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Recipe: stir-fried pork and pickled mustard green

Recipe: chinese steamed fish

My parents are like children on Christmas morning whenever they send me something in the mail. They have called for the past three days to check and see if I received their package – a ceramic knife. It’s a very nice knife and I’m familiar with how wonderful these things are. So when it arrived today, I had to – per my mother’s specific instructions – cut a tomato with it. I felt like a Ginzu advertisement, but I went ahead and took photos as evidence for them. It cuts beautifully – as nice as my Henckels.

Yesterday we made the requisite stop for dim sum in which all three of us declared we weren’t that hungry after the previous day’s gorging on sushi and then proceeded to gorge some more once the hot and juicy morsels were paraded past our table. Thank goodness I had sense to run and bike in the gym that morning. We did more Asian market shopping (Ranch 99) and then had some boba (bubble) tea. Grandma wanted to order it at the small eatery attached to the store in Cupertino, but Elena knew of a specific tea shop that sold boba tea around the corner. Grandma’s instinct is to save money – to order the $1.99 tea. Elena’s instinct is to go for the treat, the good stuff. I have stated before that Elena has impeccable taste, and that extends to pretty much everything – especially food! The difference in price is less than a buck per tea, but it represents the constant battle between Elena wanting to treat her mother to something good, and Grandma’s frugality that got her through her 85 years of life. I sided with Elena, of course, because as a granddaughter I can only push so much before it becomes disrespectful. Elena is the hard-headed youngest daughter whose mind, once made up, cannot be changed without much effort and grumbling.

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It’s a good thing I stuck to my menu, because it was cold tonight – perfect for hot and sour soup! I also made spring rolls, which I haven’t done in over ten years. I just hate deep frying in general. But these worked out well and I’ve gained a lot more kitchen experience and equipment in the last ten years to make the process relatively painless.

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