Pursuant my mention of the delightful connexion between Cantonese-American females and food, I am reminded of something that happened during Thanksgiving week.
[I waxed eloquent about the innocence of high-school girls here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2009/12/high-school-girls.html
Which lead to further details, plus several cocktail recipes, here:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2009/12/high-school-girls-now-much-more-zesty.html
And finally an essay on the allure of small maidens and their dietary habits here: http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2009/12/even-more-about-young-ladies-and.html
By 'high-school girls' , the Cantonese-American type are meant if the mention is positive, the coarse heifer type when speaking negatively - this is obvious. You could also use the search bar above this post for all of the articles that delve into this subject if you are curious.
Why are you curious? Is it some kind of obsession? ]
I was sitting in one of the bakeries in Chinatown enjoying a steamed chicken bun and coffee, when I became aware of girlish voices behind me. By turning my head slightly, I could observe the speakers reflected in the mirror.
Several small Cantonese-American high school girls. Fifteen or sixteen years old.
They were talking about food while enjoying a sumptuous array of pastries.
Specifically, they were talking turkey. Roast turkey.
The one with the thick, thick, THICK ponytail was saying "so we soak it in salt water with star-anise and sugar ....."
She took a bite out of an egg-custard tart, getting the yellow cream all over her glistening upper lip, and crumbs dribbling down her front. She sighed contentedly while relishing the eggy goodness.
A cute round-faced girl with pigtails and specs who was attacking a meat turnover asked, with full mouth: "How long? I mean, soaking, how long"
Thick thick ponytail: "about a day and a half, two days I think. Then we roast it."
Chomp. More cream, more crumbs.
Man O man, those lips!
I accidentally dashed some hot-sauce on the table before getting some in the chicken bun. Chicken buns taste very good with hot sauce - it rounds out the flavours.
As, no doubt, you know.
Pigtails and specs: "Do you stuff it at all? I don't like stuffing...."
She slurped her hot beverage audibly.
Those were the most appealingly distracting mouth noises I have EVER heard.
Girl, you are something.
And those glasses make you seem utterly sweet and bright-eyed. Very nice.
Thick thick ponytail: "No, but we do lo mai (glutinous rice) with lapcheung (fatty Chinese sausage), hoimee (dried shrimps) and dong-gew (Chinese dried mushrooms), and mah-tai (water chestnuts), is VERY gooooood!"
She dreamily drew out that last syllable, her eyes half-closed in remembrance.
At this point, so were mine.
She wasn't breathing heavily, but I was.
They continued talking, I kept listening. Girls discussing food.
Cantonese-American High School Girls, enthusiastically speaking of good things to eat, while scarfing down snacks in a bakery.
Girls! Food! Masticatory noises!
Sweet cheeses, I'm in heaven!
Apparently roast turkey is "soooo delicious......, and uh, nice!" with mashed potatoes. Fluffy mashed potatoes. You really have to whip them. Hard - "real hard, ya gotta perspire!"
When she said that, I nearly spilled my coffee.
I was imagining small golden arms energetically manhandling goo.
And the secret to a crispy skin is first to leave the turkey out for two hours after draining and rinsing it, inside and out. Then you shove some ginger and garlic up the hole, and stick it in the oven at 425 degrees Fahrenheit.
After thirty minutes, pull it out to baste.
"Rub it vigorously with butter."
High School Girls should NOT talk of rubbing a turkey vigorously with butter. Not aloud. Not in public. Not with all the turkeys wandering around this city.
It's dangerous. Trust me.
An entire stick of butter. All over.
I had to wipe my brow at this point - I had used too much hot-sauce on my snack. Steamed chicken buns are excellent with a dash of chili.
I felt hot and flushed.
Continue roasting at 350 degrees for another three hours.
Or more, if you rub it with butter again. Several more times.
[Oh yes. Several more times. Again. Very. All over. Butter. So excellent for the skin. Good. Vigorously.
