The locals have no concept of "going Dutch" or of "pot-luck"; you are a guest or not a guest. Maybe, Sudarshani suggested, we should introduce pot-luck dinners and see what happens. First off, everyone will bring the cheapest thing: rice, or rice and beans and hope someone else brings the more pricey stuff. The way to do it is to call it a competition, where each family has to show, by demonstration, how good they take care of their own at home. Then you'll get the great old family recipes showing front and center!

Another connection: Carlos will inspect any vehicle we want to buy. And he has a good idea about what is a good price to pay. Generally, in the range I am interested in: under $5K, the prices are $3K higher than in the USA for used cars. For example, the '95 KIA mini-SUV 4x4 goes for $2K in the USA and $4K-$5K here. Nadja's is diesel-powered, which is a big plus. Carlos said KIA was suspect at first, but has proven its reliability. Geraldo, a neighbor, imported a $15K Buick some years back and had to pay $6K in customs plus $2K shipping. It hurts but can't be avoided unless you are an official pensioner from overseas.

Today was José Manuel's ordination into the Catholic priesthood here in Colón. I guess it's no more clubbing for him. Now, wherever he goes he'll be known for his station as a Catholic priest and will have to keep up appearances. Especially for the older folks who supply most of the money to keep up the priests and churches; you cannot sully their visions of priestly piety and still gain support for yourself. Anyway, it was a long (not by Fr. Allen’s measure) two hour ritual with a lot of great Latin (not Roman) music by a live band and choir. The bishop was visiting from the capitol accompanied by a couple of dozen priests from all over the country and one from Spain. This must be a rare occasion after all; José was the only one getting ordained. In my youth I remember seeing them getting ordained in classes of ten or more.

The church did pass the baskets and everyone gave, even me. There was a modest box-lunch afterwards, so it was a wash. I like tradition and rituals. I've been awash in some of my own for almost 30 years and can appreciate the reasoning behind them. I was lamenting the bastardization of traditional culture a while back. Now I wonder if there is anything left worth saving, especially after the Kuna Indian story. But, seeing the Catholics in action, I felt that the true purpose of culture was intended: the refinement of perception and awareness. Unfortunately, the effort is couched in dogmatic limitations on possible realities and fear of the unknown. Aside from this weakness, this tradition may indicate that the road to refinement is found not by increasing material freedom but by restricting it.

Ekta

I posted about Ekta's opening, so you know I was in a hurry to try the food.  I'm happy to report that Chef Raju Bhattarai has matched the quality that his fans came to expect at his former post, Tiffin, at his new restaurant a few blocks down Girard.  [where: 19125]  I ordered one of the few dishes I hadn't seen before, Murg Pahari, described on the menu only as "chicken cooked in a village's style."  It arrived hot and on time, and it was comfort food-- the chicken was cooked in a thick, spicy sauce of onions, tomatoes and herbs.  No heavy cream thickening the gravy here, just fresh vegetables and a low level of heat that allowed the flavors to shine.  Peshawari naan and onion bhajis were tasty, but the real standout was the freebie "chef's accompaniment" that arrived labeled "semolina."  It was a dessert semolina porridge with golden raisins and toasted almonds, its subtle sweetness cut by a hint of black pepper.  I hope it makes it onto the menu-- I'd order it for dessert or for breakfast.

Zhi-Wei-Guan Restaurant

*a.k.a. Lanzhou (兰州/蘭州), not to be confused with Hangzhou (杭州).  Chinese transliteration is a complicated business; I'm not about to hazard guesses about what's right or wrong.  Chinese speakers, please feel free to chime in.

** This is a welcome contrast to the dumpling house that briefly occupied this space before Zhi-Wei-Guan-- I stopped in one night half an hour before closing time to order takeout and was shooed out by a surly server.

Toward the end of the show, Lynne interviewed Gary Nabhan on the "RAFT" movement. RAFT is short for Renewing America's Food Traditions, which is also the title of Nabhan's book. If you visit the Splendid Table Website this week you can scroll to the "Heard on the Show" section and click on the word RAFT to hear the interview.

I hadn't heard of this project before, and it sounds like something that a lot of foodies would be interested in.

We buy everything, and have no idea by which the articles are produced, and have no means of knowing before hand what the quality may be... Relatively we are in a state of barbarous innocence, as compared with our grandmothers, about the common articles of daily use.

