Drink

At first glance, anyone who didn't grow up in an Asian culture might scrunch up her nose at herbal jelly. It's black, it's shiny, and it jiggles. But really, herbal jelly, or grass jelly, is like JELL-O, only naturally colored. Whole Foods is losing a big opportunity to market this as the next "it" health food.

Maybe it's the fact that it takes the shape of the tin can it comes from, that may turn people off. If, as a culture, Americans have moved past canned cranberry sauce, we might not be too thrilled with something similarly ridged but not candy-colored. Although grass jelly is made from an herb in the mint family, the taste is pretty neutral. Which is why Asians love it in desserts. In Hong Kong cafés and dessert shops serve grass jelly with mangoes, coconut, and other tropical produce. At bubble tea shops like Saint Alp's you can opt for little grass jelly bits instead of tapioca pearls.

(Photo by Jing a Ling, CC)

Whenever I buy a new bottle of wine to try, I instinctively think "Okay, anything but Chinese for dinner." But really, why can't my favorite alcohol and (one of) my favorite cuisines just play nice? In China and many parts of Asia, the de-facto alcohols are rice wines, beer, and for the modern high-roller, whiskey. Drinking grape wine with Chinese food is much more complicated, because of the food's possible spices, smoked flavors, and sometimes pesky cilantro. Lately, however, the food media has been stepping up to the challenge.

Some brief insights:

One of the reasons I love visiting Macau is for the inexpensive wine. Yes, the food is wonderful, but wine is the only thing I get to tote back to mainland China and enjoy weeks (okay, days) later.

The former Portuguese colony used to have no import taxes on Portuguese wines. Even now the import taxes are so low that bottles of good Portuguese wines start at about 5 USD, much cheaper than French, Italian, even Chilean. (I have a tip on a bar that serves 75 cent glasses of reds and whites, and $1.25 glasses of port. I'll report back in a later entry.) According to a well-traveled local friend, Macau has the least expensive Ports anywhere in the world, including Portugal, since the wine producers want to keep the market in Asia open. True enough, it's common to see Hong Kongers and China-residing expats hauling home suitcases of Portuguese wine.

On this trip I decided to bring back white Port. Rather than drinking it as a dessert wine like red Port, you chill it and drink it as an aperatif. It's richer, more mouth-filling than a fino or amontillado sherry. (My Ramos Pinto dry white has a nice hint of peach.) Besides, on chilly winter evenings before dinner, you need something heavier in your belly to keep warm. Especially after a long day in front of the computer.

Now that Christmas is over, it is imperative to start thinking of the future. Namely, New Year's Eve. More specifically, drinks for New Year's Eve.

Absinthe has been in the news quite a bit in the past year, because it is now "legal" again in the US. This past spring, while researching a story on absinthe in Beijing, I got to try more than just different kinds of louched absinthe. A couple bars made very tasty cocktails in which the fruity liqueurs and juices complimented the anise flavors in absinthe. (Q Bar in Sanlitun has an Absinthe Martini w/ peach liqueur, and Club Obiwan serves a killer "Henry" cocktail w/ absinthe, Cointreau, pineapple juice, and lime juice.)

I am not a winter person. Even though I have spent most of my life in cold cities (Boston, New York, Beijing), I always dread their endless winters. Some people from northern climes can wax poetic about snow, fire places, and ski season. Me, I conjure up flu season, ugly long underwear, and bitter winds that lash across my face. No offense, Winter, but I would love to avoid you altogether by skipping to the tropics. Or hibernating until spring. 

Until science finds a way for humans to sleep for 4 months, I am finding solace in the next best thing. Alcohol. More specifically, hot alcohol.

Mulled wine, also called Glühwein in Germany and Glögg in the Nordic countries, is simply wine heated up with spices and sugar. It's an especially good drink to make if you live in a country devoid of good wine, like China. Domestic brands are mostly undrinkable, and any imported wines are either bottom-of-the-barrel gunk (literally?) or bottles 3 or 4 times the cost overseas. (How I miss Trader Joe's wine shops.) With mulled wine, you can buy the cheapest wine that is still drinkable, and allow the spices and sugar to take charge. 

