China was so vast that each region was isolated enough to have their dialects diverge and change to become intelligible to each other.
So they set up an uniform writing system that all bureaucrats can use and communicate with.
However, over time the writing system to became so archaic only scholars knew how to read it.
in 1920 they redid the writing system to match the vernacular again - what you spoke became what you write again - this was for Mandarin.

There are two types of romanization: Wade Giles vs Pin Yin (Wade-Giles were used by US soldiers in WWII and Pin Yin was adopted in the 50's by China)
Wade Giles : Pin Yin
Chi : Qi
Chang : Zhang

The romanization of other Chinese dialects become different because they're spoken differently.

GungFu: casual disregard: Thanks for your responses, Farkers. I feel so loved :3

Linguistics is incredibly interesting to me, but also so dense that I can't get involved more than tangentially.

Next question: chicken feet has bone. Do you eat the bone?

No. It's boiled and 'cured' with some spices and herbs, which gives it its distinctive coloring. This process loosens the 'skin' and cartilage, or whatever is in chicken feet, and that's what's eaten. The bones you spit out, which makes it kinda messy to eat.

But seriously, it's delicious with a little soy or chilli sauce.

Do you live in China?

If so, have you ever have the convenience store chicken feet snack bags, with the green chilis?

Holy crap those are hot. I need two tall Qingtaos to get through them!

sendtodave:

Holy crap those are hot. I need two tall Qingtaos to get through them!

??

KrispyKritter
Dim Sum is Fark for eyegasm. someone should write down recipes, put them in a book or something. when i was a little girl recipes didn't include such nonsense as "use two 10 1/2oz cans of pumpkin pie filling". you picked a pumpkin out back and cooked it down first

or you are using a 50 year old recipe and it says 2 cans of .... how big was a can of .... in the early 1960's? what was the content of sodium and corn syrup used back then. there is a crappy family recipe for chilli with beans i've tried to make for a pita 80 year old relative. i try to tell the biatche tomato soup and tomato sauce today is crap so deal with it.

Beef Tripe (stewed and steamed)
Curried Cuttlefish
Dough fritter wrapped with rice rolls
Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce

Dessert Tofu

Blackbird: Beef Tripe (stewed and steamed)
Curried Cuttlefish
Dough fritter wrapped with rice rolls
Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce

Dessert Tofu

Was going to say- where's the curried cuttlefish?

Sadly, only one pathetic dim sum place here in the middle of the cornfield where I live. However, my wife is from China and we're doing a hot pot this week with some other Chinese friends.

god damn I love me some dim sum.

My basic rule for Chinese food: Open mouth, insert food. Never ask what you're eating. If it tastes good, eat more.

syrynxx: The one time I tried dim sum in SF chinatown was the last.  Let's take carcass, organs and body parts Westerners would throw away, fry them, and sell them.  Brilliant!

Waste not.

ZzeusS: Lots of good stuff there. But you can hold the chicken feet.

Came here to say this...

Ananku: My basic rule for Chinese food: Open mouth, insert food. Never ask what you're eating. If it tastes good, eat more.

I live across the street from a delicious Dim Sum place (where you have to ask for menus with English on them) so I'm getting a kick out of these replies.

I grew up with the Filipino version of Chinese pork buns - siopao. Delicious. The filling is much the same (just a bit sweeter and richer) and includes a portion of boiled egg.

syrynxx: The one time I tried dim sum in SF chinatown was the last.  Let's take carcass, organs and body parts Westerners would throw away, fry them, and sell them.  Brilliant!
Nah, we just make hotdogs and chicken nuggets out of them.

If you don't eat Dim Sum in Toronto, we deport you.

KrispyKritter: Dim Sum is Fark for eyegasm. someone should write down recipes, put them in a book or something. when i was a little girl recipes didn't include such nonsense as "use two 10 1/2oz cans of pumpkin pie filling". you picked a pumpkin out back and cooked it down first.

/ we had AM radio
// and we LIKED it

My wife is from southern China and laughed at me as I tried to pronounce the words.

Steamed Pork Buns
Makes 10

Dough
1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour
2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 teaspoon superfine (bar) sugar water, to prepare dough
2 1/2 fluid ounces lukewarm milk
about 1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil, plus extra for sautéing

Filling
1 spring onion, finely chopped
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
2/3 cup diced red roast pork (see below)
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
1 teaspoon granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon ground white pepper
A few drops of sea same seed oil
3 tablespoons chicken stock or water
1 teaspoon cornstarch

Red Roast Pork
2 tblspn honey
2 tblspn light soy sauce
3 tblspn hoisin sauce
1/2 teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder
1 1/2 tblspn rice wine
2 tblspn vegetable oil plus extra for brushing
2 lbs 10 oz pork filet cut into 1 1/2 inch thick

Marinate the pork strips over night or for 3 hours

Preheat oven to 465

Place a tin foil lined tray under an oven rack and then brush the oven rack with veg oil. Place the pork on the rack and roast for 25 min.


// I don't really like Chinese food

funmonger: If you don't eat Dim Sum in Toronto, we deport you.

You dim sum, you lose some?

