Chinese New Year of the Earth Pig: Fun food to celebrate

Next Tuesday, February 5th marks the first day of the Chinese New Year celebrating the year of the earth pig the 12th character of the Chinese astrological calendar. Greet friends with this Mandarin phrase: gong xi fa cai pronounced gung hay fat choi.

In preparation, the custom is to clean your home until Monday to allow room for good luck to enter in the new year. You should begin the new year with a new broom as well as great food, family, and fun! One easy and fun dessert to make is Moon Cakes. These are common during the autumn festival, but by taking any recipe for a stuffed cookie you can make these magical delights by pressing them in a Moon Cake press below (Amazon ~$10). Coat your pressed cookie with lightly beaten egg yolk with a bit of water before baking and voila!

I will make a stuffed pineapple cookie to mimic the pineapple tarts served during Chinese New Year. You can find many versions of the pineapple tart recipe on the internet. Here is one made famous by author Cheryl Tan:  

https://www.thedailymeal.com/pineapple-tarts-recipe

Cooking vessels: the verdict is in!

After spending a week cooking in Julia Child's kitchen in Provence, with its menagerie of pots and pans, I came home and wondered how important is the use of stainless steel versus cast iron in stove top cooking? I set up an informal experiment. I made 2 identical batches of Italian sauce in an All-Clad large pot and a Le Creuset. The All-Clad has a bit of a rise in the center of the bottom of the pot whereas the Le Creuset is completely flat. Surprisingly, the sauce cooked in the Le Creuset was much thicker and had a deeper flavor than the other batch. I had always used the All-Clad for making the recipe, so I found the results very interesting. Buon appetito!

Winning vessel

Julia Child's Kitchen Provence