Want some Sodium with your MSG?
In terms of gastronomy, Americans can learn a lot from the Chinese. The traditional Chinese diet consists mainly of unprocessed foods, with an emphasis on the veggies. Meat is used sparingly, and they consume very little dairy. Unfortunately, what we call “Chinese” food—overflowing with MSG, sodium, and oil—hardly resembles true Chinese fare. The entire time I lived in China, I saw not one mention of general tso’s chicken, orange sesame beef, or deep-fried crab rangoon.
Yesterday, I was hit with a Chinese-food craving. But rather than run to my nearest Wok-n-Roll (where everything is deep-fried and nothing is vegan), I decided to make my own. Later, I made my own dessert as well. It wasn’t Chinese in the slightest:
Gingerbread Cookie Dough Balls
Then again, fortune cookies aren’t really Chinese, either. In actuality, these cookies hail from San Francisco! And my lunch, a few hours earlier? It hailed from Texas:
CCK Ginger Stir Fry
(I didn’t measure anything, so I’ll just give you the gist)
- Broccoli
- Red Peppers
- Zucchini
- Onion
- Pineapple
- Water Chestnuts
- Tamari, Garlic, and Fresh Ginger (or dry)
- You can also add cashews!
Steam broccoli in a covered wok (with a little water), until it turns bright green. Add other ingredients (except pineapple) and stir-fry. (You could also add a little sweetener if desired, and if you want a thicker “sauce” heat the soy sauce in a little dish, then mix with cornstarch.) At the very end, add the pineapple. As seems to be the case with most ethnic foods, this tastes better the day after it’s cooked.
Can’t have a Chinese meal without rice, right?
I took the lazy route and pulled this box from my freezer, where it’d been forgotten for months. Usually, I’m not a rice girl. But every now and then, my cravings surprise me. Today, they said, “Eat rice!” So I did.
I ate my pseudo-Chinese with chopsticks.
Grandma and Grandpa (or, rather, Obaasan and Ojiisan) joined the luncheon. Continuing with the theme of the post, they’re not Chinese either; we bought them in Japan!
What are your favorite Chinese Foods?
And do you ever make your own stir fries, fried rice, or other Chinese fare?
Writing this post reminded me about my Healthier Lo Mein. I haven’t made it in ages! Other American-Chinese dishes I like to make include fried rice (or bulgur) and the ubiquitous stir fry. Also, does anyone else love water chestnuts? I do, but I always forget to cook with them!
Even if I make something Chinese, I don’t know it is Chinese. I love spicy stir fries in general and I am also a big fan of emperor’s rice. But eating black rice with surimi isn’t very Chinese either, is it? 🙂
Mmmm you know what’s good? Black rice with coconut milk. I had some kind of black rice pudding in Thailand, and it was sooooo good!
I always wonder what REAL ethic foods would be, not the Americanised stuff we see too often in restaurants. Thus, I cannot say I’ve made many Chinese foods lately because I don’t really know what traditional/typical Chinese foods would be. We did, however, make steamed veggies with a soy-ginger sauce the other day and served it over quinoa. Yum.
What would you say is a typical Chinese day of food? Breakfast, lunch, supper/tea, snacks, etc.?
LOL I can’t say for sure, since I never spent the whole day in the home of a Chinese person. But I found this link for you: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20080722145703AAwiu3G
When we lived there, our housekeeper would sometimes make us dinner. There’d be at least three different veggie dishes (one of which was always a dark-leaft green), and then another dish with veggies plus some meat (which I didn’t eat, since I was already a vegetarian by then). And there was ALWAYS rice!
Panda Express’s Orange Chicken is basically my guilty pleasure. I know that it is the unhealthiest food out there, but it is so good!!! I make a lot of rice bowls at school. ANd they are much healthier than the Panda fare 🙂
That was my favorite too, before I went vegan! In fact, it was the ONLY Chinese food I’d eat. I was a very picky little eater lol!
I LOVE WATER CHESTNUTS!
whenever my mother and me get Chinese take-out, i always roll with the sauteed broccoli. keepin’ it simple, and delicious!
Mmmm I like the garlic-ginger broccoli. Oh heck, you can’t go wrong with broccoli, can ya? 😉
Yep! Looove stir-fries.
I do make Chinese style stir fries pretty often. I love them bc they are so quick and loaded with veggies! Yours looks really good!
i love making a soy/ginger stir fry!! yum
I LOVE water chestnuts.
I always pick the Moo Goo Gai Pan at our local SUPER vegan friendly chinese place (yes, Moo Goo is so so americanized but I love it) due to it being packed full of veggies, including my beloved water chestnuts. I never forget them and get pissy if we’re out of stock at work. I’ll actually put off making stir fry if we don’t have any on the shelf! Hah.
Also, my rattie kid, Daniel, thanks you for the banana coconut butter recipe.
He’s on antibiotics currently and they are ucky and bitter tasting – he’s been getting them mixed into the butter since that post, though, and now he thinks he’s the LUCKIEST rat in the world. And I have to have my SO help me keep his cagemates from coming and stealing the little spoon of meds from him! We do a lot of blocking little thieves faces and holding down little grabby paws. 😉
Oh my word lol you fed the coconut banana butter to your rat? Too cute. Molly and Henry WISH they were so lucky. They’d like to know if you’ll be their mommy ;).
I’ll give them anything to get them to take their Baytril! Usually it’s soyatoo or jam – but I’ve resorted to soy ice cream and pudding in the past. Hah. That stuff is icky even when it’s compounded. This time the vet didn’t compound it with anything (so the dose is tiny – .04 cc!) so it *really* needs something good to mask it. I was doing pumpkin, which they love normally, but Daniel strongly opposed after a few doses. Hah.
Of course, I always nip a couple bites of the butter before doling out Daniel’s little bit. Rat serving size is pretty small so I don’t have to get too selfish. LOL.
I love Chinese, but I don’t eat it very often. I need to try this out! 🙂
Katie, you really went “balls to the wall” with this one!! haha. you know what im thinking i might try when my cold starts going away and i can get back to being kitchen creative? im thinking of creating a combo version of your 3 ingredient peanut butter balls WITH gingerbread cookie dough balls! seriously, how yummy would that be!!! mmm should i attempt it?
xoxo
Oh yes, please do it!! I went to try it one day… but then I got lazy and just omitted the crushed oats. But I’m still super-curious as to how it’d turn out.
P.S. Feel better right now!!