Chinese New Year

Happy Chinese New Year, everyone! I can't remember if I told you, but our good friend Harry is from Hong Kong. He and Jonathon decided to have a big Chinese New Year party, and we were lucky enough to be invited!

To prepare for said party, J and I made origami horses. This year is the year of the horse, so we thought it would be fun to make some. Here they are next to the beautiful flowers that Harry and Jonathon got.

These are just a few of the many beautiful decorations that greeted us as we arrived. As you can see, yellow/gold and red are the Chinese New Year colours.

Harry and Jonathon made steamed dumplings, which were delicious. Harry had to explain to us all how they worked and how to eat them, which was fun.

Harry made nian gao, which is Chinese New Year cake. He told us that traditionally, only his grandmother makes it, for the whole family. But he said that he missed her (and the cake) so much that he decided to make it himself. He did a wonderful job. First, he made this glutinous cake, which is very dense. 

Then he got it out of the pan (no small task, considering how sticky it is), and cut it into pieces.

Then he put the pieces in a pan with olive oil and lightly fried them.

He flipped them over, with chopsticks, of course.

And then he dipped them in egg, much like we do with French toast.

When they were done, they looked like this - outside pretty similar to French toast, but with sweet, dense, kind of gooey centres. Very delicious!

And here we all are out front, enjoying the warm, lovely evening. It was a wonderful party.

Happy New Year!!