Cooking up a storm.....in a storm.

23/09/2005 29 °C

Well, having spent 3 days on a Typhoon 1 standby, this morning we were lifted to a typhoon 3. A bit of wind and a little rain and I've been told we are supposedly feeling the outer edges of Tropical Storm Damrey. All I can notice is that the temperature has finally dropped below 'sweating like a pig' and is more in the region of windy like 'Bridget Jones on a mini break'. Anyway, the reason why I am writing this blog entry is to tell you all about my fantastic cooking class this morning - hence the cooking up a storm in a storm. It was a Dim Sum cooking class that just turned out to be a private lesson (I guess the other students were too scared of the typhoon?!?) so my lovely teacher Martha (a Chinese ex-dental hygienist turned chef) started me off on Sui Mai. I was told two things as I started to pound the pork, prawns and secret spices together - 1) The term Dim Sum means "With Love" or something along those lines as with all the fiddling and folding you have to do to make each one, it must only come from love and 2) Most chefs make dim sum with the scrapes and left overs of their main menu items so really it's just a left over meal - Left overs with love - my kind of food!

The 3-hour session was extended to 4 1/2 hours because I was so slow at folding the Hargow and I had also made a batch big enough for a class of 5 even though it was just me making AND eating the dumplings. I had a great time chatting to Martha as she candidly asked me questions like "Why don't foreigners like to eat pigs ears" and "How come Foreigners find it so hard to fold dim sum" - I think she was hinting at something there. She was a lovely lady who now wants me to teach her how to make Maltese Rabbit Stew and Hungarian Goulash in exchange for her cultural hand downs.

As the storm grew and grew outside I failed miserably at making Sui Mai (to Martha's amusement) and triumphed at churning out over 40 perfect Hargow (to Martha's surprise).