Udon Noodles with Prawns and Vegetables in Black Pepper Sauce

A dish like this at your average Oriental (Asian) restaurant would be glistening from the excess oil they use. On the very rare occasion that I do go to these restaurants, the amount of oil that they use is so great, that it makes the dish so heavy that I can’t finish it. Now, boys and girls – that’s saying something, because I eat a lot! The heavily-oiled dishes make me feel bloated, sits in my stomach like a lead-brick and takes forever to digest - ugh!

Prawn Dumplings

An excellent way of judging how good a dim sum restaurant is to try their har gow. You know… those translucent prawn (shrimp) dumplings that everyone is so fond of. If you’ve even been to yum cha, there’s no doubt that you’ve tried them. The quality of the har gow, is a pivotal point on whether the other dim sum items are going to be good or not. It takes many many years for a dim sum chef to master these dumplings, and if those are good, the other items are going to be excellent!

Chinese-Style Stuffed Tofu

We decided to invite two couples over for dinner one night. It was the same two couples that relocated to the US, at the same time as we did. I decided to cook them a Chinese dinner. This is where the trouble began - they weren’t expecting traditional Chinese food.

My menu consisted of rice served with steamed lap cheung (Chinese pork sausage), steamed fish with ginger and spring (green) onions, stuffed tofu, braised shiitake mushrooms, stir fried choi sum (Chinese greens), jiaozi and Szechuan pork balls. For dessert - tang yuan

Prawn "Meat" Balls

Prawns have always been a treat for me. We didn’t eat them much growing up, but when we did, it would always be for celebrations, such as Chinese New Year.

Now that I've grown up, we indulge of prawns once every two weeks. They are a good source of protein, low in fat and very tasty! I usually stir fry them with a little garlic and chili to serve with rice, or cook them with vegetables for noodles.