Last week I helped out at a Thai cooking class at The Hutong taught by my friend Sandra of Savour Asia. As we sat down to a meal of mango salad, pork laap, and red curry chicken, I realized how much I missed having lemongrass as a kitchn staple. In New York I could easily take the train to Chinatown whenever I wanted to cook with lemongrass. In Beijing, Sanyuanli market has several stalls selling the aromatic stalky grass, but is such a trek from my apartment that it doesn't enter my cooking consciousness at a moment's notice.

After scooping the last of my laap mu into my mouth, I decided I must must must get lemongrass that day and make iced tea. Lemongrass and ginger iced tea is my drink of choice with Thai food if I want something lighter than iced tea with condensed milk. A somewhat long trip to Sanyuanli later, I had four stalks of fresh lemongrass to take guilty whiffs of and inspire bleary yearnings for a trip to Thailand this winter.

There are many things about the US that I started missing immediately after arrival in China: unrestricted internet, entertaining TV, concept of "personal space", the use of bleach and other disinfectants in public restrooms, just to name a few. Then there are the foodstuffs that, after months of searching, I came to realize are simply impossible to find. Chinese beers may cost pennies, but anything with actual hops are 3 times the Stateside price. Vegetables are insanely cheap, but good luck finding a decent box of cereal for less than $8. Markets have massive bins of Sichuan peppercorn and any dried seafood you'd desire, but I can't find cardamom anywhere in the city.

Therefore, friends and loved ones who go abroad are essential to a worldly cook's sanity.  When Jacob returned from his last trip to Hungary, he toted back not only foie gras (hugs!!!), truffles (hugs!!!), and a plethora of Eastern European liquor (drunken hugs!!!), but also whole cardamom and cloves. It's amazing how much those two spices can automatically freshen up your kitchen cabinets. And it was fitting we would take turns making tons and tons of chai.

The smell of cinnamon brings out the New Englander in me.  One whiff and I would start pining for apple orchards, hayrides, and a big piles of raked leaves ready to be jumped in, even though I actually grew up in a city and rarely did all that bucolic fall stuff. But 'tis the time of year.

Or is it? Here in Beijing, the days have confused me slightly; hot and muggy one day, cool and crisp the next. I spent my last fall in Colorado and California, but I still remember all those years of living in the Northeast when summers dragged late into September, well after the kiddies have gone back to school and clothing stores have purged themselves of anything short-sleeved.

This cinnamon and ginger tea, served cold, is possibly the perfect transition drink for September. The heady aroma of cinnamon goes well with the shortening of days and yellowing of leaves, but the crisp icy taste is still refreshing when the temperatures climb back up.

Ever since the calendar switched over to August, a miraculous thing has happened. Beijing has clean air.

No, really. And honest to goodness blue skies. The city promised clean air for the Olympics, and lo and behold, it actually has been ridiculously clear for the past 3 days. Maybe it's because of fewer cars on the road, or closed factories, or just the luck of 8. Whichever case it may be, I love being able to breath again.

So when the sun is able to shine directly onto the city, the temperatures get just a smidgeon hotter. And when temperatures get hotter, my brain starts to churn out more ideas for cold drinks.

Like this plum and ginger soda. I had seen various recipes for lime and ginger soda, and I did have a bag of ripe plums from the new fruit store down the street. And if plum and ginger make a good sauce for duck, they would surely be find flavors for a soda.

Digression: This aforementioned fruit store, by the way, began renovations last Monday, finished on Thursday, and opened on Friday. The pace of construction in China continues to astound me. I wouldn't be surprised if the owners came up with the business proposal on Sunday.

If foodies have food porn, can tea geeks have tea porn?

I got a bunch of these display teas at Beijing's Maliandao, the street that has so many tea shops even the air outside smells like tea. These tiny bundles of flowers and green or black leaves are hand-packed and hand-sewn into various shapes. They unfurl into impressive little displays when steeped in hot water for about 3 minutes. It's like watching those little compact towels and sponges from theme park gift shops expand to "full size" when soaked, except less disappointing in the end.

(You can also find these online at sites like Adagio Teas or Silk Road Teas, but for heftier prices.)

The bloomed teas can be displayed in the center of a table and drunken at the same time. Tea shops will usually present these in big glass teapots, which I don't own. I did have fun watching these bloom in my mini glass tea set, beer mug, and other random see-through containers from my cabinet. Tonight also marks the first time I have ever sipped hot tea from a wine glass.