Our guest blogger today is author Pat Mora, whose book “Yum! Mmmm! Que Rico!”, from Lee & Low Books, is part of First Book’s Stories For All Project.
“Once upon a time . . .” A magic phrase that can change our breathing. As far as we know, humans are the world’s story-telling creatures. Let’s think about the unique period in the lives of children when they begin to savor that phrase, when in fresh ways little ones are experiencing their surroundings and deciding where they fit. For many youngsters, media is their main source of information and entertainment. Children lucky enough to become readers discover that they can read those once-upon-a-time words to themselves—and others. They discover the pleasure and power of words. Since words and books are powerful, how can we doubt that the images of children, families, and cultures in their books have a subtle and significant impact on young readers and their families? Who merits having their stories shared and who doesn’t? How does it feel not to see people like you between the covers of beautiful books? Are all our books created and valued equally?
Today is Chinese New Year! Traditionally, the night before Chinese New Year, Chinese families will gather around and eat dinner together, much like this plate from the LEE & LOW title, Auntie Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic:
Auntie Yang’s Great Soybean Picnic author and illustrator Ginnie and Beth Lo were kind enough to share one of their favorite soybean recipes with us: Mapo Tofu! While not a traditional Chinese New Year dish, the Lo sisters say that “mapo tofu is a Lo family favorite that we eat on the holidays, Christmas, and Chinese New Year.”
MAPO TOFU
- Stir fry in small amount of veg. oil about 1lb of ground pork unseasoned over med-med hi heat. Salt lightly. When it is just losing its pink color add 1 ½ to 2T soy sauce and 1T sugar. Stir fry until done. Remove from pan, set aside.
- Stir fry one chopped onion in veg. oil until translucent. Set aside (you can put it in with meat).
- Stir fry in remaining oil, 2T or more hot chili sauce (hot bean paste with chile, or hot chili sauce with garlic etc.), for 30 sec – 1 minute.
- Add 2 packages cubed firm tofu, the pork and the onion, stir fry until well combined. Add edamame, frozen green peas and cook 10 minutes or more, until flavors are well blended. Add salt or more hot sauce to taste.
Just before serving, remove from heat and add 3 scallions, finely chopped and 2T Chinese Sesame oil, stir and serve.
Enjoy, and feel free to let us know how it turned out!
Further reading
Angelo’s Sosa’s Chilled Edamame and Spring Pea Soup
What is Chinese New Year?
Filed under:
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Holidays Tagged:
Asian/Asian American,
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Yum! 
On Thanksgiving, everyone looks forward to the turkey. Valentine’s Day is the time for chocolate. During Chinese New Year, one of the most popular dish is one called jai, or Buddha’s Delight.
Jai is a vegetarian dish and is eaten on the first day of Chinese New Year to bring good luck. According to Buddhist tradition, no animal or fish should be killed on the first day of the lunar new year, thus, a dish with lots of vegetables is considered purifying.
While most of the ingredients are probably not available at your local grocery store, they can be found at Asian grocery stores in many parts of the country.
Want to try your hand at cooking jai? Here’s a good starter recipe from Vegetarian Recipes and Cooking website, reposted with their permission:
Prep Time: 1 hour
Cooking Time: 10 minutes
Ingredients
1/2 cup bamboo shoots, thinly sliced
2 dried bean curd sticks, soaked for 45 minutes in hot water to soften, cut into 1″ chunks
1/2 cup cellophane noodles, soaked in hot water until soft
6 dried shiitake mushrooms, soaked in hot water until soft (reserve soaking liquid for sauce)
1 carrot, julienned
1/4 cup dried lily buds, soaked in hot water until soft
1 oz. dried fat choy (black “hair” moss), soaked in hot water until soft
1/4 cup canned ginkgo nuts, drained
1/4 cup canned lotus seeds, drained
1/2 cup napa cabbage, thinly sliced
1/4 cup peanuts, roasted
1/2 cup snow peas, julienned
1/2 cup fried tofu, cubed
1/2 cup wheat gluten, thinly sliced
1/4 cup fresh wood ear mushroom, cut into strips (or soak dried wood ears)
1/2 cup bean sprouts
1/2 cup straw mushrooms
1/2 cup lotus root, thinly sliced
1/2 cup arrowroot (a starchy tuber), cooked and diced
1 TB peanut or vegetable oil
For sauce
1/4 cup mushroom soaking liquid or vegetable stock
1.5 TB Shaoxing wine
1 tsp ginger, minced
1 TB vegetarian oyster sauce
1 TB light soy sauce
1 tsp dark soy sauce
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp sesame oil
1/2 tsp cornstarch
Directions:
Heat 1 TB oil in wok or large pan over medium-high heat. Add bean curd sticks, cabbage, snow peas, mushrooms, and carrots and stir-fry for 2 minutes. Mix sauce ingredients in a bowl, stirring to dissolve cornstarch, and set aside. Add remaining ingredients, except cellophane noodles and peanuts, to wok, along with sauce, and stir to combine. Simmer until bubbly and slightly thickened, about 5 minutes, stir in cellophane noodles and peanuts, and serve.
Happy cooking! And Happy Chinese New Year!
Further reading:
What is Chinese New Year?