-Ellen Richards, home economist, 1885

I picked up Ann Vileisis's Kitchen Literacy: How we lost knowledge of where food comes from, and why we need to get it back at the suggestion of a reader, and I'm glad I did.  It's a fast, fun overview of an important topic.

Vileisis takes the reader from the kitchens of the late 18th-century New England to those of the present day, tracing the history of the American food system from its pastoral beginnings through its process of industrialization.  She shows how each successive generation has been a step or two further removed from knowledge of where food comes from, and explores the social changes and food scandals that shaped the balance between what people want to eat and what the food industry offers them.  She wraps up by arguing that if we're going to have a sustainable system that doesn't poison us on a regular basis, we're going to need to regain an understanding of seasons, local specializations, and where our food comes from.

It's a simple enough thesis, and Vileisis doesn't overcomplicate things-- her explorations of the changing roles of women, the nature of work and living patterns, and the politics of federal agencies are mostly cursory.  I didn't learn much that I hadn't already read, but I'm pretty well read on this subject.  If you haven't already exhausted the works of Marion Nestle, Michael Pollan, Friedrich Engels and Upton Sinclair, you'll find much to enlighten you-- and even if you have, it's an enjoyable and accessible synthesis of what can be a complicated literature.

The joy of this book is in the details Vileisis digs up in her extensive research.  She uses antique cans, product labels and advertisements to trace the way food manufacturers have adapted their pitch to appeal to the needs of each new generation of consumers.  The book is packed with little gems, like a 1928 Piggly Wiggly ad that appeals to the liberated woman (complete with chic hat) by telling her how the new self-service supermarket gives her self-sufficiency:

The woman of today!  So self-reliant now in all her shopping-- so sure of her new skill!  Only yesterday her mother depended almost wholly on the advice of salesmen when she bought food-stuffs...  The woman of today with her new, wide knowledge of real values has blazed a trail of her own.  The she may be entirely free to choose for herself, she has made this plan of household buying a nation-wide vogue.

These details really bring the book to life.  (Especially for cultural studies types like me, who loooove to deconstruct advertising.)

Vileisis begins in colonial Maine, where she draws on the wonderful diary of midwife and farm matriarch Martha Ballard (worth a read in itself) to illustrate how very close Americans once were to the sources of our food.  Back then, you knew your milk was fresh because you milked the cow yourself.  Food came directly from sweat and hard work-- you grew it yourself, or you traded what you grew for what your neighbors were growing.

As the nineteenth century began, the country began to urbanize rapidly, and the countryside began producing for the city.  A city's foodshed consisted mostly of the farms in the surrounding countryside, plus a few exotic items like sugar and tropical fruits that were shipped in.  Food was mostly sold fresh in open-air markets.  But as cities industrialized and transportation improved, food was being brought in from more and more far-flung locations.  Fresh food often didn't survive the trip too well-- fruits and vegetables were beginning to rot, and cattle were bruised and emaciated from long and brutal train trips.  This was when the food system began an industrialization of its own, with the introduction of canned produce and "Chicago-dressed" meats (killed and dressed before being shipped).  Vileisis does a great job of illustrating the initial suspicious reactions of people used to fresh foods-- it was, after all, a hard sell to convince people to buy food they couldn't see until they'd paid for it.  Early canning methods were worthy of their skepticism-- it took a while for canners to realize that if cans weren't heated to a specific temperature, botulism could grow and thrive. Food poisoning was quite common in those days, and even well into the twentieth century: Armour's canned meats notoriously killed nearly as many World War I soldiers as the enemy did.

But social changes prevailed over skepticism: agricultural jobs gave way to factory work, and city children grew up never seeing live plants and animals.  More and more women entered the workplace, not only out of a desire for freedom from traditional roles, but also just to earn enough to keep families afloat.  They had less time to spend shopping and cooking, and convenience foods began to sell widely.  As new generations were raised on canned and prepackaged foods, they became the familiar, comforting norm-- and advertisements became less about connecting products to "nature" and more about creating an imaginary world of bountiful farms and idyllic countryside that would appeal to the eyes of consumers.  (Vileisis's description of the term "natural" and its evolving meaning to generations of consumers is a highlight of the book.)

