Pot Luck
Alex is hosting a pot luck at his new apartment.
Everyone is to bring a plate. Rules of pot luck.
I went there earlier to help him buy pots and pans.
We set off to Mustafa Centre, which is claustrophobically packed in the day time. The term Personal Space has no meaning there. It doesn't bother Will though. Will is Alex's housemate. Coming from Hong Kong, he has probably seen worse. He zipped in and out of the crowds getting to the stuffs he wanted while Alex and me got stuck behind Indian uncles and aunties along the narrow path between the shelves.
Will cooked curry (hence Mustafa for the ingredients) and I bought a white cabbage and 3 sticks of carrot. It's been a long time since I cooked and I thought It would be simple to stir-fry cabbage.
If Yan can cook, so can I:
Chop some shallots and garlic. Cut carrot into strips. Cut cabbage into small leaves. Heat oil in pan. Throw in chopped shallots and garlic. Fry until fragrance. Throw in carrot strips. Stir and fry until soft. Put in some chicken meat (stolen from the ingredients of curry) and stir-fry until cooked. Put in chopped cabbage leaves and stir-fry until soft.
Oops.
The leaves of a whole cabbage don't fit into the pan! There is no room to stir-fry.
So I have to batch process them. Stir-fry the first batch of cabbage leaves till they soften and shrunk, then add the rest of the leaves and repeat the step.
Took me quite a while.
But when all is stirred and fried, the cooked dish doesn't taste that bad. More importantly, it doesn't taste bad! Its comforting to know that it's edible.
The Hokkien term for cooking is tse-jiak, tse for cooking, jiak for eating.
Aye-tse must aye-jiak!
Literary translated as (without the punch though), if you can cook, I must be able to eat what you cooked.
When I finished my dish, Will already had the curry simmering in the big pot and whipped up 2 huge omelettes.
And we did not even take out the price tag from the pots and pans!
The guests came with their plate between 730 to 8pm. There is a spread of potato salad, glutinous rice, claypot rice, black pepper pork rib, curry chicken, ommelette, sit-fry cabbage, black forest cake, Haagen Daz ice cream and a bottle of white wine.
Considering the amount of leftovers, I think the party is quite a success.
Everyone is to bring a plate. Rules of pot luck.
I went there earlier to help him buy pots and pans.
We set off to Mustafa Centre, which is claustrophobically packed in the day time. The term Personal Space has no meaning there. It doesn't bother Will though. Will is Alex's housemate. Coming from Hong Kong, he has probably seen worse. He zipped in and out of the crowds getting to the stuffs he wanted while Alex and me got stuck behind Indian uncles and aunties along the narrow path between the shelves.
Will cooked curry (hence Mustafa for the ingredients) and I bought a white cabbage and 3 sticks of carrot. It's been a long time since I cooked and I thought It would be simple to stir-fry cabbage.
If Yan can cook, so can I:
Chop some shallots and garlic. Cut carrot into strips. Cut cabbage into small leaves. Heat oil in pan. Throw in chopped shallots and garlic. Fry until fragrance. Throw in carrot strips. Stir and fry until soft. Put in some chicken meat (stolen from the ingredients of curry) and stir-fry until cooked. Put in chopped cabbage leaves and stir-fry until soft.
Oops.
The leaves of a whole cabbage don't fit into the pan! There is no room to stir-fry.
So I have to batch process them. Stir-fry the first batch of cabbage leaves till they soften and shrunk, then add the rest of the leaves and repeat the step.
Took me quite a while.
But when all is stirred and fried, the cooked dish doesn't taste that bad. More importantly, it doesn't taste bad! Its comforting to know that it's edible.
The Hokkien term for cooking is tse-jiak, tse for cooking, jiak for eating.
Aye-tse must aye-jiak!
Literary translated as (without the punch though), if you can cook, I must be able to eat what you cooked.
When I finished my dish, Will already had the curry simmering in the big pot and whipped up 2 huge omelettes.
And we did not even take out the price tag from the pots and pans!
The guests came with their plate between 730 to 8pm. There is a spread of potato salad, glutinous rice, claypot rice, black pepper pork rib, curry chicken, ommelette, sit-fry cabbage, black forest cake, Haagen Daz ice cream and a bottle of white wine.
Considering the amount of leftovers, I think the party is quite a success.