Tuesday, April 24, 2012

Catfish

For me, it is usually a treat to eat freshly steamed fish on special occasions, such as Chinese New Year or out for a banquet dinner.  During a regular visit to my mother-in-law's in SF, we stopped by Chinatown (our usual hangout spot), devoured some delicious dim sum from our favorite restaurant, Great Eastern Restaurant (yes, where the President was this past February!), and went grocery shopping on the busy and crazy Stockton Street.  Both my mother-in-law and I bought a fresh big catfish to eat for dinner.  You can truly taste the freshness in each bite!

Steamed Catfish with Black Bean Garlic Sauce

Ingredients
- 1 fresh catfish
- 3 cloves of garlic, minced
- 1 Tbsp garlic black bean sauce
- 2 tsp soy sauce
- 2 tsp rice wine
- 1 stalk green onion, thinly sliced

Steps
1. Wash fish thoroughly. Pat to dry.

2. Mix minced garlic, garlic black bean sauce, soy sauce, and rice wine together.  Place washed fish on plate and pour mixture all of the fish.

3. Fill a large pot with water. Ensure that you have a stand or some type of device that can place a plate on top, in order to steam the fish. Turn heat to medium and let it cook and steam for about 20 minutes. The fish should be flaky when done.

4. Place thinly sliced green onions on top of the fish and serve.  Serves 2-4.


Saturday, April 21, 2012

Just Pictures: Tea Party For Our New Niece!

My older sister is having a second child, a girl (yayy!), and didn't want a baby shower this time around. Well, I made her have one.  A surprise tea party baby shower.

My sisters and I have been talking about holding a tea party for awhile now, an inspiration from my talented friend, Cin Cin Let's Eat's annual tea party (examples here and here). My younger sister and I planned this party together and decided on 3 savory sandwiches (my responsibility) and 4 sweets (sister's responsibility).

The menu...  
-- Curried Egg Salad --
(inspired from here, without the celery and green onions and added about 1 Tbsp of yellow curry powder to the mix of 8 eggs)

-- Chicken Salad (courtesy of Safeway, haha) --

-- Cucumber Sandwiches with herb butter, half with proscuitto on top --
(mix softened butter with chives and salt, thinly slice an English cucumber and nicely layer cucumber pieces on bread)

-- Raspberry Coconut Thumbprint Cookies --

-- various cupcakes from Frost Factory --

-- Passion Fruit Tart with Strawberries and Raspberries --

-- Fruit Salad (not pictured) --

The spread 

It was a fabulous time on a Sunday afternoon of April Fools Day.  We cannot wait for our little niece to arrive in the world (just a few more weeks, yeah!).