While each generation had different emotional and cultural needs to which food producers responded, consumers also had fears that shaped both federal regulation and product marketing.  The food system has never been free of problems-- from the horrific slaughterhouse conditions Upton Sinclair portrayed in nauseating detail in The Jungle (1906) to, um, the horrific slaughterhouse conditions Eric Schlosser portrayed in nauseating detail in Fast Food Nation (2001).  Contemporary readers are also consumers, and today's worries about tomatoes, spinach, e. coli and pet food from China will seem familiar in Vileisis's descriptions of scandals over adulterated jam, pesticide residues in canned vegetables and sodium benzoate (a poisonous and once-controversial preservative still widely used in manufactured foods):

Even as serious concerns were raised and not addressed, most consumers had little choice but to continue their grocery shopping as usual.  What could an individual shopper do about the fact that pesticides killed fish, that chickens were jammed into cages, or that agriculture used too much oil?  Through the 1950s most American shoppers' lack of awareness about their foods may have been characterized by a naive "I don't know," but by the mid-1970s, with more prevalent news of toxic pesticide residues and repugnant animal factories, it had become an anxious and resigned "I don't want to know."

Sound familiar?  She follows this with a quick overview of the rise of the organic food movement and a call for consumers to become more involved with their food choices.  It's surprisingly short, though in fairness, how to do so can be (and is) enough for an entire book in itself.

Kitchen Literacy is a fascinating book.  It's not a food-politics education in itself, but it's a great jumping-off point for those new to food politics, and might inspire even the skeptical to read further, and better yet, to ask some pointed questions about what's in the food they eat.

I enjoyed the special delights of this cuisine as I visited my aunts and uncles after they emigrated to Brooklyn.. These are warm, happy memories of family.... so, I was delighted to find a record has been made of the cuisine of the Jews of Libya.

• In Sephardic cooking by Copeland Marks..there is a section on the food of the Magreb... including a section on Libya . Featured are recipes for foods I know such as Mafrum, T'fina, Couscous, Burekas and Hrieme. There are also foods I do not know such as Bestil ,Tabikhsa bil Houmas and Tabikhsa bil Karrate. The section on Tunisia featured other familar foods such as Dabla, Harissa and Makroud.
• Most recently I was introduced to a cookbook published in Italy- La Cucina Tripolina by Linda Guetta Hassan. Sadly, I am so far not able to get the book here in New York.

image from FallenSouffle.com

The chicken holds a strange position in the American diet. On one hand, we eat more chicken than just about anything else; chicken dishes are staples in restaurants, in fast food and in home cooking. On the other hand, most of those chicken dishes don't taste much like chicken at all.

The American chicken is a monstrous, genetically modified beast, bred for maximum breast meat, without much attention to flavor (or to humane raising practices, for that matter). We eat chickens raised on feedlots, fed meal made from other chickens and laced with massive doses of antibiotics. It tends to be tough and stringy and taste like cardboard, so we fry it in grease or slather it with sauces. It's a blank slate on which to build a meal, a tasteless carrier for cheese or breading or sauce. It's protein without passion.

Which brings us to the Sunday roast chicken. My generation doesn't think to roast chickens, really, since we're not used to chickens having flavor; our grandparents' generation, on the other hand, mostly grew up raising chickens, eating fresh eggs and occasionally killing a chicken for Sunday dinner. (My grandmother, a sweet and physically tiny woman, likes to gross out her grandchildren by telling us about how good she was at wringing chickens' necks back on the farm in Carolina.) But today, with organic and humanely raised chickens once again becoming widely available, the roast chicken is making a comeback.

Anthony Bourdain says in his Les Halles Cookbook that you can measure a chef by how well they do a simple roast chicken. With all respect to Bourdain, though, my favorite recipe is Thomas Keller's roast chicken, posted on Epicurious.com. It is the simplest of recipes: truss the bird, salt it, roast it for an hour or so, baste it and let it rest before serving. That's it. No stuffing, no temperature changes, nothing fancy whatsoever. It comes out with a beautiful, crispy golden brown skin and tender, juicy meat. It tastes like chicken. And it's delicious.

Serve with roast vegetables, potatoes or fresh bread.

Roast one of these babies on Sunday, then use the leftovers all week for chicken tacos, chicken salad, or whatever you can think of.

