GM food in Canton

just read from news paper, 70%  papayas grow in Canton region are GM. authority said  fruit is not easy to be label, so these papaya would not required to be label as GM food. when you are buying papaya in Guangzhou, be careful about that.  

Chinese medicine

two weeks ago, my grandma broke her spine and was sent to the hospital. she is 80, and has Rheumatoid Arthritis, 2 years ago, she was given some pills by doctors to release the pain of her bone. some of the pills are steroid, after 2 years taken, which caused her osteoporosis, so now her bones are very fragile and easy to be broken. we took her to the chinese medical hospital this time. According to the doctor, Chronic diseases like Rheumatoid Arthritis, are better to use chinese medical therapy. modern western medicine are good at dealing with emergency situation, while for chronic, western drugs usually  cause some side effects when taken for a long time. 

SARS was a very horrible disease, which  happen in 2003 in the whole china and hk. in HK and Beijing many healed  SARS patients have sequela of Avascular Necorsis while in Guangzhou no Avascular Necorsis cases was found, as doctors here use both western mix chinese medical therapy. 

Compare with the north, Cantonese are more conservative, when getting sick, many people still like use traditional chinese medicine. so there are many chinese medical hospitals in Guangzhou, the 1st hospital of the Guangzhou University of Chinese Medicine  is the best in south China. 

Address: 16 Jichang Rd, Baiyun, Guangzhou, Guangdong, China

for illnese of bones, the Foshan hospital of chinese medicine is the best chinese medical therapy of bones in southeast asia.

Address: 6 Qinren Rd, Chancheng, Foshan, Guangdong, China 

Chronic and Sub-health are better to go to see a traditional Chinese physician, as chinese medicine is more moderate and considerate.  Chinese medicine has a history of 2000 years, it has more clinical experiences than the modern western drugs which results are usually tests on white mouse, so it is relatively safe, I think. 

if feeling a small problem or a bit of under the weather, many cantonese will go directly to a herbal tea shop to buy a cup of herbal tea first before going to a doctor. 

you can find many herbal tea shops on the street in Guangzhou. there are varieties of herbal teas to solve different problems. 

here are some common herbal tea menu

龟苓膏-Turtle jelly, main ingredients: Turtle, Smilax glabra. use for: Acne, Eczema, Mouth ulcers ... some skin related problems. 

廿四味- 24 herbs, contains 24 main ingredients, but different stores have its own secret 

recipes. this herbal tea tastes very ugly! extremely bitter, but very effective when you were 

on the beginning of your cold. 

五花茶 - five flowers tea, main ingredients:  Lonicera japonica, 

Chrysanthemum,Sophora japonica L,Kapok flower,Plumeria. use for: Diuretic, Heatstroke, and  Eczema.

火麻仁 - Hempseed shake. main ingredients: Hempseed. it looks and taste like milk shake. use for: Constipation, and make hair more shining. 

茅根竹蔗水 -  Imperata cylindrica root and Chinese sugar cane drink.  use for: Heatstroke, in dry season you feel dehydrated. 

罗汉果茶 - siraitia grosvenorii tea. use for :Cough and phlegm, and deal with dehydrated and good for liver.

酸梅汤 - sour Chinese plum soup. use for: Refreshing, Loss of appetite, Heatstroke, Indigestion

we usually call these herbal tea 凉茶 (cool tea), which means they are served to  against the  uncomfortable feelings caused by the humid weather. the Canton province only have 2 months winter in a year.  the effect of herbal teas are very modest, if you was just passing by a herbal tea shop, in the summer, i suggest you try a  cup of sour Chinese plum soup, that is the entry-level. if you really feel sick, must go for a doctor. 

herbal tea shop

Recipe：Cantonese dessert---Papaya Tremella fuciformis sweet soup 木瓜炖雪耳

My mum's little papaya tree harvested 4 large papaya recently. we gave some to friends and left one for me. but the papaya is too big too eat it in one time, so I have to think about use it to make some dessert. today I made Papaya Tremella Fuciformis sweet soup.  

Ingredients:  serves 4 people 

Papaya  some,  diced 
Tremella Fuciformis   1/2 bloom
Sugar    1/4 cup of cube sugar 
                1/2 piece of jaggery sugar     if you cannot found these sugar, you can use white sugar

few slices of ginger               

all ingredients can be found in supper market, both Chinese and Thai supper market. 



how to choose Tremella Fuciformis:
avoid to buy those are extremely white. the one showed on the first picture is the good quality one. my friend brought from Taiwan.   

