Chinese Opera, Interrupted..........

I had my butt plopped on the couch after a good dinner on the eve of Black Friday relaxing to a Chinese musical play called ‘The Peach Blossom Fan’. Watching this historical drama brought back memories. I have loved Chinese opera as far as I can remember. My parents and I used to walk to a nearby park when I was a kid to have supper. Every now and then, the Chinese opera troupe will be at the park at night performing. I would be sitting on one of the wooden benches watching the entire show. Truthfully, I do not understand half of the story due to language barriers but they fascinated me nonetheless.

There are many varieties of Chinese opera such as the Beijing, Shanghai, Kunqu, Sichuan, Cantonese opera and many others. The one that I can relate to is the Cantonese opera. There are two types of plays in Cantonese Opera i.e. Mo and Mun. Mo plays involve characters who are warriors and generals where there is strong emphasis on good gymnastics and martial arts skills. With Mo, the theme typically involves battles, wars, loyalty and courage. Mun on the other hand involves characters who are scholars or royalties. The theme mostly pertains to romance and ethics.

One of my favourites : Romance of the Phoenix Chamber

Nonetheless, my immersion in my cultural heritage was rudely interrupted when J decided to join the mindless crowd at midnight for the Black Friday sale. While I had a shopping list I was reluctant to go out in the cold of the night and I really wanted to watch Chinese opera. J’s rationale was that these games may be gone by morning. My take on this was that there are plenty of GameStops in Maryland. If we could not find the game in one store we could go to another. J was adamant however and I did not want him to drive out alone. Hence, I followed suit.

I should have known better by following my instints. It was a little too late when I realized that. What welcomed us were long lines and crowds.

Soon after we started queuing up, someone at the front of the line fainted. Normally one would faint due to illness or shock over some bad news. In this instance, someone actually fainted over games and/or a game console. This is so surreal.

It is also in these settings where one would encounter interesting characters. One of the patrons actually dashed out of the store frantically when the store operator announced that the PS3s were all sold out. About an hour later, a group of robust women entered the store and their conversation went more or less like this.

‘Is this the line? Are you guys in line to pay?’ asked one. We nodded in unison.

‘Damn!’ was her reply. Then her companion mumbled that all she wanted was a game. I was caught off guard when she decided to yell from the entrance where they congregated to the opposite end of the store,

‘I just want to know if you guys have Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3!’

The store operator hollered, ‘Yes, we do!’.

‘Do you still have many left?!’.

'Yes, we do!'.

‘How much is it?!’.

‘It’s $59.99!’, answered the store operator.

‘Oh, hell no!’, the lady retorted without hesitation. Then she mumbled to her friend, ‘I am getting the hell out of here’.

After they left, everyone in queue snickered and laughed. I was chuckling the whole time. There is no way a new game will be discounted even on Black Friday. What were they thinking? Also, how difficult it is to walk up to the store operator to ask. It almost felt like an auction going on at a fish market. Surreal, just surreal.

It was 1.30 am when J and I were still in line. I decided to call it quits as I was tired and sleepy. I walked back to the car leaving J to continue with the madness. Out of boredom, I decided to take pictures. It was surprisingly a nice quiet night away from the crowd.

Experimenting with the 'Night Scenery' option on my camera

Chilling to Frank Sinatra's...peaceful

At approximately 2.00 am, J came back to the car and this was our loot….hahahahaha…..

Dragon Age Origins & Awakening beckons me but they will just have to wait until I finish ‘The Peach Blossom Fan’.

A Misadventure with Food : Duck Eggs vs Baby Duck Eggs

Coming from Malaysia where everyday multi ethnicity food is of variety and abundance, we often unknowingly take them for granted. I know I did as I never thought about not being able to eat what I liked when I was in Malaysia. When I came to the US, everything changed. There certainly are foods that I could not get hold of and those that I can obtain did not come close to authenticity or quality.

One of my favorite foods is the salted duck egg. Salted duck eggs can be hard boiled eaten with hot congee or steamed with chicken eggs or minced pork. They are also used in glutinous rice dumplings and mooncakes. Hunting them down has been a pain as the ones sold here in the US are already boiled where the texture of the yolk is not firm and the whites a tad too salty. A good salted egg should have a firm dark orange yolk. It should also have the right amount of saltiness to it. While the salted duck egg is a simple dish by itself, there is definitely food science behind making a great salted duck egg.

