NOTHING GLUTEN-FREE

They're doing a booming business at the bakery, several exciting flavours of mooncake (月餅 'yuet bing') which I haven't had before. No, I shan't try the double egg yolk durian paste (雙黃榴蓮 'seung wong lau lin'), that's one bridge too far. But the chestnut puree single yolk (單黃栗子月餅 'daan wong leut-ji yuet bing') sounded interesting enough, so I bought one to snack on at home when I paid my bill, and headed out into the blustery cold of a typical San Francisco summer evening with my pipe.

Note for Tad G: Do not confuse 栗 ('luet'; chestnut) with 粟 ('suk'; millet, corn). Though they look similar, one has wood or tree (木 'muk') as the bottom, the second has a rice grain, uncooked rice (米 'mai').


By quarter past seven, the evening had turned bitter and gloomy. Across the street from the building where I live, Mrs. Siu was waiting with the teckel for her husband to bring the car around so that the beast could go to the dog park. She was well bundled up.

There are no mooncakes in my immediate neighborhood. The nearest bakery does fancy stuff for an upscale Anglo audience, which my apartment mate often likes, and then there are the doughnut places, frequented by hipsters getting their late night dose of Dutch American cuisine. We Dutch invented the donut, but it's not my favourite wheat creation.
What I had had at the bakery was a little chicken pie.

I heard several different dialects of Cantonese while I was there, some of them only contextually intelligible, and then just barely. Nine, for me, is 'kau'. Not 'kiu'.
And half is 'pun'. Not 'puan'. Kau go pun. Not 'kiu ge puan'.
It's probably related to Toisanese.
But even further back.

It is quite likely that "Dutch cuisine" would go splendidly with a hot cup of HK milk tea.
But I do not know of any places in Chinatown where that combo may be got.


When durian donuts are invented, I shall be sure NOT to try it.
You can let me know how it is, okay?




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