Chinese New Year at home (the reprise)

Home made Chinese New Year feast: chorizo dumplings, turnip cake, kale, rice

As the actual Chinese New Year fell on a Tuesday, we first celebrated ahead of time: the Friday before. Too tired to cook, too tired to go to the restaurant (and there were probably no tables available anyway), we caved in and had food from Duck & Rice delivered home. Once a year!

But this week-end Devvers was possessed by the spirit of the New Year and spent most of the week-end cooking a turnip cake… amongst other things, but this is what took the longest.

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How I came to love lentils again

Lentil stew

When I was about eight years old, one of my cousins started helping at home, which meant she’d pick us from school and cook lunch etc. One side of her family came from Castile where the winters are very cold and you have to eat substantial food, so she started introducing us to stout meat and potato stews and other new ingredients that I wasn’t familiar with, which was quite a change from the food I was used to eating.

At the beginning, I was fine with this situation—the food was generally OK and the novelty didn’t bother me excessively. Plus, having her around meant I got to stop being the oldest of the younger people in the household (and thus didn’t have to be The Role Model all the time). And I most definitely loved teasing her teenage vanity; I took a special interest in hiding her cigarettes so she couldn’t smoke 😏

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