Future Chinese New Year’s Cuisine (2021)

Reunion dinners are something special and special for older people. Each reunion dinner continues its traditional chain that grows as long as you can remember.

Eating out is not a practical option for large families. Remembering these may be useful when preparing your dishes. Reunion dinners are always about family favorites. Each family has their own “festival dishes” that everyone grew up in. These match your heritage. I hope it will be hakka. Nona or Hockin. In fact, when I ask my family what is usually submitted for their reunion dinner, I can guess the cultural background of the family patriarch.

Here we detail some of the dishes we plan to cook for the reunion dinner and the rest of the CNY.

Fry the shrimp along the river in black bean sauce

Without this dish, there is little to think about Wong’s reunion dinner. This is one of the early recipes I’ve posted on my blog. In the early days, river shrimp were heavily caught and were sweeter than agricultural ones. Recently, the latter has to be redoed. Buy as fresh as possible and put it in the freezer as soon as you get home. NTUC sells them during this period within several wet markets. If you can get river shrimp, sea-haired items like crystal shrimp and wild Angka will also work well. Or a large import frozen.

Lo Han Chai or Chap Chy

This is a family favorite. There are different versions of this depending on whether you are nonya, hokkien, or Cantonese. My mom likes to use white fermented tofu (fu yi) and Wonbok instead of cabbage for this. The Wongbok has a solid texture, holds well, and doesn’t absorb stock like Cabbage does.

This is an all day dish and you can easily cook new batches by adding fresh ingredients to the leftovers. You can find the recipe here. It’s best to eat it with Sambal Bellachan.

Steamed chicken

Rub the whole chicken with salt and steam for about 40-45 minutes. It was then served with fresh red chili sauce and a beautiful ginger garlic sauce (recipe here). Get the best chicken you can put your hands on. Anxious or another type of “kampun chicken” works. The large, fattier, meaty chicken broiler also works. If you have leftovers, stir-fry in garlic, soy sauce and thick black sauce. If you still have leftovers after this, add them to Chai Buay. 🙂 You can see why my mother always makes this for reunion.

Treasures and paper treasures

Ordering this from a restaurant is easy, but if you are an experienced chef, it is not difficult to prepare this at home. It also costs considerably less. You will better control the freshness, actively assemble it, and provide it warmly. I usually steam my own egg tofu (this recipe) and add mushrooms, clams, abalone, sea cucumbers and green vegetables. Some shrimp will have a nice orange shade to your dish. Be flexible and use your imagination.

Stocks and sauces should be prepared in advance a few days before dinner. Prepare the stock using the whole chicken and one lean pork. In this post, you’ll find out how to prepare a great sauce and how to prepare an avalon.

Fried hakka pork (“char yoke”)

This is another perennial favorite and perhaps the only dish that reveals our secondary mint roots. For some reason, Hakka culture is usually covered in conflict with Hokkien or Cantonese, which was certainly an experience of living in Western Malaysia. Please check this recipe.

Assorted meat with wax

Cantonese waxed meat, whether steamed or fried, is easy to prepare. It’s suitable for nibbles for the next few days.

Chii Booy (Led photo)

Check out my recipes here.