I fondly imagined all of them armed with butter, basters, and wooden spoons.]
Someone with long soft black hair and a gently dimpled forehead volunteered that she loved to rub the turkey, as it smelled and looked so nice when roasting. So crisp and toasty. Roast turkey was YUMMY if you sloshed it with gravy.
Her voice was mellifluous and reverent......
So charming and girlish in her Turkey pleasure.
She then cheerfully remarked that before you stuck the bird in the oven, "it looks just like an old-man's butt - all moist and wrinkly!!!!"
The others agreed, adding emphatically "white man's butt".
[Mopping up spilled coffee with a napkin, I wondered how those girls knew. Was there something about the contemporary teenage world in SF that had escaped me?]
Another girl liked the greasy bits, and also the thick fleshy parts of the drumsticks.
Turns out all of them liked meaty thighs. Nice, meaty, thighs.
Delicious!
While they then all agreed that potatoes made silky smooth, with LOTS of butter and cream, where very very VERY! good, all creamy pale and spoonably soft, I paid up and left. It was hard to do - I could have easily spent another hour there - but I felt flushed and needed fresh air.
I really must have used far too much hot sauce.
Odd, that. I have a high tolerance for capsaicin.
It's a totally innocent fondness.
====================================================
APPENDIX
When brining a bird, the proportion of salt to liquid is 1:35.
That means for each tablespoon salt you will need 35 tablespoons (slightly less than two and a quarter cups) water.
Use less sugar than salt.
For a big turkey you will probably need two or three gallons of liquid in all.
One gallon is sixteen cups. For each gallon, seven tablespoons salt. Plus a pinch extra.
You can replace some of the water with rice-wine, sherry, or fragrant vinegar.
Throw in some star-anise and ginger, plus other spices.
Do not add garlic - while it tastes good, the result will be reminiscent of Italian Salami. Which is fine, but not particularly festive.
First 20 - 30 minutes of roasting are at a higher temperature (425°) to colour the skin and get the heat into the bird. The remainder of the roasting, at 350 degrees, will take twelve minutes per pound of dead bird.
So for a twenty pound turkey, about four hours.
Rest the bird for half an hour after taking it out of the oven.
Do not stuff it - if you need stuffing, make it on top of the stove, and use some of the pan juices for flavour.
If you eat with bowl and chopsticks, don't bother carving the bird, simply whack it into chunks with a cleaver, or cut it up with kitchen shears. Drizzle some of the pan juices over.
And yes, roast bird is very good with hot-sauce: Sambal Oelek or Chili Garlic.
From Huy Fong Foods, available in fine stores everywhere.
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EDUCATED TASTES
After Thanksgiving (sometime next week), we get to stare Christmas in the face. That cold hard face, those haunted eyes. That incessant nast...
21 comments:
Well my friend, it's very convenient for you that you have a lovely Cantonese lady at home who can serve as an object of your affections after you've fixated on these young females for some time.
That long sentence was translated from the German.
Cheers,
E.I.
""it looks just like an old-man's butt - all moist and wrinkly!!!!"
"
I am so not touching that with a ten foot pole. Let alone a stick of butter.
And you should know that this post was more than mildly demented.
Really.
it's ok to be a pervert, but it should be your own business. is it really necessary to describe in detail the nature of your perversion? i would describe it in more general terms, for instance as your distress at the lost innocence of the human race. as it is now, you're making it much harder for me to recommend your blog to my friends- or my children. this is a shame, since you really are good at what you do and have terrifically valuable insights. i also have great respect for the fact that your reaction to criticism is to "keep on keepin' on, only moreso".
may i ask: do you think your obsession with asian women has anything to do with the common western perception of same as "childlike"?
you have problems, dude, as do we all. but i don't want to see such a talented writer (and jewophile) go down in flames because of something as worthless as honesty.
Not just Asian women - I am an allrounder.
