take pictures. Click on the link below.

Food Photography for Bloggers

~Christine 

Soon!!

Hiya! I've moved to Toronto for school, as Lucy mentioned (I think it's just 'T-dot'). I'm taking photography at Humber College. It's a pretty fun program with awesome profs. I can't wait for better assignments, as we are just making contact sheets right now.

Now that I'm in Toronto... I'm that much closer to the tastiest makers of "My Noodles!" Woot! I haven't been able to explore Toronto yet, but no worries. Within, I'd say a month, I'll get out and eat more.. which only means more entries! Yay! It's a win-win situation, don't you see? I get to go out and eat, satisfying my cravings for food, and you get to read all about it! Can't wait!

Oh, about the slideshow I mentioned 5ish months ago... I'll be going home this weekend so I'll be able to upload my pictures from the family computer. Yay! Everything is finally coming together. Have a good Friday and have a good weekend everyone!

~Christine

Sashiburi!

We've been totally awful with posting lately, but it's for a good reason. Christine is now living in the T-dot-O (known to everyone else as Toronto) and going to school for photography! Congratulations!

I've been busy with school and work and extracurriculars, and then summer school and work, and then full-time work, and now school and work and extracurriculars again. Do not fear, loyal readers (all two of you)--Christine and I have been taking pictures all summer. We will gradually get back to posting regularly.

For now, I will attempt to appease you, the two loyal readers, with a picture of a chocolate cake (courtesy of YumSugar) that I'm lusting to bake once the weather cools down a bit more.

See you guys soon!

~Lucy

Holy Smokes!

Holy cannoli Batman!! It's been more than a month since the last post. Pathetic - I know, and I'm sorry. I haven't forgotten about the blog!

Here's a little update: I was busy with my application to college, my camera broke and, I was sick in the hospital (back home now).

I will begin to start finishing up some posts soon and create a new slideshow. Sorry for the inactivity (again). Stay tuned!




~Christine

Chinese New Year! - February '08

Let me start off my saying this, "I LOVE Chinese New Year!" There's so many people, dishes of food and hilarious conversations that can be found at our Chinese New Year celebrations. Good times... oh, good times!

I thought I would combine my Chinese New Year posts in one entry, that way all the awesome pictures are in one place.

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My grandpa decided to host his during the weekend (before the actual date of Chinese New Year) so that everyone could join in the festivities. My grandma chose to host hers on the actual day.

So during our drive to his house, I saw how beautiful it was outside. It had snowed last night and everything looked so pretty. It was one of the storms that hit most of the eastern coast. Here's a picture of a large mountain of snow near my house.


As we drove along the parkway, I saw that most of the trees had a cute coat on, so I took a couple of pictures. I think this is the best one.


Once we arrived at my grandparent's house, we started the prep work; washing and slicing veggies, chopping up meat, fixing the broth, setting the table, etc.

Then my grandpa arrived with all of the meats from Chinatown: BBQ pork, soy chicken, roast pork, squid, pig stomach and duck. We finished everything, but before we could eat, we had to first invite our ancestors to come have the feast, give thanks, pray for good luck in the future, and then burn hell money and coloured paper so that they have money to spend and different coloured material (to make clothing).
Yum yum. So that was all at my grandpa's place. Now for my grandma's place...


We (my dad and I) got there early to help my grandma and uncle prepare everything because everyone else was working. We did the prep work and then my uncle and I left for Chinatown to bring home the tasty meats. You usually have to go to pick up your meat around 10:30ish if you want to beat the rush hour. The stores that sell the BBQ meats will be packed the weekend before and the weekend after Chinese New Year, because different people host their Chinese New Year event at different times. We ran to one place to try and buy some meat, but they didn't have any roast pork when we were there, so we picked up what we could and ran across the street to grab the roast pork.

It was almost 10:45am when we got across to the other store, the Kowloon Market. There was a line here. It was pretty long. Let's see, I see about 10 heads here. I took this picture about halfway down the line, so imagine how long you would have to wait. Look at the roast pork behind the dude with the green and white shirt. Everyone who was in this long ass line wanted a piece of that. They obviously had more in the back, but I'm assuming they were being prepared. My uncle (he's near the front of the line) said that he thought that the guy in front of him was going to take the rest of the roast pork, because there was only about a handful of ribs left. Luckily, he only took two or three. How tense. I would freak out if someone in front of me took the whole thing. Anyway, we got a couple of ribs and left enough for two people (or one greedy bastard).

 
I should also mention that their bakery was practically cleaned out. They still had their usual things on the table in front of the shelves of baked goods though. I should've known. *Tear* If you wanted something from the bakery, you would probably have to call ahead and find out when they're baking. We don't buy anything from the bakery during Chinese New Year. My grandpa brings some back randomly though. Anyway, yeah. If I could describe how busy and full it was in the stores, I'd compare it to Boxing Day. This is our Boxing Day. Everyone is shopping for meat, there are crazy line ups, everyone is trying to get something, and things run out quickly. Does that sound like Boxing Day to you?

Wow, that's a lot random talking I just did. So back to buying the ribs...

After we bought the ribs, we headed back to my grandma's house. The table was pretty much waiting for the meat and the hot pot when we got arrived. Here's a look at 4 dishes that were prepared, starting clockwise with the top-right dish: two kinds of mushrooms with shrimp and squid, shiitake mushroom and bamboo, chicken and Chinese broccoli, and sugar snap peas with shrimp.
  Here's a close up of the hot pot. I'm focusing on the daikon - the star of my grandma's soup. You can see some nappa cabbage, fish balls, and I think I see the tail of a shrimp.
 
Anyway, it's too bad you guys can't taste this soup, because this soup cures all. I mean, I say that about to pho, but that's just because I love to eat it. This, however, does cure... err... you... of some things. There's so many good things my grandma adds to this soup; nappa cabbage, carrots, onions, daikon, chicken bones, chicken meat, shrimp, and other things. How is that not good for you? Come on. I want to master this recipe. This is the best soup someone can have - just look at it.

Alright, so moving on... here's the table when everything was finished. Starting from the top-right again: rice pot, platter of meat, hot pot, sauces that go with the meat (the two small containers beside the meat plate), the four stir fried dishes, chow mien with shredded napa cabbage, carrots and bean sprouts, jang (aka zongzi), a plate of baked goods (hmm, don't really remember buying that. I guess there were some baked buns left), a plate of fruit (the thing in the yellow bag is lychee, green and purple grapes, and apples), a cantaloupe, red bean jello (beside the cantaloupe), salted sunflower seeds, some cans of pop, incense, hell money, coloured paper, tea pot, alcohol, bowls, utensils, tea cups, shot glasses, the candles and the incense base.

As you can imagine, the homemade feast was moan-inducing. I over-ate again. No surprise there. I can't help myself. This is my Thanksgiving. This is when I stuff myself to the point where I waddle when I walk. I'm looking forward to next year's celebration! It's more than a month late (>_<), but Happy Chinese New Year!

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