Thursday, February 7, 2008

Home Cooked Feast

We had our second reunion dinner last night. With my B-i-l and his family now living in Perth, there are only 13 of us left, which means we can all fit around the dining table at home. Previously, with 16, we would load the childrens' plates with food, and they would adjourn to a smaller table, whilst the adults sat around the main dining table.

M-i-l, as usual, cooked up her "must-have" CNY reunion dishes. Here's a sampling of the dishes:

Chilli king prawns. The chinese love to serve prawns for the reunion dinner, as it is called "har" in cantonese which sounds like Laughter.


Meat balls. The round meatballs symbolises a complete family.


Chicken curry. A dish the family loves to have.


Fried Chicken Wings. Another favourite of the children!


Chap Chye. A vegetable dish to add fibre to our meal.


Kong Bak. A hokkien dish which the family enjoys having with buns.


Fried Pek tor. This fish is a "must-have" for teochews. It used to be available only during the CNY period (before they started farming it) and the fish at this time of the year, usually comes with the roe or egg. The chinese serve fish because the word "fish" in mandarin sounds similar to the word "abundance".


Leeks with sea cucumber. This is also a required dish for all teochew families during the CNY as they believe it would bring wealth. The name of the vegetable, "sng", sounds like the teochew word "count".


Fu Kwey Cai with Mushrooms, abalone and black moss. An auspicious chinese new year dish. This year we opted for this dish instead of the treasures pot, as m-i-l did not want to put in the "seo bak".

A few other dishes I forgot to take photos of were the fried noodles (for long life), the soup, and the spring rolls.


And for dessert, sweet yam. This hokkien dish is quite similar to the teochew "or nee" or yam paste, only that the yam is chunkier.


I hope with these photos, you managed to enjoy our meal with us!!

What are the must-have CNY dishes for your family?

10 comments:

Unknown said...

WOW!you really make me hungry :P *drool* *drool*Chicken curry,Fu Kwey Cai with Mushrooms with abalone?I miss eating that.Did you cook those dishes?yum yum.

Yan said...

That's perfect for reunion dinner!

The must-have for my family is the eggs (Tai-Ping Dang or eggs of peace). Hard boil the eggs, take off the shells, pan fry the eggs, cook a soup and put in the eggs. The soup is usually the chicken soup.

ICook4Fun said...

Our family will have very similar food to yours. "hong bak' with sea cucumber is a must have dish for us Hokkien beside fish and meat balls.

bp said...

Yum, yum, yum! Thanks SAHM, what a feast and your 2nd round at that!

I do miss the shark's fin, abalone... all the seafood that costs a lot here and the frozen version doesn't come close!

pretzel said...

Wow!! What a Feast!! *Droolz*

Anonymous said...

Wow!! So many dishes?? All also I would like to have. :)

NomadicMom said...

Waa...very scruptious dishes!! I also want to come and eat. Can ar?

p/s Your MIL so good leh..don't want to put "seo bak' so that your maids can eat!!

Jo said...

Hi SAHM! I am here! haha..

Wow.. your reunion meal was sooooo elaborate and extravagant. Mine really paled in comparison. Then again, there are just the few of us, it's impossible for us to finish all that food.

Glad that you enjoyed your reunion meal. Gong Xi Fa Cai, Wan Shi Ru Yu.

Anonymous said...

BIG DROOLSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

Can I fly ur MIL over? HA HA HA!!!

Perhaps I shud start some sort of tradition...since I am the only one doing the cooking??? HA HAHA!!

just me said...

The must-have traditional dessert is the round balls filled with a savoury ingredients...no matter how simple the main dishes are