Chinese food looks simple to cook. There’s nothing to bake; everything is flash fried or steamed. All soup is made in front of you, even at a roadside stand. There’s separate bowls for all the ingredients; you order; they mix it all up with hot water and hand it to you. The biggest emphasis is placed on the freshness of the food, and the end result has to have as much evidence of freshness as possible. The less evidence of cooking that is present, the better the food is perceived to be. This is the “biggest must” among the many rules to follow.

The second rule is there has to be vegetables, and they have to cooked perfectly.

It looks easy to cook, and it’s an afterthought in our cuisine. It’s basically boiling and chopping. The first time, I did several things wrong. The color was wrong because I cooked it longer than necessary. I used to much oil, and ruined the broth for ‘tong’. Too much ginger, then there was not enough. I think I’ve got the whole thing down now, and I’ll present a pictorial of the feat. I still like the whole dumping a can of corn in a saucepan, but the following food has its place in my kitchen repertoire.

These are the vegetables I bought from the market in Wan Chai. I have no idea what they’re called, so I have to consult that kid’s book of vegetables I bought in Shenzhen… ah, they’re suan tai (蒜苔). Ok, Suan Tai is surprisingly oily for something so green, but it’s a great vegetable to start cooking with. It’s easy to get everything consistent as the pieces are all uniform. It’s easy to cut, and quick to cut, also. There’s little cleaning prep to be done. A good one to start with.

Cut these guys up into suitable sized chunks; about the size of a green bean. The roots are hard and I don’t like eating them, but the flowery top thing is ok to eat, and makes it look better in the end. After everything’s cut, you put the following in the saucepan: about a tablespoon of salt, about the same amount of oil, and ginger, about a finger’s worth. I missed that here, but my cooking instructor was away at the time so it didn’t matter. The amount of water is smaller than you’d expect; you want the water to quickly hit the boiling point.

This is the cruicial stage in the game here. If you ignore the other instructions and decide to put jello in the mix I’ll forgive you, but you have to do this right: The dish is DONE, as in off the stove and on a plate, when the color starts to turn slightly greener. It’s very crucial. If the vegetables start to lose their color, the vegetables are ruined and you must throw them out into street from your 30th floor apartment whilst shouting “bu hao chi de!” to anyone unfortunate enough to have poorly cooked vegetables dumped on their clothes. So watch the color. It’s the most important part. You got that?

I made some sauce because it’s a blog and it’s got to be all fancy. I think this is called teriyiaki sauce.

The end result. Notice the flower things aren’t cut off, and I’m here to write this so it’s good to eat. I cut them off the first time I cooked this, so I’m just pointing this out in case you decide to cut these off.

Eat!

I am a food snob. It has to be fresh, spicy, and interesting. I will never eat bologna. But there is one foodstuff that I love despite its pedestrian roots — the hamburger. It takes a lot of work to cook one the right way. Regular meat, corn flakes, eggs, worcester sauce, and finely diced onions. The paddies have to formed perfectly, and you must use a charcoal grill. After that, the fun part, and the reason a hamburger is one of great foods of the world — the condiments. Mushrooms, 5 year cheddar, romaine lettuce, chili sauce, bacon, mayonnaise, mustard, carrot flakes, eggs, tomatoes, pineapple, those cheap processed cheese slices, fresh onions, cilantro, homemade yellow relish, or pickles. Hey, you can even put some black forest ham on there, whatever. The tao of hamburger is a “whatever you want” atop an expertly created base.

I’ve had a lot of great hamburgers before, but here are some of the more notable hamburger experiences in my life.

Moss Burger in Tokyo

There is a lot of great burger restaurants in Japan. They actually do the whole American Casual restaurant thing quite well, but one thing that Japan has is awesome hamburger restaurants. In some respects, they make better hamburgers than the Americans. This burger gap must be closed, lest we fall behind.

In and Out burger in San Francisco after walking the Golden Gate Bridge

Visiting my sister in San Francisco, I walked from Fisherman’s Wharf to Marin County, and THEN BACK ACROSS THE BRIDGE AGAIN. With no food. There was some incident with a homeless man who smashed a bus window while yelling incoherently, which made my sister regret listening to me when I convinced her not to take a taxi. Short story shorter, In and Burgers rule even when there are eaten on a hotel room’s desk.

Burgers I cooked on a charcoal grill at my house

You can’t say you appreciate food until you can make it yourself. I was good at making hamburgers, but the charcoal grill caused the occasional time related problem. It was worth it in the end.

VJ’s late night burger under the urban skies of Winnipeg

There was little burger place in my hometown of Winnipeg that served great hamburgers. There was no room to sit inside the building, but there were tables outside. They put chili sauce in the burger, something I haven’t seen replicated anywhere else. Regional variations add to the hamburger mythos.

Arch Deluxe during a burger run to Brandon, Manitoba

I loved that Arch Deluxe that McDonald’s had. There’s not many fans of it out there. Oh, and a burger run? I lived in a small town where the nearest fast food restaurant was an hour’s drive away. When we started getting cars and driver’s licenses in high school, one thing to do to kill time was to drive to the fast food places, go to a Burger King, and then eat the food while driving back.

Burger at Schmeker’s in Winnipeg after Korean vacation

I had spent a bit under a month in Korea, eating nothing but bebimbap, kimchi, and 알몬드. The hamburger at this crazy restaurant called Schemeker’s was perfect, as it contained all of the food I’d been denying myself. I know I could have eaten at McDonald’s while I was there, but I was a bit snobbish at the time. The house-cut french fries were the one thing that made it a notable experience.

The Hamburgers That My Grandmother Cooked

My favorite memory of Grandma are the dinners I had with her and Grandma when I was working at a local convenience store. The walk was less than a block, and the food was always prepared with great care. The main course were hamburgers, To this day I cannot duplicate and cook them myself (I think there’s ketchup in there). There was always lemon-aid and scalloped potatoes. Vegetables, of course. At the end, there was always desert capped with a nod to our British heritage in the Djarling tea with cream. There was left over dainties from her many social engagements, and my favorite, specially prepared flour-free muffins with home made icing on top. When I starting cooking in college, my first foray into baking was remaking those muffins from a recipe that she gave me over the phone. Thanks Grandma!