SC - Old Wives Cleaning

[Philip & Susan Troy]

Well, as it turned out, the red bean paste I had got thrown out in the
recent shuffle of re-doing the kitchen.  Instead, I decided to carve a
dragon out of daikon, and it turned out just great.  I used three large
daikon, one chunk about 6 inches long for the head, a curvy piece (which
I accentuated) for a nice serpentine body segment about 12 inches long,
and another rather oddly shaped piece roughly 8 inches long that went for
the tail.  I used a book from my Garde Manger days called Chinese
Appetizers and Garnishes, and followed the pictures for their dragon
boat, and went from there.  I also made Four Fruits Soup, which is mung
beans, barley, dates, and glutinous rice, all soaked and then cooked
together, seasoned with sugar to taste, and topped with chopped peanuts
w/sugar and salt.  It was interesting, (not bad, just different) but
after the first couple of bites, it really started to grow on me and I
finished my bowl.  On my hostesses' suggestion, I made a Vietnamese
meatloaf, with ground pork, chopped mushrooms (aging criminis from my
fridge), chopped scallions, egg, flour, s&p, and soaked mung bean thread.
 It came out really nicely, and she made a rice and pork skin dish to go
with it.  We also had pork dumplings; fried prawns; chicken wings with
something like teriyaki sauce; a Korean 9-item appetizer (with more like
12 items) with pancakes, sliced veggies, and meats; Mongolian Beef;
jasmine rice; stir-fried chicken with fish sauce; a watermelon and mango
punch; sake; red wine; and plum wine; and a platter of traditional
candied fruits we got at a local oriental market with candied lychee
nuts, soursops, limes, carrot slices, sweet potato, coconut, ginger,
chestnuts and winter melon.  Our hostess also had a pitcher of what she
was calling Frog's Egg Pudding, (it looked very much like that) that was
actually a drink/pudding of Holy Basil Seeds, soaked for two days in
lychee juice and sugar.  The seeds were a dark spot surrounded by a
pastel bluish-grey sack, floating densly in a liquid.  It was good, but
sure looked strange!  After eating we made our hosts sit down and watch
an episode of IRON CHEF, which they had never seen before, to the
enjoyment of everyone.  We had fun, the food and company was great, even
if we didn't get to shoot off any fireworks.  Kind of a quiet way to
start the Year of the Dragon, which is usually marked by turbulent change
eventually resulting in good.  It should be an interesting year, and
we'll hope the old Chinese saying "May you live in interesting times"
doesn't turn out to be too much of a curse!
	Happy New Year!
	Christianna
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