What CELEBRATING Chinese New Year means?

 What is celebrating Chinese New Year to all of you? 

For many, when people think Chinese New Year, they instantly think.....

 

  "Kam" or gold in chinese, even cute Cady knows how to grab oranges

For others....it could be...

 

 

 Wearing red?

For many Malaysians, glorious food such as cookies, soft drinks, and Bak kwa is a MUST!

 

 

 

 Delicious vegetarian food on the first day!!!

 

 After the first day, it's all types of food allowed already!! Even satay baby!!!

For children and the young adults... alot of them look forward to..

 The red packets...Ang Pow!

Even for the mischievous ones... they think celebrating must entail...

 

 Fireworks!!

 

 Gambling

There are some families who treat Chinese New year as a must for a

 Holiday!

For me, it's actually ALL of the above(not so much the gambling or holiday) but definitely the FOOD! Many people put on tons of weight over the Chinese New Year holidays. Most importantly though, it' spending all of what I've mentioned above with my relatives and friends... It's a meeting ground for everyone to come together and celebrate all the customary traditions. Although each of us may interpret "celebrating' differently, we will always be together when doing one or all of it right?

 

 

 

 

 With my cousins, grandparents, parents, aunts, and uncles...You have not even seen my extended family YET!

 

 

 

With some of my close friends from all over!!

 Last but not least, all those older have shared their traditions with us all the way from China. Passed down from generations to generations... For us younger generations, what we can do is preserve it, and share it with the little ones......

 

Am I right about the above? Do you guys celebrate the same way too???

Gong Xi Fa Cai! May all of you have a prosperous, happy, lucky and successful year ahead!!!

xoxo

Meiz

The original recipe of Yee Sang from China

You know what this year is right on the Chinese Calendar?!?!

 

The auspicious dragon year

Given that Chinese New Year is coming round the corner, my father being the traditional China-man he is has urged me to write about a very fundamental food and an important part of chinese new year in malaysia!! It's none other than Yee Sang!!!!Love Love it!! Missed it sooo much when I was in Hawaii..

As my father is a second generation China-man, he believes that this isa must for all chinese people and foreigners alike to know the history of yee Sang. My late grandpa(Yeh-Yeh) was born in dongguan and adopted into jiangmen on the other side of the guangdong province:

Apparently, the seventh day of the chinese new year is known as Yan yatt or peoples birthday, that is the day when everybody is an equal and a meal is provided to be shared by both employers and employees. The main dish is yee sang and everybody stands up and toss it together for another good year of business and prosperity.

 

This practice was brought into malaysia by the cantonese and specifically into Ipoh and Kuala lumpur . Just FYI, did you know that Yee sang is only celebrated once a year on the seventh day and everybody looked forward to it unlike now where it is available one month before new year until one month after new year. Yeh yehs very good friend who once worked for tun hs lee as a cook gave the recipe to my father before he passed away. Tun hs lee was the first finance minister of malaysia who later started d and c bank and which is now known as RHB bank.

Now, if you plan to make it for CNY, here's THE ORIGINAL recipe from CHINA! 

1. Slice white lobak(radish) into toothpick size and put in water for a few hours, then put in cloth bag and squeeze the water out. Repeat with red carrot and yim sai but for yim sai just dry on a basket.

 

2. Next, the fish which is mostly grass carp to be dried under a fan, squeezed and sliced and put on mahjongg paper to dry and absorb the fat away. 
 

3.Put seaweed in water, slice hong keong, kew tou , sin keong and kwa yeng as condiments. 

4. Also put in pieces of pomelo, fried keropok,pork oil , peanut biscuit and sin mui cheong(sauce). Add peanut oil with garlic, sesame seed(cheemah) and lime tree leaves cut into slices.
 

5. Add lime that is six or seven pieces to be squeezed onto the mixture.

Voila!!! You are now ready to "loh sang" which means toss the Yee Sang in Chinese. 

My father says that you will be assured of a wonderful golden orangy tangy taste and flavour unlike what you eat at the restaurants where everything is purchased in bulk with the only flavour being the sin mui  or the "assam"sauce. What galls him is the kerapok which substantially makes up the dish nowadays and which the kids love and ME!!! Eeppsss!!!!

Try out the recipe guys and you will know the difference! Although there is more work, BUT it's so worth the time!!! Hopefully this recipe can be passed on to future generations and you cooks out there can share it with others!!

Gong Xi Fatt Cai
Meiz