a culinary genealogy
Below, view all our posts in chronological order, starting with the most recent. To browse recipes by category, course, or collection, visit our Recipe Index. Also be sure to check out our How-To section and Chinese Ingredients Glossary.
The name is a doozy, I’ll give you that. I debated whether or not I should shorten it, but really, this is the only name that does this drink justice. It’s an Arnold Palmer, which means it’s a mixture of iced tea and lemonade. But what really makes it special is the “Sparkling Strawberry Oolong”
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After our Huang Shan stairmaster-esque climb and comparatively more relaxing mountain descent, we couldn’t leave the area without taking a look at Tunxi Ancient Street, which is a pedestrian walkway that dates back over a thousand years. There are shops on either side of the street, many of which have existed for over a hundred
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Okay, so today: A word on Chinese tones. Thus far in these Chinese Lesson posts, you may have seen these little numbers that I’m putting next to the pinyin of each word. What’s up with that? Well, each number (from 1 to 4) represents the tone in which each word is spoken. What’s up with
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This is what Beijing looks like this morning: I was supposed to go with Bill to a TCM (Traditional Chinese Medicine) appointment (for his back pain), but I decided not to go. Why should two people breathe this stuff in when one is too many? As of right now, the pollution index is about 342 which is “severely
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This back alley Beijing place apparently has some fxxking good mojitos. Also, the coordination of Kaitlin’s shirt in this picture is completely by accident. So what do you say to get some of your new Chinese friends to go out and have a drink? Two words: 喝酒 Pinyin (i.e. the transcription of the Chinese words
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This recipe is Kaitlin’s invention, whipped up on a rainy afternoon in Beijing from a few ingredients that we had on hand. Made with lo mein noodles, these special noodles are spicy and incredibly flavorful, and we all bowed down to her greatness after we finished every bit of what was on the plate. Kaitlin’s
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So this past week, we found ourselves back in Jersey for a week of relaxation, visiting with family, and a lot of cooking and/or eating. We took the time to have our grandparents come over, visit my mom’s cousins, go to a 50th birthday bash, have friends from Texas over, do a little shopping, get
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My life here in the suburbs has been mostly quiet and peaceful so far. That is, until the aliens landed. Some of you may have heard that this year is a big year for cicadas. Ya’ll here in the northeast know what I’m talking about, right? Those ginormous winged creatures dive-bombing you when you’re trying
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Around the same time that we went to see the Yungang Grottoes and the Hanging Temple, we visited Huangshan (translated as: Yellow Mountain). Huangshan is a large mountain range in Anhui Province. It’s often featured in Chinese artwork and poetry and really does look like a Chinese watercolor painting come to life. Again, in our inexperienced
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When shopping with local vendors in China, every transaction calls for haggling. If you ever come to Beijing, you will most likely end up at a large clothing market like the Silk Market, or the one that’s closest to us: Ya Xiu (雅秀), located near Beijing’s Sanlitun Village (三里屯). My advice to you is to
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This picture was taken in one of the little hutongs, or old alleyways of Beijing, where they have little storefronts and cool shops selling knick knacks and souvenirs. The last two characters on the sign above the shop in this photo are： 商店 Translation: store Pinyin (i.e. the transcription of the Chinese words into Latin script): shang1
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Braised oxtails is one of Judy’s specialties, which she likes to whip out on special occasions. It’s an incredibly simple, flavorful dish, made with some really strong, pungent spices like star anise, bay leaf, and cloves. One particular ingredient is somewhat unusual. Rock sugar is what gives these Braised Oxtails their slightly sweet flavor and amazing glazed
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Dragon Boat Festival is a 2000-year-old holiday in China. Better known in Chinese as the Duan Wu Festival or Duānwǔ Jié (端午节), the 3 day festival usually falls in June. I’d never really heard of it before coming to Beijing, but apparently, the story goes that the holiday commemorates the suicide of ancient Chinese poet Qu
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Tea eggs are basically hard-boiled eggs infused with the flavors of Chinese tea, spices like star anise and cloves, and soy sauce. They’re sold all over China by street vendors, especially at breakfast time. In fact, there’s a vendor just down the street from our apartment, near where the local market is. They sell for
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This is a knockout recipe. You may have seen a similar kind of roast pork before. In most Cantonese places, they have the meat hanging in the window for all to see. Better to draw customers in, of course. This is our homemade version and it’s pretty much as easy as it gets! You get a really
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While my sister and I were staying in Beijing with our parents last summer, we were introduced to the weirdness that is Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM). So yeah. Here’s that story. Our mom booked us appointments at the local hospital, wanting to see how our health stacked up against non-Western medicine. We followed along, like
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A Chinese banquet is a long, extravagant affair. Usually reserved for special occasions like weddings, Chinese New Year, and big birthdays (like, your great grandmother turns 90…that kind of big), there’s a certain procedure that gets followed. You go to a big restaurant in Chinatown, sit at a table of 10-12 people, and eat a
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