The first annual Slow Food Nation conference is coming up on Labor Day Weekend in San Francisco, and I hope to be there. (Let's hope my recent stretch of bad luck ends and I can actually manage to go!) Tentative program highlights were just published, and if this isn't my ideal vacation, I don't know what is. Check it out below the jump:

Location 1: Civic Center

Victory Garden
A spectacular vegetable garden of over 15,000 sq. ft. will showcase a model urban farm.

A Seat at the Table
This ticketed dinner on Civic Center Plaza will celebrate a good, clean and fair food system featuring a mix of food grown in urban gardens and products grown on farms in Yolo, Napa, and Contra Costa counties.

Marketplace
60-100 growers and artisans, each presenting a single high-quality product with each stand's visual and informational context highlighting how the product is grown and produced. A soapbox within the market will feature a rotating roster of farmers, sharing their stories and outlook. Free of charge.

Slow on the Go
10 stands featuring emblematic, affordable foods from across the country made from entirely sustainable, fully source-verified ingredients: tacos made with homemade tortillas; South Indian dosas; grassfed hamburgers; Vietnamese sandwiches; Afghan bolani; and more.

Food for Thought
Speakers series including journalists, scientists, advocates, and business people speaking about issues that intersect with food: climate change; food access; education reform; youth empowerment; and more.

Changemakers Day
300 NGO leaders and activists in the fields of social justice, the environment, agriculture, culture and policy will focus on a common theme of forging a "slow" and sustainable food system.

National Congress
Over 300 Slow Food Convivium (chapter) leaders from all fifty states will attend the congress.

Farm Bill, Immigration, and Education Forums
Presentations in the Rotunda and Light Courts of the Civic Center on hot-button issues in the food system, targeted at media, policy-makers, and "changemakers".

Location 2: Fort Mason Center

Taste Hall
The Taste Hall will offer products from hundreds of American producers grouped by type of product, and each curated by an expert in the field. Taste Areas include: Fish, Cheese, Olive Oil, Bread, Pickles & Chutneys, Jams & Preserves, Cured Meat, Microbrews, Wine, and more.

Explore
Directly in front of the Taste pavilion, Explore is a fun open space for kids and families that explains the food cycle, from growing to transforming to consumption to composting.

Taste Workshops
At a Workshop, 30-60 people at a time participate in guided tastings while hearing the stories behind the foods directly from the producers.

At Other Locations

Slow Food on Film
International documentary, short and full-length films.

Taste of Marin (Sunday, August 31, Fort Mason)
Marin Organic, Marin Agricultural Land Trust and Marin Farmers Markets are partnering with Slow Food Nation to host their annual local food event, dedicated to supporting and promoting Marin's agricultural bounty.

Slow Food Nation Dinners
Bay Area restaurants in all price ranges selected for their good food and commitment to sustainability will host dinners during the event. Each dinner will be held in partnership with a non-profit focused on sustainability, the environment, social justice, nutrition, and other areas.

Slow Journeys
Itineraries exploring the food and fishery landscape - including urban gardens, watersheds, farms, and gastronomic hotspots - of the greater Bay Area. Coordinated in collaboration with Food and Wine Trails.

Slow Hikes
Hikes in collaboration with local non-profits in agricultural landscapes of the Bay Area.

Slow Food Nation Music Festival
Two-day concert at Great Meadow (adjacent to Fort Mason Center), featuring rock and world music performers.

it is said that the first recipe for chili con carne was put on paper in the 17th century by a beautiful nun, Sister Mary of Agreda of Spain. She was mysteriously known to the Indians of the Southwest United States as "La Dama de Azul," the lady in blue.

Mind you, Sister Mary was supposedly projecting herself spiritually to this unnamed tribe from her abbey in Spain. Good story, but probably not it.

Another theory is that the recipe evolved from pre-Colombian ingredients and migrated north. Another holds that it was invented in Mexico specifically to cater to American visitors-- tourist food, in other words, which is an interesting theory. The prevalent belief, however, is that chili con carne evolved as a simple peasant dish in San Antonio in the 19th century. We know that

During the 1880s, brightly-dressed Hispanic women known as "Chili Queens" began to operate around Military Plaza and other public gathering places in downtown San Antonio. They would appear at dusk, building charcoal or wood fires to reheat cauldrons of pre-cooked chili, selling it by the bowl to passers-by. The aroma was a potent sales pitch, aided by Mariachi street musicians, who joined in to serenade the eaters. Some Chili Queens later built semi-permanent stalls in the mercado, or local Mexican marketplace. (Link)

Everything traceable seems to bring chili back to Texan street food-- the perfect spot for Native American, Mexican, Spanish and Anglo cultures to be drawn together into regional specialties.