Since my parents are here with me, we decided to make salted duck eggs as we were not happy with those that we have bought from the Asian grocers. One fine weekend, we went to buy fresh duck eggs. While my parents were buying vegetables, I hunted for fresh duck eggs. After walking from one section of the store to another, I finally found a box of duck eggs. The strange thing was that the box had a placard labeled ‘Baby Duck Eggs’ and some foreign writing that I could NOT make out. Also, next to this box of baby duck eggs were baby chicken eggs.

Baby Duck Eggs (front)

Baby Chicken Eggs (back)

I was rather happy I found duck eggs BUT questioned why they were labeled ‘Baby’. Perhaps they were labeled as such to inform buyers that these were baby aka tiny duck eggs. I was further convinced by this conclusion seeing that the baby chicken eggs were especially tiny unlike the usual chicken eggs that one would normally get from grocery stores like Giant or Shop Rite. To obtain a second opinion, I asked J.

‘Why do you think these eggs are called baby duck eggs?’

‘Erm…..I don’t know. Maybe they are tiny?’ answered J who shrugged and went on looking for pastries to purchase.

Thinking nothing more of this, I informed my parents. My parents selected an entire tray of eggs. With a slight doubt on my mom’s face she asked,

‘Why do these eggs look darker than usual?’

‘Mom, honestly I am not good at this. I have NO clue whatsoever’. Very ‘helpful’ answer indeed.

‘Hai kam ka la’, my dad answered in Cantonese. That translates to ‘It is what it is’.

When we got home, my parents were excited as they boiled a concoction of saturated salted water with Shaoxing wine, Szechuan peppercorns and some star anise. When the liquid cooled they placed the eggs and brine in a container. Approximately 21 days from the time we started brining the eggs, we decided to test one of them for saltiness. Normally when the eggs are not salty enough, they are left in the brine until the desired saltiness is achieved. My mom decided to hard boil the egg for this purpose.

I was sitting in the office working when my mom came to me asking why the hard boiled salted duck egg looked so foreign. That really piqued my curiosity hence, I followed my mom to the kitchen to investigate. I took a look at the cooked egg.

The yolk looked really dark with a texture that looked like flesh. Looking at my mom I told her that we should not eat the egg. Instead we should throw that out. With optimism I told her that perhaps it was just that one egg and that we should check the rest over the weekend.

That same weekend we returned to the Asian grocers to shop. While I stood over the baby duck eggs pondering on what went wrong I was struck with an ‘aha’ moment. What if, just what if these Asians literally translated 'Baby Duck Eggs' to eggs that had baby ducks in them?! I turned towards J and exclaimed,

‘What if there are baby ducks inside the eggs? Maybe that is the reason they labeled these boxes of eggs ‘Baby Duck Eggs’?!’

J’s eyes lit up and said ‘Yea! You could be right’.

When my parents walked toward me, I shared my suspicion with them. They looked at each other in disbelief. Disbelief as they could not believe that humans will actually eat such food. On top of that, an exotic item as such actually sold in a store locally.

When we got home, my dad broke one of the eggs and what we saw justified our suspicion. The smell of the content reeked of iron and the sight ghastly. I was disgusted and excited at the same time so much so I had to capture it with my digital camera.

Warning: Not for the faint hearted. Scroll down quickly if you do not want to be disgusted.

:

:

:

:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:

‘Who would eat this?’, my parents asked.

‘Uugghhh so disgusting!’, J piped in.

Nonetheless, I explained to them that in some parts of Asia this fertilized duck embryo known as balut is considered to be an aphrodisiac, a high-protein and hearty snack. Those who love balut will eat it hard boiled with salt, chili, garlic or vinegar. The broth surrounding the embryo is first sipped from the egg before the shell is peeled to reveal the yolk and young chick where these would be eaten thereafter. My parents and J were clearly appalled with this new found knowledge.

That evening even though hungry I could not stomach my dinner as I remembered the smell and sight of the embryo. Will I be able to forget this vivid encounter with a fertilized duck embryo? Will I be able to eat salted duck eggs again? Given time I believe I can. This feeling shall pass I pacified myself as I reluctantly put another spoonful of dinner in my mouth. Furthermore, I believe this encounter and realization is not as bad as J’s. He was practically sleeping beside the container of baby duck eggs in salty brine for almost a month.

Why was he sleeping beside them? That is another story all together……....


Salted Duck Egg Recipe - http://en.christinesrecipes.com/2010/09/homemade-salted-eggs.html
Balut - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Balut_(egg)