Filed under:
Activities,
Celebrations,
Holidays Tagged:
Asian/Asian American,
chinese food,
Chinese New Year,
cooking,
jai,
recipes,
vegetarian cooking,
Yum! 
Cover Shot! is a regular feature here at the Café. I love discovering new covers, and when I find them, I like to share. More than anything else, I am consumed with the mystery that each new discovery represents. There is an allure to a beautiful cover. Will the story contained under the pages live up to promise of the gorgeous cover art?
This is another YUM! cover! And since we didn’t get much hockey this season, I may as well read about it. Taking the Shots by Toni Aleo will be available in May.
In Toni Aleo’s exhilarating Loveswept debut, the first in a series featuring the hockey hunks of the Nashville Assassins, a reformed bad boy helps a charming, willful woman face off against the demons of her past.
No matter how hard she tries, Elleanor Fisher never thinks she’s good enough, from her job to her weight to her love life. After enduring years of abuse at the hands of an ex-boyfriend, Elli has been drifting through life in a daze. Until, that is, she meets Shea Adler on a promotional shoot for the NHL’s Nashville Assassins. Before Elli knows what’s happening, the gorgeous Shea breaks the ice and shatters her world.
A brilliant athlete inside the rink, Shea Adler is tired of the life he’s living outside of it: the women, the money, the drinking. But everything changes when he meets Elli. After laying eyes on this feisty, witty, beautiful woman, he feels like he’s just taken the hardest hit of his life. No matter how skeptical she is, Shea knows they are meant to be together—if only he can convince Elli to put her insecurities aside before she misses out on a shot at love.
Includes a special message from the editor, as well as excerpts from these Loveswept titles: Trying to Score, Empty Net, and Along Came Trouble.
Cover Shot! is a regular feature here at the Café. I love discovering new covers, and when I find them, I like to share. More than anything else, I am consumed with the mystery that each new discovery represents. There is an allure to a beautiful cover. Will the story contained under the pages live up to promise of the gorgeous cover art?
This cover gets a big old YUM! I love this cover! And Beth is such a flawed character, so Dare You To should be all about the angst. What do you think of this cover? Did you read Pushing the Limits?? Did you like it?
"I dare you…"
If anyone knew the truth about Beth Risk’s home life, they’d send her mother to jail and seventeen-year-old Beth who knows where. So she protects her mom at all costs. Until the day her uncle swoops in and forces Beth to choose between her mom’s freedom and her own happiness. That’s how Beth finds herself living with an aunt who doesn’t want her and going to a school that doesn’t understand her. At all. Except for the one guy who shouldn’t get her, but does….
Ryan Stone is the town golden boy, a popular baseball star jock-with secrets he can’t tell anyone. Not even the friends he shares everything with, including the constant dares to do crazy things. The craziest? Asking out the Skater girl who couldn’t be less interested in him.
But what begins as a dare becomes an intense attraction neither Ryan nor Beth expected. Suddenly, the boy with the flawless image risks his dreams-and his life-for the girl he loves, and the girl who won’t let anyone get too close is daring herself to want it all….
Cover Shot! is a regular feature here at the Café. I love discovering new covers, and when I find them, I like to share. More than anything else, I am consumed with the mystery that each new discovery represents. There is an allure to a beautiful cover. Will the story contained under the pages live up to promise of the gorgeous cover art?
Jaci Burton has some of the yummiest romance covers ever! I love seeing each new addition to the Play-by-Play series. I really need to make the time to start reading these books! Are you reading them? Which cover is your favorite? Do you like the cover for One Sweet Ride?
In stores June 2013.
Race car driver Gray Preston enjoys fast cars and an uncomplicated life, until political aide Evelyn Hill enters the picture and complicates the hell out of it with a request that he help out his estranged father’s political campaign. Racing and politics don’t mix, but Gray and Evelyn’s sexual attraction sizzles like asphalt in August.
Welcome to winter! I know, according to the calendar winter doesn’t start for another week and a half, but the weather says it’s winter. So let’s curl up by the fire, roast some chestnuts, and talk diversity.
There’s been a lot of back-and-forth on some new films depicting African Americans. We start out with Precious: is it a harsh but realistic portrayal of issues too-often found in poor black communities, or is it a racist depiction of black Americans, relying on stale clichés and taking advantage of the people and situations it pretends to help? David Schmader explains why he likes it and then highlights the arguments of those who don’t.
On the other end of the spectrum is The Blind Side, portraying a black football player adopted into a white family. Sounds better, right? But, as we talked about last week in relation to depictions of Native Americans, portrayals of the perfect minority are also dangerous. Thaddeus Russell looks at film history to explain The Blind Side as a a continuation of the “magic negro” genre, in which a harmless black man helps or saves white people. Ta-Nahesi Coates takes this theme and runs with it, looking at the magic negro through guilt and history, and looking to the future.
In other news, chicken soup is good for the body and soul, and recently, a Times reporter with a cold went in search of Chicken Soup in New York. She found everything from Jewish penicillin to a Chinese soup that should be eaten regularly to stave off illness.
And speaking of lunch, it’s time to start frying. Winter started just in time: Chanukkah starts tonight at sundown, and that means an excuse to eat fried foods for eight days.
Wow, I did not heard about that up to the present. Thanks!