A totally decadent Chinese dish which, I believe, is a Cantonese creation from Hong Kong, although I'm still researching to confirm its exact origins. My first taste of this unctuous concoction was almost 20 years ago at the Hong Kong Flower Lounge in Millbrae, a Northern California restaurant noted for its dim sum and other staples of Cantonese cuisine. They called it 'Walnut Prawns' on their menu, but it's also known as 'Honey Walnut Shrimp.'

This is a delicious home-style Chinese tofu dish which I adapted from a recipe by the amazing foodie family at www.woksoflife.com . Their dish is called Chicken & Soft Tofu Casserole  https://thewoksoflife.com/chicken-soft-tofu-casserole/ . The main changes I made was to double their recipe, use an assortment of fresh mushrooms (including fresh shiitakes, oyster mushrooms and king trumpet mushrooms) rather than dried shiitakes, and add extra oyster sauce and sesame oil. I als

I used to hate Thousand-Year-Old Eggs ('Pidan') as a kid. Probably because the only time I would be tasked with eating them was once a year when we were at my Grandma's for Chinese New Year and these darned things would inevitably show up in the appetizer course along with Chinese ham, abalone & mayonnaise, and jellyfish salad - all of which were fantabulous, with the glaring exception of those gnarly looking black eggs. Fast forward about 5-6 years after I came to California

Lettuce is not typically cooked in Western cuisines but leave it to the Chinese to do just that. My grandmother had on a few occasions while living here in the U.S., made romaine lettuce sautéed with garlic, and it was delicious! Tender crisp is the best way to describe the texture. I adapted this version from Woks of Life  https://thewoksoflife.com/cooked-lettuce-with-oyster-sauce-garlic/ , adjusting by adding just a little sugar to balance the sauce to my preference.

I took a cue from the Taiwanese dish Sha Cha BBQ Beef with Noodles and decided to make a variation of it using chicken instead since this was the only meat I had in the frig. I opted to serve the sautéed chicken with steamed rice rather than tossed with noodles. Sha Cha BBQ sauce is a savory and mildly spicy Taiwanese sauce that's made from dried shrimp, brill fish, chiles, soybean oil, shallots and garlic. It's the traditional condiment used for hot pot (we always mix ours w

Taiwanese congee or rice porridge is usually cooked plain (just rice and water) or with some diced sweet potato, but another traditional version called "Giam Mue" (translated as "salty" rice porridge) includes savory ingredients like shiitake mushrooms, tiny dried shrimp, celery, fried shallots, and ginger. My mom makes a delicious version, but since I don't have her exact recipe, this is my take on it. I've gone off the rez a bit by adding ground pork but, hey, everything's

I'm not all that familiar with Hakka cuisine, but I came across this recipe in Tsung-Yun Wang's Home-Style Taiwanese Cooking . This dish is very similar to the "Eggplant in Garlic Sauce" found on the menus of many a Chinese restaurant here in SoCal (not the spicy Szechuan version). I've come across very similar recipes that refer to this as "Taiwan-Style" Eggplant with Basil, perhaps because the Hakka are the 2nd largest ethnic group (comprising about 15% of the population) i

A staple in the Taiwanese household - and it certainly was in ours as this was mom's go-to soup for lunch, back in the day. The ingredients are few and simple, but very flavorful and nutritious. Mom used a pork stock made from pork ribs as the soup base, but I like to combine a pork-based stock with some chicken base to round out the flavors. Daikon radish and dried shiitakes are readily available in Asian markets and even many supermarkets these days. Hondashi is a Japanese

We used to grow red amaranth back home in Taiwan and mom would always make a simple saute of them with a bit of vegetable oil, minced garlic and salt. The pigments from the greens would create a beautiful purple-red sauce that my sister Elaine and I loved to mix with white rice to give it a quasi-psychedelic hue (think jacked-up spinach). Amaranth greens are readily available here in SoCal at many Asian markets (e.g., 99 Ranch Market) and can also be easily grown from seed. T

This dish straddles the line between traditional and non-traditional because I more or less made it up (although I did take inspiration from a recipe from Panda Inn's 2002 March calendar feature called "Sizzling Scallops with Asparagus"). My sauce ingredients are similar: soy sauce, sesame oil, rice wine, cornstarch, sugar, and white pepper - but I use very different proportions and plain water instead of chicken stock. Kangshan chili sauce is from Kaohsiung in Southern Taiwa

Mongolian Beef is not Mongolian at all, but rather a dish created by early Chinese immigrants to the U.S.  Today, the Mongolian Beef dish from the popular restaurant chain P.F. Chang's is probably the most well-known version. The thin, tender slices of flank steak stir-fried in a savory brown sauce with lots of scallions and just a few dried red chiles makes this dish super flavorful, very mildly spicy (unless you bite into the peppers) and, therefore, very accessible and pal

This popular and delicious dim sum dish is actually a breeze to make at home. The hardest part is cutting the spare ribs into riblets - something I don't recommend doing yourself. Your best bet is to have your butcher do this or better yet, buy them pre-cut at many Asian markets. I recently even found these at Costco! Some recipes call for the addition of oyster sauce and/or light soy sauce in the marinade. I myself prefer just salt, sugar, white pepper, sesame oil and Shaoxi

Traditionally, only green bell peppers are used for this dish, but feel free to kick up the color palette with the addition of a red bell. I also like to add a sliced jalapeno pepper for a little extra heat as I'm a hopeless spice addict.  I took inspiration for this recipe from a dish at a literal hole-in-the-wall restaurant that our family used to frequent back in the day circa 1981 near Taipei American School (in fact, I think it was actually called "Hole in the Wall"). Th

In Taiwan, stinky tofu was a street vendor staple and a nostalgic fav of mine. For the uninitiated (aka stinky tofu virgins), the name typically raises eyebrows and inner trepidations, and the actual aroma can be an affront to the olfactory senses. But, hey - if you like stinky cheese, then this is a piece of cake! The tofu is fermented and usually deep fried and served with a chili-garlic sauce and pickled Taiwanese cabbage on the side.