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February 13, 2005
A Successful (Early) Valentine's Day
I've never done anything for Valentine's Day, until now. I invited Kathleen over to the apartment for lunch today and decided I would make a full course Chinese meal. It was a lot of fun and turned into quite an experience.
And now, my kitchen is like a disaster area. Hooooly mackeral.
The plum bonsai arrived Saturday, totally intact, in a box from Northern California (the Internet is amazing). I'd wanted to get her something to go with the print of plum blossoms I got her in Japan. The plums are blooming in Japan right now and I'd thought of her when I went to go see them last year. Plums are also symbolic of China in Japanese poetry so the symbolism was delicious (her being Chinese, the Chinese New Year theme of the meal, etc). I was worried about giving her a gift that she had to take care because she's really busy but that's the only plum-ish thing I could find.
Then last night I went shopping. Remarkably they had everything I needed except dried lily buds (wtf?) and white pepper (which I can fudge with a little black). I love Whole Foods. However, I've never bought more bottles of sauces/oils at one time in my entire life: sesame oil, peanut oil, rice vinegar, red wine vinegar, Ruby port, cooking sherry. Then I get home, unload everything and clean the apartment. Watching Futurama fell somewhere in there. Then I make the almond gelatin for the dessert, which I chose because I remembered she loves almond extract and the cherries in port, which are supposed to go over the gelatin. Into the fridge those go. Then sweet sleep. I wake up at 8, which I eventually realize is FAR too late. I wash my hands and get the chicken in the pot, ready to poach. As I'm doing salad preparations I periodically wonder if it's boiling yet but manage to restrain myself from taking the lid off. It doesn't start boiling until 8:40, which means it comes off the heat at 9, which means it'll be ready to come out just before she gets here at 12. Which would be OK if I didn't need the broth for the hot-and-sour soup.
Oh, the soup. This thing took WAAAAAAY longer than I originally anticipated. And so many BOWLS involved! I swear at one point my entire counter and much of the table was covered in bowls, "set aside" for some unclear future use (I'm serious. Just look at that ingredient list). I'm madly stir-frying the pork and bamboo at 11:35 and she arrives. I make a mad dash to the intercom to let her up then dash back to the skillet. Fortunately by now the salad is done so I have that to serve her. (Plus she really is the coolest person in the world and she never cooks so it's not like I got points off for not having everything ready.) The soup is finally ready next, then the chicken. I'm gradually leaving the table to finish stuff, which is really OK because my kitchen is four feet away from the table so it didn't even interrupt the conversation. Plus the specially-recommended tea from the Chinese specialty tea shop came out excellently.
The salad is too salty but OK. The soup is fantastic (thank God because if it wasn't I think I might've started throwing dirty bowls out the window). The chicken is good for what it is (very simple) and the dessert is predictably fantastic.
She says she loves spinach, her mom used to make that same soup, AND (freaky) her mom used to make scallion and ginger poached chicken as well. She loves the tea and she devours the dessert, saying she's never tasted anything like it. And she didn't seem immediately horrified that I'd given her a gift that requires maintanance.
Seriously, I have so much fun just being around this girl (and she, for some reason, enjoys spending time with me).
So now it's dinnertime and I'm still STUFFED. I feel like I could hibernate through the rest of the winter.
Posted by Ben at February 13, 2005 07:03 PM
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Comments
Hi, Ben -- Your mom told me about your cooking dinner for Kathleen. It is so cool of you to do that for someone. I'm glad you had a great time! See you sometime soon! Kath
Posted by: Kathy at February 16, 2005 04:28 PM
That's wonderful Ben. Thanks for sharing that.
Posted by: Augusto at March 3, 2005 01:13 AM