You can found the left one are much whiter than those on the right. It is might be treat by  sulphur dioxide. it is really difficult to buy non sulphur dioxide  treated tremella fuciformis in China, (food security has been a problem~). so I suggest to sock the  tremella fuciformis  and leave it over night. I allergic with sulphur dioxide, so I have to make sure it was erased before cook.  

sock it over night, and you will see their volume has enlarged a lot.

wash them again then put into the slow cooker along with the diced papaya. 

add some water in about 1L, when choose the mode of making soup. 

for those use fire stoves: strong fire cook until boiled, then turn into small fire and keep cooking for about 30 mins .

cube sugar

jaggery sugar

add sugar in and raise the temperature and cook the soup until the sugar was melted.  

serve in hot. or 

put it into fridge after the soup to cool down to room temperature. 

 most of people will use cube sugar, but I would like to add half jaggery sugar.

why? different sugar actually taste slightly different, you can do some experiment, and try to found out what fit your favour.  But I think this combination tasted better. 

 tremella fuciformis is quite equivalent to bird nest,  both of them full of collagen, which is good to skin and lung!!!!  while its price is just 1/10 of bird nest. 

the beauty expert Paula Begoun said when wrinkles appears on your skin, it is almost impossible to get ride of them, skin care products are only visually help you to solve the problem. collagen can help you to prevent wrinkles.   

Recipe：Cantonese dessert Papay milk pudding 木瓜炖蛋

An easy homemade Cantonese dessert.

Ingredients: (serves 2 people) 

Milk X1 bottle ( about 220ml ) I prefer buffalo milk,Canton is a region that produce very good buffalo milk.  egg  X1
sugar 2-3 table spoon (depend on your favour)
papaya ,diced, some

1. prepare ingredients 

2. bit the egg gently with a fork, try to not creat too much bubbles.

3. when you feel the liquid became mixed, add in sugar.

4. when they were mixed, gradually pour in milk, and simultaneously whisk the mixture gently until it was fully mixed. 

     

5. pour the mixture into 2 rice bowls, and add in some diced papays.

6. put then into the steamer, and steam about 10-15 mins ( time depands on the power of your stoves)

voilà~how easy to make! the process is less than 20 mins. serve in hot or put in fridge to chill it. 

its up to you, 

enjoy it!  

How Cantonese celebrate the Qingming Festival

The Qingming Festival, also known as Tomb Sweeping Day or Ching Ming,^[1][2] is a traditional Chinese festival on the first day of the fifth solar term of the traditional Chinese lunisolar calendar. This makes it the 15th day after theSpring Equinox, either 4 or 5 April in a given year.^[3][4] Other common translations include Chinese Memorial Day andAncestors' Day.

The festival is called Qīngmíng Jié in Standard (Mandarin) Chinese (清明節 / 清明节; Wade-Giles: Ch‘ing Ming Chieh), literally "Pure Brightness Festival" or "Clear and Bright Festival".^[3] The name suggests a time for people to go outside and enjoy the greenery of springtime (踏青, tà qīng, "treading on the greenery"), but it is mostly noted for it connection with Chinese ancestral veneration and the tending of family graves. The Chinese characters are read Cing¹-ming⁴ Zit³in Cantonese, and Chheng-bêng-cheh or Chhiⁿ-miâ-choeh in Min.

Qingming has been regularly observed as a statutory public holiday in China. On Taiwan, the public holiday is now always observed on 5 April to honor the death of Chiang Kai-shek on that day in 1975. It became a public holiday in mainland China since 2008.

                                                                                            ------ From  Wikipedia ( I am too lazy to write)

What Cantonese do on this day?

mourning our late family members as well as family gathering and go hiking. 

first, you have to equip yourself, as in this misty season, going on the countryside path could make you very dirty. so umbrella, rain boots, hats...are needed. 

guys responsible for carrying heavy oblations. you must seeing too many people are participating in, yes, as they are included even grandfather's cousins' family members. even couldn't seen so much people in the new year. 

in the past, when people die, family can pick a place where has beautiful view on the hill, dig a hold and bury their beloved. the ancestors' grave we have to visit, the eldest one has few hundreds history. you know after sooooo many years some places might have became a road, a bay, a ... anyway, no matter how these places become, there are at least one people in the family is obliged to remember all the graves' location. usually male member do this.

after finding the grave, guys will do some clean up.

then ladies start to burn the  oblations

what is the hottest oblations ? 

something high-tech

something luxury 

something to wear. our late ancestors might still like chinese style of clothes, so most people still stick with the choice of Chinese costume. 

a new villa

some money to spend

surely our late ancestor might like to spend a holiday abroad, so they might need some dollar.

they are all made of paper, people used to believe the late ancestor will get what they burnt, and the paper made things will became full function useful things in the late people's society. however, nowadays, we do this just for keeping a tradition. although personally I think it is quite polluted and un-eco, it is funny have a tradition to play in a festival.

I think after 1997, it became illegal to randomly pick a place to be a grave, so those who died after 1997

must be cremated and bone ash must be placed in the cemetery.
for those big families like mine, on the day, we have a lot places to visit, from day till night. although tired, have a lot of fun and joy. for kids, this activity is just a day of hiking and picnic.