Intelligent. Shorter than me. Round head. Dark hair.
Small hands.
Loves food. Got a mouth on her that would sometimes blister paint.
Haven't exactly described Marilyn Monroe, have I?
On the other hand, Audrey Hepburn fits that description perfectly.
Don't like childlike. Childlike makes me barf. Grown up common sense is good.
Squeaky little blondes make me barf. Little girlish voices .... make me barf.
So does an excess of make-up.
Cantonese people, as is well-known, have a well-developed ability to swear and curse. Because the Cantonese language is far more toxic than any other version of Chinese.
Cantonese are also far more adventurous, and far less apologeticly inclined.
All of those things are very attractive in a woman.
Oh, and by the way - the post is about food. Was that not obvious?
Chicken bun, egg custard tartlet, meat turnover, TURKEY, star anise, sugar, cream, crumbs, hot sauce.....
Stuffing, TURKEY, hot beverage, glutinous rice, lapcheung, dried shrimps, mushrooms, water chestnuts.....
TURKEY, butter, potatoes, crispy skin, chili, drumsticks, thighs, mashed potatoes with cream and butter, hot sauce.....
Plus an instructive appendix. Which is all about food.
Insofar as young ladies (not turkeys) are concerned, they must be able to act like young ladies - no trashy clothes, no slutty behaviours, no public sex or drunkenness, no rump tattoos, no multiple piercings in strange places.
Nice, normal, well-brought up, and capable of holding their own like intelligent people.
Childishness, spoiledness, whiny, pouty, and temperamental - these are NOT appealing traits. Seems like many young women nowadays do not understand that even if the sun DOES shine out of their ... 'donkey', they should not insist that the rest of us acknowledge it.
Oh, and public displays of affection with some hunkorama at a bar or bus stop are also loathesome.
i had the distinct impression you LIKED pouty. :)
"all about food"-
well i guess i'm the one with the dirty mind, then. carry on, sir.
btw i wrote a song once that included the lines
"my best friend he liked mary ann,
but ginger was the girl for me
he got to eat them coconut pies
and i got to like what i see"
not shakespeare, i know, but somehow relevant.
i had the distinct impression you LIKED pouty. :)
No no no! Not pouty! An angry indignant young lady is cute as the dickens. A pouty girl is just boring. Pouty is immature. Elquent vociferation, or absolutely speechless anger, that can be very alluring.
A pout indicates weakmindedness.
A stormsurge of well-expressed fury indicates strength of mind. Which is MUCH more entertaining!
well i guess i'm the one with the dirty mind, then
Trust me, my mind is plenty dirty. That's why I have no need to talk about sex on the blog. It's all in my head.
That song sounds vaguely country-western.
Although I can hear a distinct flavour of electric guitar solo.
I inclination not concur on it. I assume nice post. Specially the title-deed attracted me to be familiar with the sound story.
Amiable post and this fill someone in on helped me alot in my college assignement. Gratefulness you as your information.
Also see:
http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2008/12/cantonese-american-female.html
The Cantonese-American Female.
For the truly obsessed: http://atthebackofthehill.blogspot.com/2010/12/cantonese-american-girls.html
Yes.
That was hilarious.
Subject for serious term paper stuff.
Obviously.
I hope it helps Anonymous at 2:17.
Who should send photos of herself.
In all honesty, I have scarcely a clue what either 1:19 PM ("I inclination not concur on it. I assume nice post. Specially the title-deed attracted me to be familiar with the sound story.") or 2:17 PM ("Amiable post and this fill someone in on helped me alot in my college assignement. Gratefulness you as your information.") are on about.
Even though they're probably both troll-bots using bad translations from Latvian to seed likely sites for future spammatographica, their gibberish is sufficiently charming that they may stay.
Anybody who truly wishes to get a hold of me should use the designated comment field: 'LETTERBOX'.
If you wish a response, be sure to include your own contact data.
Thank you.
---ATBOTH
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