Weekly Wanderings {week 5}
For those of you who celebrate, happy Lunar New Year!
Each year, Son’s dad wants to cook less and less, which means the responsibility has been falling on me more and more.
Which meant the first half of my week completely revolved around preparing the food – from a mad rush to find good recipes for all the new-to-me things I had to make, to somehow managing to entirely avoid the crowds when buying ingredients at 99 Ranch (talk about good luck!), to somehow managing to cook everything in one day while also attending client meetings and getting all my work done (I still don’t know how I managed to get everything cooked on time!)
This year’s menu consisted of stuffed bitter melon (a first for me)…
… catfish…
… egg tarts (which turned out SO GOOD – recipe coming soon!)…
… as well as boiled pork belly, rice, and a bamboo/pork belly/duck braise that Son’s dad made, that we ate in spring rolls.
And now I’m exhausted. I’m glad we only have to do this once a year!
~~~~
As my mom and her siblings are cleaning out my grandmother’s house, they’re finding all sorts of random stuff. My mom texted me a few weeks ago to ask if I wanted an exercise ball they had found deep in one of the closets… of course, I said yes.
Although brand-new, you can tell it’s really, really old – when we opened the box, we found an unopened VHS tape accompanying it! I feel like I’ve unearthed some sort of ancient artifact… 😉
~~~~
After the craziness of the Lunar New Year, I didn’t have the time or gumption to cook the rest of the week. So we went with one of our usual no-cook meals – meatballs from the freezer, in spring rolls with leftover veggies from Lunar New Year. Super easy, but still delicious!
~~~~
My favoritest thing about the Lunar New Year is the leftover bánh chưng (a Vietnamese rice cake filled with pork and mung bean) that we get to eat for the rest of the week! I like to eat it topped with coconut palm sugar; we also sometimes have it with a certain type of Vietnamese pickles.
Best ever.
I really need to learn how to make it one of these days.
~~~~
I ended the week by dragging Son to go see Los Angeles Ballet’s production of Sleeping Beauty… because my mom works for them as a costumer! It was really cool getting to see some of her work in action – she’s made plenty of costumes back when I used to dance, but this is the first time she’s actually built an entire tutu from scratch. Go mom! ^_^
~~~~
Links I’ve loved lately:
Ohmygosh if you haven’t seen this, you absolutely must go watch it now.
I wish I were Irvin’s next door neighbor.
If ever I make fortune cookies, it will have to be these.
The best thing I never knew I needed in my life.
~~~~
Weekly Wanderings posts may include affiliate links. All opinions are my own.