So what is chili?

The ingredients of chili are subject to at least as much passionate argument, regional variation and family secret-keeping as barbecue recipes. Tomatoes, ground beef, oregano, beans and red (or green) chili peppers are all either absolutely essential or sure signs that your chili isn't the 'real' thing, depending on your source. We are, after all, talking about a dish that is cooked for competitions all over the U.S., often for large cash prizes and fame-- chili recipes are serious business. Texas-style chili never contains beans and is normally hot and quite simple, but chili has long spread beyond Texas and been adapted for regional tastes and ingredients for about 150 years now. Vegetarians eat it with beans and tempeh. New Englanders make it with chicken. Cincinnatians put it on spaghetti-- talk about mixing food cultures! Chili can't be contained in a simple recipe or two. Chili is an evolutionary process. Chili will never stop changing.

We had some friends over last night. We were hurrying home from work, so another slow cooker recipe made perfect sense-- and when it's snowing and the roads are icy, nothing hits the spot quite like chili. I prepared the ingredients in the morning, turned on the slow cooker, and came home hours later to some really wonderful smells.

I intended to use this recipe from Serious Eats, posted by the Gurgling Cod just in time for Super Bowl parties. But I didn't exactly have all of the ingredients, so I substituted left and right-- ground sirloin for sliced chuck, Indian red chili powder for Korean red pepper flakes, epazote for oregano. (I know, that's weird, but I'm always buying new and interesting herbs and spices, and we ran out of oregano, so I went for another green leafy thing. Hey, it worked.) Also, he simmers his beans with salt pork and serves them on the side; I had neither salt pork nor hours to simmer beans, so I threw them in with everything else. This is originally a recipe by Craig Claiborne, adapted by the Gurgling Cod to account for what wasn't in his kitchen. Funny how recipes evolve, isn't it? Here's the recipe I ended up with-- apologies to Craig Claiborne and Gurgling Cod. Note that all measurements are inexact, since chili is really just another variation of the fine art of throwing stuff into a pot. This recipe is gluten-free.

Chili con Carne

1 lb ground sirloin (from the Amish market, in this case)

1 tbsp cayenne pepper or Indian red chili powder

1/2 cup gluten-free oatmeal

2 teaspoons cumin seeds

2 teaspoons dried epazote (or oregano)

7 garlic cloves, chopped

Enough beef broth to cover the meat in the slow cooker (I like Pacific organic brand), about 4 cups
1 can fava beans

Sherry

Diced onions

Grape tomatoes, halved

Sour cream

Grated cheddar cheese (preferably extra-sharp)

1. Brown meat in a large skillet.

2. Combine chili powder and oatmeal in a food processor; process until oatmeal is pretty floury.

3. Drain the meat and put it in the slow cooker. Mix in the oatmeal mixture. Add the cumin, epazote and garlic and stir together.

4. Add the broth and beans. Cover and cook in the slow cooker, on 'low' (200 degrees), for approximately six hours. If you're home, stir it occasionally. If not, stir it when you get home.

5. Add sherry near the end of cooking. When we got home, it had been on 'warm' for a while, so I added the sherry and turned it back to 'low' until it was time to eat.

6. Serve with Carolina Corn Cakes, onions, grated cheddar, sliced grape tomatoes, sour cream, and cold beer.

The Christian season of Lent started yesterday-- it's early this year, thanks to a quirk of the calendar. Catholics around the world have a tradition of fasting and/or food restrictions-- they're different everywhere. I'm from western Pennsylvania, where people eat fish on Friday during Lent. Specifically, they eat beer-battered fish sandwiches.

Fish sandwiches are a big deal in the Pittsburgh area. They always involve a soft bun, a thin but flavorful batter, no toppings other than maybe some tartar sauce, and WAY more fish than bun. The fish is usually sole. There are sandwich shops where you can get them year round, but the real place to go is the basement of the local Catholic church on a Friday afternoon during Lent. Churches (often the women's auxiliary-- yes, those still exist-- or another fundraising group) all around the area make homemade fish sandwiches and sell them for eat-in and takeout. They're crispy, juicy and utterly delicious.

