A VEGETABLE!

On the bus through Chinatown today I looked at the neatly arrayed vegetables outside a store.
One vegetable caught my eye.
It was simply labeled as "A菜".  A choy.  A vegetable.
A vegetable?!?
Of course it is!

Now, I'm quite used to the Cantonese taking liberties with their own written language, and frequently incorporating English into the text. Even using English initials and numbers as if they were independent words, or parts of single characters - such as the utilization of an o or 0 on the left-hand side of a standard character to signify that the word is Canto dialect, pronounced the same as the original word, but with a different meaning. The o or 0 serves as shorthand for the mouth radical, often used to create new glyphs, which tells the reader to go by the sound alone.
Coffee, for instance: 咖啡.
Which is 加 and 非 with 口 added to both characters.
Go by the sound: o加 (kaa) o非 (fei).

This little trick is frequently employed by computer and cellphone users, as the Unicode for Cantonese lags a bit, or the actual written word might be hard to find in an on-line dictionary.

First time I've ever seen an A added, though.

Did my friend Ah-Choy get so lucky playing cards that they now celebrate his victories by naming a vegetable after him? He always was clever (choi: 才, hence also 財), but that would take the cake.

Dude, here's your very own vegetable! It's green! Lucky colour!

Nope. Silly me.
It's not even Cantonese.


A菜 ...

Lactuca Indica. A vegetable suitable for stir-frying, also known as 'Indian Lettuce'.
Click HERE to see what it looks like.
Also called 萵仔菜, 生菜, 鵝仔菜, or 媚仔菜。Basically a longish cultivar of Lactuca Sativa.

Doesn't need any blanching, simply wash, separate, and dry. Then cut across into wide sections, and stirfry till beginning to wilt. The pan may be pre-flavoured with garlic and ginger. If using oyster-sauce, heat that up with the rice wine afterwards and drizzle over the dish.
A few drops of sesame oil in any case are a splendid addition.
Or a bit of melting chicken or duck fat.
For the toothsome aroma.
Bon appétit.



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