[Sca-cooks] Regarding the Size of Rissoles

[Phil Troy / G. Tacitus Adamantius]

Also sprach Bill Fisher:
>On Wed, 13 Oct 2004 09:09:05 +1000, Margaret Rendell
><m_rendell at optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
>>  sorry to drag out inter-kingdom terminology again, but I had difficulty
>>  with this thread at first, not realising that a 'rissole' might be
>>  something in pastry. So if US 'rissoles' are wrapped in pastry, what
>>  would you call an Australian rissole: basically a large
>>  meatball/roundish hamburger patty fried in a pan or grilled (I think
>>  you'd say 'broiled')?
>>  And what is an egg roll?
>>
>>  Margaret/Emma
>>
>
>Downhill, usually.
>
>Uhm,  an eggroll is deep fried wrapped asian food,  Usually cabbage, sprouts,
>pork, wrapped in what is called an eggroll wrapper (rice based w/ 
>egg) and then
>deep fried. The meat is typically cooked before adding it to the roll,
>veggies are
>raw.

As far as I know, in the US, an egg roll is usually the Cantonese 
variant of the spring roll, which is, in turn, a snack eaten in China 
during the festival marking the beginning of spring: the Lunar New 
Year. Chinese restaurants normally sell "egg rolls" with pork and/or 
shrimp, as described above, more or less, and the name indicates an 
egg & wheat-flour pasta wrapper, as opposed to the eggless wrapper 
resembling a high-gluten filo dough used for the Shanghai spring roll 
variant (which has a moister, more delicate and tender filling). 
Spring rolls are found in many southern Asian cuisines, but I believe 
they all probably stem from the Chinese originals.

In China, an "egg roll" (or a name, depending on the dialect, 
translating as such) is actually wrapped in an almost paper-thin 
omelette before frying. I believe ground pork and scallions are a 
common filling -- because the wrappers are so delicate, they don't 
seem to get bigger then two inches or so in length.

>Dimensions are anywhere from 1.5 to 2 inches in thickness and about 4-5
>inches long, depending on the wrappers you can find. If you can find wonton
>wrappers, they should be in the same section of your grocery.
>
>I think they are Filipino in origin and became popular in the US after WWII.

Lumpia are, AFAIK, the Filipino variant.

>I have seen then with everythin from beef to shrimp in them as well.  Even
>scrambled eggs.

A friend once told me that he'd been in a Chinese restaurant in 
Boise, run by two little old Swedish-American ladies. It seems they 
had been to a Chinese restaurant in Chicago, and remembered 
everything they'd eaten there, in detail. He claimed they sold 
sauerkraut and ham blintzes, fried and sold under the name of a 
common Chinese restaurant menu item.

There used to be a Hakka restaurant (the Hakka are sort of the 
Cantonese equivalent of gypsies; they live on boats in harbors in 
several southern Chinese towns) in New York's Chinatown called The 
Home Village, sadly long gone. Early in my time in the SCA, I had 
dinner there after working in the Wall Street financial district, 
wearing a nice suit and sitting there by myself, taking notes on a 
little pad while I wrote up an event proposal I was to present at a 
Provincial Commons meeting two hours later... they apparently thought 
I was a restaurant critic, and kept bringing food to my table that I 
hadn't ordered... it was a little embarrassing...

One of the dishes was the Hakka version of the spring roll, which 
contained shredded bamboo shoots, shredded barbecued pork, and 
shredded black mushrooms, wrapped in leaves of what might have been 
Bibb lettuce, dipped in a crunchy batter (probably water-chestnut 
flour based), and fried. I've never had them anywhere else, but these 
were absolutely the best.

Up until the 1960's or so, you could also buy a commercial 
dinner/burger/hot-dog-type bun which was sort of 
challah/brioche-like, and these were also commonly known as "egg 
rolls". I never seem to see these any more.

Adamantius

-- 
"As long as but a hundred of us remain  alive, never will we on any 
conditions be brought under English rule.  It is in truth not for 
glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are  fighting, but for freedom 
-- for that alone, which no honest man gives  up but with life 
itself."
	-- The Declaration of Arbroath, 1320

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