In the kitchen

At the market the other day I bought fresh water chestnuts, they kind of aren't that easy to come by and I was lucky to ask the right woman at the right time. I had been imagining my favourite dish, Xia Song. Xia meaning prawns/shrimps, Song I guess meaning cut up in little bits. Or I guess, Shrimp Lettuce Cups.

This is my favourite dish EVER!!! Water chestnuts with the addition of You Tiao - which is dough deep fried until crazy crispy. (You Tiao is typically a breakfast dish eaten dunked in hot fresh soymilk.) Then the shrimp, ginger, some special flavours. And there you have it. Cold crispy crunchy lettuce leaves form the wrapper of this insanely delicous dish. I think I did an excellent job. Steve said it was pretty darn good. It's served at higher end restaurants here and at wedding banquets so it's a pretty hard act to follow. I initially asked my sister in law, who is an excellent cook, for the recipe. She came back to me today saying it was too mafan (hassle) to bother with. I explained I had actually done it last week and enjoyed the results. I had Steve google Xia Song and there was one excellent video on there, of a Taiwanese woman making it. Were I a better photographer you'd be really feeling it with me right now....

Trip South ~ Family Time Part Two

Finished with the business of the day, we headed to our special destination - just twenty minutes away from Bai He. I'm so glad we researched and decided where we were going ahead of time and that we chose somewhere close. Any further driving and the girls would not have held it together. This place was amazing. Whenever I go away in Taiwan for a 'holiday', I always feel like something is missing. This place was the entire package. After a long day on Wednesday and late night, even Steve (eternal sleepy head if given half a chance) was up and raring to go first thing. The Jian Shan Pi, Jiang Nan Resort is actually owned by Taiwan Sugar Co., Ltd. and is just over 100 hectares. All the facilities encircle a Reservoir and it's blurb reads that the resort " introduces a new era to tourism in Southern Taiwan." And, "is classified as one of the few resorts in Taiwan that can compete internationally." This rivalled anything I've seen in Taipei, Taipei could never compete with that much space and clean air. I was really impressed with what was happening down South. It's been a good nine years since I lived there and things are improving incredibly. Back to the resort. The staff were excellent. The hotel rooms were excellent. The log cabins were gorgeous, inside and out. The views were sensational and the clean air was a God send. The recreational activities hit just the right note. A perfect holiday for the family and one we will take again I'm sure of. Mid week off season prices also made this so worthwhile. And I love how in Taiwan check out is at 12. Do you know how much you can do if you get up early before 12? It's like another day! And this resort was in such an unlikely area too. But as we drove towards it and up the hill to the main entrance I just knew we'd hit the jackpot. Cannot seem to be able to say enough about this place. Really great. I think Evie's smile says it all...... she laughed and laughed at these greedy fish as Tilly doled out the food one bit at a time. I had to shake a whole heap out to get them to come back to her. Some photos.....

Trip South ~ Family Time Part One

1. Tuesday was Tomb Sweeping Day, we drove down to Ding Zhou on Wednesday. It takes three hours to get to the place where Steve's mum comes from. We came down to clean up Baba's tomb and to make steps to have his ashes moved to a different place, to Bai He - the place of his and Steve's birth. I say we, though the girls and I don't get involved in the details or activity. Tilly got the flu the day before and was a bit out of it yesterday. The weather was lovely and those there met Evie for the first time. Bai He is pronouced Buy her, but don't be fooled by my spelling of the pronunciation. It's a pretty little town and the name means White River. It is the famous hometown of the lotus flower. The trip we took between Ding Zhou and Bai He (about half an hour) was lovely. Green and lush. beautiful schools, old traditional style housing.
2. Steve's uncle, his mother's eldest brother, making us tea. He rode in on his scooter just after we arrived and came straight in and put on a 'cuppa'. He's a lovely man.
3. Steve's older sisters and Evie. Evie was really lapping it up. In all the 'ki li ka la' of the Taiwanese language being thrown around, she was not fazed by it one bit. She almost looked at them like she knew what it was all about.
4. Steve's second sister Pei Qi, don't get to see her much. She's a doll.
5. Mum, her first real chance to be with Evie. Mum lives here in the South and we don't travel much down here. Though she did come up to see her after she was born.
6. Mum's brothers run a cherry tomato farm. Yum, considering they are well expensive in Taiwan, we are lucky to always have a big bag to bring home.
7. Ding Zhou, Mum's hometown. It's small and most Taiwanese here in Taipei that I tell about it don't even know it. (But that's coz they're just city slickers......)
8. Big Sis getting geared up to clean up Dad's tomb.
9. Need a broom for the sweeping?
10. How about this one? Any better? If you've never been to Taiwan and you have no idea about it, you would never believe the way things are done here. Convenience is ultra and in the extreme. This woman and her husband came back and forth a good five minutes with tomb sweeping goods to show my sis in laws, just for them to spend a couple of bucks on a broom and a sickle shaped knife to cut the grass. And that's ok, because that's how it's done here, and life rolls by smoothly.
11. Bai He, the place Dad's ashes will be moved to. This is a funeral hall as such. This picture is outside the funeral hall, I asked them what it was but didn't get a clear answer as they didn't really know either. Ha. All these things I view from the car with the girls. Steve's family are incredibly gracious about not expecting us to participate, on any level. I am supposed to as he is the 'eldest son' (even though his sisters are older) and therefore the head of the family. My responsibilities would be great indeed. Yet, I have none and they accept that. That might sound strange, though this whole thing is steeped in centuries old, confusing tradition and being an outsider so to speak and a Christian, they do not ask me or the girls to do any of those things.

Early this morning

Unashamedly my form of bliss......

Two little girls happily at play.

Kids these days... (tisk tisk)

In a desperate attempt to quieten a fussy baby and get out the door and somewhere on time and leave behind a tidy house, I put Evie in the middle of the bed with the Ipod while I flurried. She is actually watching Alphablocks, as in really watching it. One other time I put her in the rocker in front of the TV and let her watch, oh dear.... Baby Einstein for a whole 15 minutes. I was completely mortified. This is coming from a mother who used to ask people to turn the TV off when Tilly was this age and older.... Tisk tisk for thinking I needed to get myself into a flurry in order to have my house straight before I leave (though changing this side of my nature seems difficult for me....), tisk tisk for letting my 7 month old at the technology, tisk tisk for probably being too uptight.....

Story time

Story time in this household is a super important part of the day, at least to Tilly. I have also started telling stories to her without books, old fables such as The Three Little Pigs, or Little Red Riding Hood. That came about after Daddy read those stories to her from her Fable story book which is completely in Chinese. She sits glued to wherever she happens to be, watching me tell the story. All those years teaching English as a foreign language to children - I can be quite animated........ She is desperate for books and stories every day. This evening we read through all the Pamela Allen story books we have here. Black Dog is about a girl who has a pet dog and they live in a house together. She becomes preoccupied with the fantasy that a beautiful blue bird is flying through the woods one winter and is so preoccupied that she neglects herself and Black Dog in hopes of catching a glimpse of the imaginary bird. It tells of Black Dog's quest to win her back and bring her back into reality, which he does - though not without hurting himself in the process. She realises her deep love of Black Dog in the end..... But I digress.... Just at the first page Tilly asked why Christina and Black Dog didn't live with her mummy and daddy. I told her Christina was old enough to live by herself and take care of herself and Black Dog, using myself and her Nan & Pop as an example. I rightly or wrongly further explained that one day Tilly will also be grown up and won't live with mummy and daddy anymore. To which was the reply: 'No, no mummy. I won't be growing up.' And that for now is that.