Aunt Shoba’s Secret Meat

08 May 2015 23 Comments

by scolgin in Humor, Pork, Starlets Tags: , , , , , , ,

My kid’s call her “Aunt Shoba.” And she’s got a secret.

Our dear friend Shoba, you see, comes from Singapore, where she was recently visiting her parents. We fed her family while she was gone — including a birthday dinner for husband Bob. As a gesture of love and thanks, she brought me something back, a regal red bag with gold Chinese characters embossed on the front, a package weighing around a pound inside, that she slipped to me stealthily with a suggestion: “Hide that.”

Shoba's back

Shoba’s back

“What is it?” I whispered back.

“Meat,” she said.

It was called “bak kwa,” from the Lim Chee Guan company. She then sent me a link explaining. More

Enter the Dragon

24 Jan 2012 8 Comments

by scolgin in Eating Out, Observations Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

On Chinese New Year, I always wish that we had a Chinatown in our town. I don’t mean in Los Angeles, where there are several large and thriving Chinese communities — all an hour or more drive away. I mean in our little beachy, mountainy community of Topanga Canyon. The entire of our one-stoplight village is itself no bigger than the most modest 3rd-tier middle-American city’s Chinatown. But it would be cool to have a tea-and-dumpling house, a market and a crappy chotchke shop. I know a couple people in the canyon of Chinese descent, so I guess that’ll have to do.

Chinese immigrants in the New World

I like ethnic celebrations, and if I lived in New York or San Francisco on this Chinese New Year, I would hop a subway or cable car, go unwrap some sticky rice and watch a parade. More