They're not just for Catholics, either. When I was growing up, we Presbyterians were regulars at the fish fry at St. Alphonsus in Springdale, and it was common to walk into the church basement and see a table full of Presbyterians and another of Lutherans, drinking Cokes and maneuvering massive fried sole filets into their mouths. I can't speak for Lutherans, but Presbyterians are under no obligation to eat fish on Friday-- it's just that the fish is sooo good.

St. Al's no longer makes their divine sandwiches, but if you're in the Pittsburgh area, here's a list of parish fish fries. Don't be shy if you're not a Catholic-- if you like fish, you'll be welcome.

Hey Philadelphians-- has the fish fry caught on in eastern PA? If so, where should I go for my Lenten fish sandwich tomorrow?

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There is a popular Chinese saying: "There is nothing more delicious than jiaozi." Such an accolade no doubt points to the popularity of the simple Chinese dumpling. (Chinese dumplings come in many shapes and sizes but the most common are jiaozi and guotieh. They're essentially the same dumpling-- the only difference is how they're cooked. See headnote below.)

No one can trace the origins of the dumpling definitively but it's been around for over 2,500 years. Its evolution may have started when people living in the vicinity of the Yellow River learned to grind wheat into flour, and it became even more widespread when an official decree during the Han Dynasty produced a food item filled with mutton, chilies and medicinal herbs to help the poor get through the cold winter. Today, Chinese dumplings all over the world seem to adhere to one common denominator--a soft, pillowy pouch filled with pork and cabbage.

Chinese dumplings are a must for Chinese (or Lunar) New Year. The Year of the Rat (starting February 7th) is almost upon us and Chinese households across the globe will be making dumplings on New Year's eve. Like all the foods and dishes eaten during the New Year, dumplings are full of symbolism. Thanks to their resemblance to shoe-shaped gold or silver ingots, they are believed to bring fortune and good luck. SILVER + GOLD = MONEY = PROSPERITY = WEALTH.

In northern China, families usually chop the meat and prepare the filling themselves. This symbolizes the chopping out of bad luck. Dumplings have always been regarded as some of the best food one can eat, so enjoying it at the intersect between the old and new years brings the past to a close and ushers in good luck for the coming year.

Generally, the dumplings are prepared before midnight on the last day of the previous year, a tradition Ellen Chou remembers well. "On New Year's eve, you have the big feast. Then the women in the family prepare dumplings for New Year's day breakfast."

Born in 1942 in China's Hubei province, Ellen fled to Taiwan with her family when the communists took over in 1948.

As a young girl, Ellen didn't learn to cook. "My mom never went to school and her dream for me was to have as much education as possible so she chased me out of the kitchen," she explains. Since Ellen's mother dominated her kitchen, Ellen learned to make dumplings in school. "It was the first thing we learned in home economics," she says. "I went to an all-girls school and we'd clear the ping pong table and everyone stood around it making dumplings."

Ellen was kind enough to share her recipe for guo tieh or pot stickers, just like how she made it way back when, giggling with her schoolmates around the ping-pong table in Taiwan.

Happy Year of the Rat, everyone!!

Ellen Chou's Pot Stickers

Pot stickers are a favorite Northern Chinese snack, the Chinese version of fast food if you will. That being said, it's considered peasant food, made with pork and cabbage, two cheap and ubiquitous ingredients. The dumpling can be steamed, boiled or pan-fried. When it is pan-fried, it is called guotieh, literally pot sticker, because the bottom sticks to the pan and forms a crispy crust. When it is steamed, boiled or served in soups, it's called jiaozi.

Considering how readily available it is frozen or as take-out, why would one even attempt to make pot stickers at home, with dough made from scratch at that! Let me tell you: pot sticker skins really make the dumpling and nothing beats the texture of homemade skins. Store-bought skins, like fresh pasta sheets, are thin and flat. Pot sticker skins should have some heft to them and are thicker in the middle to endure the heat of cooking and protect the filling.

