This is a cooling and nourishing for the lungs (in TCM terms - traditional Chinese Medicine) dessert and good to take when you have cough or having green phlegm.  Otherwise, it can also be taken as a dessert for cooling the system anytime.

Ingredients

1. 1 round winter melon ,(not those huge Chinese winter melon, but use those round ones about a size of a volley ball)
2. Water
3. Rock Sugar (as the “rock” size vary, approximate to about 5 tablespoon of sugar combined)

Method

1. Wash the outside of melon.
2. Using a sharp knife, cut off the top end (the end with the stalk) with a nice clean cut, and the piece that was cut out is about 5 cm at the thickest point (center), and it looks like a “cover” of about 10-15 cm diameter.  We need this to cover the melon during steaming.
3. Using a spoon, scoop out the seeds of the melon from the cut end and hence leaving a hollow center in the melon.
4. Put in the rock sugar, and water to fill up the hollow.
5. Cover with the “cover” that was cut out in step 2 so that it is back to a round melon.  Secure with tooth picks.
6. Using a metal bowl as a base to hold the melon upright without spilling its content.
7. Steam the whole melon in medium heat for 1 ½ to 2 hours.
8. When done, open up the “cover” and scoop out the water and using spoon scoop out the flesh (should be very soft now) and serve in a bowl.

Aglio is simply garlic, and Olio means olive oil, so this is simply tossing garlic and oil with spaghetti, but I have added some more ingredients to make it taste better.

Ingredients (serve 2)

1. ¼ packet spaghetti
2. 5 garlic
3. 4 tablespoon Extra virgin olive oil
4. 10-15 cherry tomatoes
5. 3-4 slices bacon
6. 1/2 teaspoon salt
7. freshly cracked black pepper

Method

1. Peel and chop up the garlic into small pieces or chucks if you like to bite them.
2. Wash the cherry tomatoes.  Cut the bacon into small pieces 1-2cm size.
3. Boil the spaghetti in a pot of water until the desired softness. Drained and set aside.  Leave the pot of water boiling if you are proceeding to next step.
4. Heat up a pan with medium heat, add in the olive oil, garlic, cherry tomato, bacon, salt, cracked black pepper  and stir briefly and cover for 5 mins.
5. While the pan is cooking, put the spaghetti back in the boiling water for ½ to 1 mins, and drain again (so that it is hot and moist, not stick together)
6. Pour the spaghetti into the pan and toss it. 
7. Serve hot with some cracked black pepper on the side of the plate.

You can get roast pork in market, usually cheaper than what you get from the char siew or roast meat rice stalls.  In Chinese wedding, you may get some from the bride’s family if you are relatives to the bride, as in Chinese tradition, the groom family has to give the bride’s family a roast pig.  These meat are seasoned and roasted on charcoal fire and can be served as it is.  However, you can try this to make it tastier by cooking with some soya sauce suggested here.

Ingredients

1. 1 slice roast pork (can vary, about 300 grams)
2. 1 tablespoon dark soya sauce
3. 2 tablespoon light soya sauce
4. 2 tablespoon sugar
5. 1/3 cup water

Method

1. Cut the roast pork into small pieces.
2. When the wok is warm (not too hot) add in the pork and increase the heat, pan fry the roast pork till the oil comes out, and the skin crispy.  (you don’t need to put oil, the fats will release the oil while you cook, but important to put in the pork when wok not too hot, so that it don’t stick immediately to the wok)
3. Mix ingredient 2 to 5 in bowl. Pour into the wok and boil with the roast pork for 2 mins. 
4. Serve Hot.

Traditionally these soups are best cooked in a soup clay pot over charcoal fire, but now a day not many families are still using charcoal stove.  Hence cooking over gas stove or slow cooker is also ok.

Ingredients

1. 2-3 section of lotus root
2. 5 dried red dates
3. 1 honey date (金丝蜜枣) (dried dates with sugar)
4. 200 grams pork ribs
5. 2 dried scallop (干贝)
6. 4 dried oyster （蚝豉, 蚝干）
7. 1 tablespoon wolfberry (枸杞子) optional
8. 2 liters water (some will dry up during cooking)
9. Salt

Method

1. Wash the lotus root and remove the skin, slice into thin slices of ½ cm.
2. Wash all other ingredients.
3. Put all ingredients, and water in a soup or stock pot, and put to boil.  Turn down flame to very small and allow to slow boil for 3-4 hours.
4. Add salt to taste, and serve hot.

You can also cook this in slow cooker for 4 hours. 

This is same as the earlier post last year, but now with carrot added.  Tried this and find that the carrot added a twist to the taste and bite.   The modified recipe is in this post.

Ingredients

1. 250 grams minced lean pork
2. 4 table spoon of preserved vegetable (冬菜)
3. 1 teaspoon corn flour
4. 1 table spoon sesame oil
5. 2 table spoon soy sauce
6. dash of pepper
7. ½ teaspoon sugar
8. 1/2 carrot

For gravy

1. 2 tablespoon soya sauce
2. 1 tablespoon sugar
3. 1/2 teaspoon dark soya sauce
4. ¾ cup water
5. 2 clove of garlic
6. 2 table spoon cooking oil

Method

1. Wash the preserved vegetables and press dry.
2. Skin the carrot and dice into small cubes ½ cm.
3. Either you get ready minced pork, or you can get a piece of lean pork and minced it using your cleaver.  (cut into thin slice, and then chop repeatedly for about 5-10 mins.) 
4. While still on the chopping board, add in the preserved vegetables and chop again for another 5 mins so that that the vegetables are also chopped finely, and mixed well into the pork.
5. Add in the diced carrots and mixed in the corn flour, soya sauce, sesame oil, pepper, sugar and mixed well with a spoon or hand. (you can do this in a plate or on the chopping board)
6. Putting the pork on the chopping board, scoop up the pork with the cleaver in 1 hand and your other bare hand and slap it down gently on the chopping board repeatedly 10-20 times.  This will expel the air within the minced pork and will make it more compact and more springy to the bite when cooked.
7. Spread the pork flat like a patty.
8. Heat up a frying pan, add in oil and spread the oil out, especially if you are not using non-stick pan.
9. When hot, put in the patty to pan fry one side of the patty till brown, usually take 8-10 mins (you can pan fry the other side but it is optional)
10. When almost done with frying, add in chop garlic to fry in the oil.
11. Mix the sugar, light and dark soya sauces and water in a bowl. Pour the mixture into the pan, and cover for 5 mins to simmer.  Open lid, and flip the patty over and cover for another 5 mins to simmer.
12.  Serve hot.