Time: 1 to 2 hours (depending how nimble your fingers are at making the pot stickers)
Makes: about 40

DOUGH:
2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 to 1 cup lukewarm water

FILLING:
1 pound ground pork (2 cups)
2 cups finely chopped napa cabbage (half a medium cabbage)
1 stalk green onion, finely chopped
1 teaspoon minced fresh ginger (about 1/2-inch)
1 tablespoon soy sauce
2 teaspoons plus pinch of salt
1/4 teaspoon white pepper
1 teaspoon sesame oil
3 tablespoons vegetable oil

In a large mixing bowl, combine 2 cups flour with 3/4 cup water. Mix well with a wooden spoon until it starts to come together, adding more water if necessary. With your hands, form dough into a rough ball. You want the dough to be pliable but not stick to your fingers. Sprinkle a little more flour if dough is too wet. The dough won't feel smooth at this point. Set the dough ball in a bowl, cover with a damp towel and let it rest while you make the filling.

Place cabbage in a medium bowl and sprinkle 2 teaspoons salt. Mix well. Taking a handful of vegetables at a time, squeeze water out. Or wrap cabbage in batches in a cheesecloth or non-terry towel and wring dry.

In a large bowl, combine pork, cabbage, green onions, ginger, soy sauce, salt, white pepper and sesame oil. Mix well with chopsticks or a set of clean hands. Set aside.

Make the wrappers. Knead dough for several minutes until it is smooth all over. Divide it into 4 balls. Knead each ball individually for about 30 seconds. Roll each portion into a log about 5-inches long and 1/2-inch in diameter. Pinch off 9 or 10 even walnut-sized pieces. Dust with flour as needed.

Roll each piece into a ball and flatten into a disc between your palms. Place flattened disc on a well-floured surface. Starting at the bottom edge of the disc, use a Chinese rolling pin* and roll from the outside of the circle in. Use your right hand to roll the pin as your left hand turns the disc anti-clockwise. So the sequence goes: roll, turn, roll, turn. Roll each disc into a circle about 3-inches in diameter. Don't worry about making a perfect circle. Ideally, the wrapper will be thicker in the middle than on the edges.

Spoon about 2 teaspoons of filling into the center of wrapper. Fold wrapper in half over filling to form a half-moon pocket and pinch shut**.

Repeat until all the dough or filling is used up. Set pot sticker down firmly on a parchment-lined tray seam-side up so that dumpling sits flat.

Heat an (8- to 10-inch) non-stick skillet over medium-high heat. Swirl 3 tablespoons vegetable oil into the bottom of pan to coat evenly. Place about a dozen dumplings in a single layer seam-side up in the skillet and brown for 1 minute.

Add 1/2 to 3/4 cup water to the pan, depending on its size. Cover immediately and steam 9 to 10 minutes, until all the water evaporates. The bottom of the pot stickers should be golden brown and crisp but not burned. Remove pot stickers with a spatula and serve on a plate with bottom side up. Serve with dipping sauce (recipe below).

*Chinese rolling pins are skinnier and don't have handles. They're available in Asian markets, or get a 3/4-inch wooden dowel from a hardware store.

**The simplest way to seal the dumplings is to pinch the edges shut so that you have a flat seam. It will look like a turnover. If you are good at crimping, you can create a "pleated" edge. Pinch the middle of pocket to seal. Starting from the outer right edge of the back flap of wrapper, make 3 pleats facing the outer edge while working your way toward the middle. Repeat on the left and continue pressing edges together until entire curve is sealed.

Grandma says:
-To keep or make ahead, freeze pot stickers in a single layer on a tray until firm (about 15 minutes will do) so they don't stick to each other when placed in a plastic bag. Freeze for up to a month. Do not defrost before cooking. Simply increase cooking time to 15 minutes.

-To reheat cooked pot stickers, swirl 1 tablespoon oil in the bottom of pan. Set pot stickers and pour in 2 tablespoons water, cover and steam until heated through.

-Since weather can affect how dough comes together, the ratio of flour to water  for the dough may not be 2 to 1 as suggested. Use your judgment to determine whether the mixture is too wet or dry and add flour or water as needed.

Soy-Ginger Dipping Sauce

Makes: 1/2 cup
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/4 cup rice vinegar
1/4 cup cilantro, chopped (about 1 tablespoon)
1 stalk green onion, finely chopped (about 1 tablespoon)
1 teaspoon grated fresh ginger (about 3/4-inch)
1/4 teaspoon chili sauce, or to taste
1 clove garlic, smashed

Mix all ingredients in a small bowl. This will keep in a sealed container in the refrigerator for several days.

Chefs are going ga ga over pork belly.

Yes, this fatty, inexpensive cut is fast gaining favor and has risen on the trend-o-meter in the past couple of years. Here in Seattle, pork belly has top billing at fancy restaurants the likes of Tilth, Harvest Vine and Chez Shea.

But Asians who grew up on this humble cut have long enjoyed its succulent, full-fat flavor. Usually braised for hours on the stovetop -- whether prepared the Chinese (red-cooked pork), Vietnamese (thit kho) or Indonesian (babi kecap) way -- pork belly speaks of comfort food and brings us home to mama.

Pork belly, however, is not unknown to the American palate--it's the part of the pig cured and smoked for bacon. The raw, unsmoked version comes with or without the skin and is commonly sold at Asian markets. With its increasing popularity, you should be able to special order pork belly from your local butcher, or try online sources like Flying Pigs Farm or Niman Ranch.

To make Asian braises, skin-on pork belly is essential to create the rich, velvety texture we're used to, although other preparations may render the skin leathery and inedible. Not many pork cuts can withstand long braising, pork belly being one of the exceptions. In fact, braising is the typical way to cook pork belly, the slow, even heat transforming it into pure unctuous pleasure. Stop there or pan-fry or roast the belly to a crisp in the oven for a delicious crackle and crunch with each bite.

Ah ... another reason why we love grandma and mum's cooking!

Buying belly

Buy belly pieces between 2 and 3 inches thick and choose pieces that come from the front belly as opposed to the back belly for a good balance of meat and fat. How to tell? Look carefully at the layers and select a slab that is about 50/50 lean meat to fat.

Here is a Vietnamese braised pork belly (thit kho) dish adapted from a recipe Cathy Danh learned from her aunt.

Vietnamese Braised Pork Belly (Thit Kho)

Thit kho is one of those dishes rarely found at restaurants but eaten in all Vietnamese households, usually served with a canh (soup) dish for dinner. A meal during Tet (Vietnamese Lunar New Year) would be incomplete without a kho (as these savory-sweet braised dishes based in a caramel sauce are called), and this pork and egg dish is a favorite among Southern Vietnamese. Coconut water (sometimes called juice) is not to be confused with coconut milk. It's available in clear plastic bags in the frozen section, or canned in the drinks section.

Boneless, skin-on pork belly (actually uncured/unsmoked bacon,) with the ideal ratio of lean meat to fat, or pork leg (rind-on) are traditional cuts for thit kho; but be warned, the resulting dish is not for the faint-hearted. For a lighter version, substitute the leaner Boston butt or use a mix of cuts. But try not to use all lean meat, the unctuous skin and fat is essential for the rich, velvety texture of this dish.

Time: 2 hrs
Makes: 4 to 6 servings

1-1/2 tablespoons sugar
1 tablespoon water
2 pounds pork belly (skin-on) or Boston butt (or 1 pound of each)
3 large garlic cloves, sliced
2 medium shallots, sliced (about 1/2 cup)
3 tablespoons fish sauce
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1-1/2 cups coconut water, strained of any meat
6 eggs (or 12 quail eggs), hard-boiled and shelled

Using a sharp knife, scrape off any stray hairs from the pork skin and cut meat into chunks 1-inch thick and 1-1/2 to 2-inches long.

In a 4-quart heavy bottom pan or Dutch oven, heat sugar and water over medium-high heat. Stir continuously until sugar melts. Continue cooking for another 10 to 12 minutes; syrup will form globules, turn a light golden hue and eventually caramelize into a thick amber liquid. You will smell a "burnt sugar" smell.

Add pork and raise heat to high. Stir for 1 minute to render some fat. Add garlic and shallots, and sauté 5 minutes until pork is browned but not cooked through. Lower heat to medium. Add fish sauce and pepper and sauté 1 minute to evenly coat meat.

Add coconut water. The liquid should barely cover pork. Bring to a boil. Add eggs, cover and simmer over low heat for 1 hour (1-1/2 hours or longer if you want your meat melt-in-your-mouth tender), stirring occasionally to ensure eggs and meat are evenly coated with sauce. Pierce meat with the tip of a knife to test for tenderness. If at anytime the sauce drops to a level lower than one-third of pork, add water, 1/4 cup at a time.

Remove from heat and let stand for 10 minutes. Skim fat off surface with a ladle. (If you can wait, refrigerate overnight and allow fat to congeal on surface, making this task much easier.) Reheat over medium-low heat, taste sauce and adjust seasonings. Serve hot with steamed rice.