1nsanilicious: KrispyKritter: Dim Sum is Fark for eyegasm. someone should write down recipes, put them in a book or something. when i was a little girl recipes didn't include such nonsense as "use two 10 1/2oz cans of pumpkin pie filling". you picked a pumpkin out back and cooked it down first.

/ we had AM radio
// and we LIKED it

My wife is from southern China and laughed at me as I tried to pronounce the words.

Steamed Pork Buns
Makes 10

Dough
1 1/2 cups of all purpose flour
2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 teaspoon superfine (bar) sugar water, to prepare dough
2 1/2 fluid ounces lukewarm milk
about 1 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil, plus extra for sautéing

Filling
1 spring onion, finely chopped
2 teaspoons vegetable oil
2/3 cup diced red roast pork (see below)
1 tablespoon oyster sauce
1 teaspoon granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon ground white pepper
A few drops of sea same seed oil
3 tablespoons chicken stock or water
1 teaspoon cornstarch

Red Roast Pork
2 tblspn honey
2 tblspn light soy sauce
3 tblspn hoisin sauce
1/2 teaspoon Chinese five-spice powder
1 1/2 tblspn rice wine
2 tblspn vegetable oil plus extra for brushing
2 lbs 10 oz pork filet cut into 1 1/2 inch thick

Marinate the pork strips over night or for 3 hours

Preheat oven to 465

Place a tin foil lined tray under an oven rack and then brush the oven rack with veg oil. Place the pork on the rack and roast for 25 min.


// I don't really like Chinese food

I for got to add

Sauté the spring onion in veg oil for 1 min
Add pork and remaining ingredients except for the chicken stock and corn starch and stir-fry until well mixed. Now add the stock and corn starch

Cut 2 1/4 in rounds of parchment (baking) paper and set aside

Roll the dough into a sausage shape and cut into 10 equal pieces.

Press the dough pieces into 5 in diameter each

Place spoonful of filling in center and close the dough around it pinching the edges to seal

Place each bun on a piece of the paper

Place the buns Ina steamer for 15-18 min until soft and spongy.

Oh this is a bookmark. I am just now starting to get into the various chinese foods out there. I can't handle spicy stuff anymore (sad) and seafood generally doesn't go over well, but pork and chicken dishes are something to try! Sadly, the only Chinese restaurants around here are not exactly exotic fare, but I am working on teaching my bf about the dishes.

/dumplings, yea please

funmonger: If you don't eat Dim Sum in Toronto, we deport you.

A lot of the good restaurants are found in either Scarborough, Markham, or Richmond Hill as far as the GTA is concerned.

I'm from a large Cantonese-speaking family so I am getting a bit of a kick out of this thread. I kind of miss some of the dishes from my childhood.

Quail egg siu mai - they just don't serve it in any of the restaurants in the GTA these days due to fears over cholesterol (it was still available in Hong Kong the last time I visited) but I loved it as a kid back in the 80's


Thousand-layer cake - thankfully, this can still be found on occasion but it doesn't seem to be available in as many restaurants nowadays


For those who enjoy BBQ pork buns, you can give the following pastries a try (same filling but in a flaky pastry instead); it won't always be triangular in shape though as some restaurants opt for more of a cylindrical shape.


Oh, and as a tip to everyone here, try to avoid ordering the BBQ pork rice noodle rolls as many restaurants usually use leftover meat from the previous day; shrimp and beef are usually fine though.

Anastacya: Oh this is a bookmark. I am just now starting to get into the various chinese foods out there. I can't handle spicy stuff anymore (sad) and seafood generally doesn't go over well, but pork and chicken dishes are something to try! Sadly, the only Chinese restaurants around here are not exactly exotic fare, but I am working on teaching my bf about the dishes.

/dumplings, yea please

PF Chang's is best

Romanes Eunt Domus: funmonger: If you don't eat Dim Sum in Toronto, we deport you.

A lot of the good restaurants are found in either Scarborough, Markham, or Richmond Hill as far as the GTA is concerned.

I'm from a large Cantonese-speaking family so I am getting a bit of a kick out of this thread. I kind of miss some of the dishes from my childhood.

Quail egg siu mai - they just don't serve it in any of the restaurants in the GTA these days due to fears over cholesterol (it was still available in Hong Kong the last time I visited) but I loved it as a kid back in the 80's
[static4.orstatic.com image 480x360]

Could they make them look any more like testicles?

lyndsayj: Romanes Eunt Domus: funmonger: If you don't eat Dim Sum in Toronto, we deport you.

A lot of the good restaurants are found in either Scarborough, Markham, or Richmond Hill as far as the GTA is concerned.

I'm from a large Cantonese-speaking family so I am getting a bit of a kick out of this thread. I kind of miss some of the dishes from my childhood.

Quail egg siu mai - they just don't serve it in any of the restaurants in the GTA these days due to fears over cholesterol (it was still available in Hong Kong the last time I visited) but I loved it as a kid back in the 80's
[static4.orstatic.com image 480x360]

Could they make them look any more like testicles?

Possibly but it might require a bit more effort. That's the downside to quail eggs being the size and shape that they are. Well, that and the cholesterol.

abhorrent1: Are the chicken feet actually chicken feet?

/ew
//love me some potstickers though

Not really, you should see how long it takes to make those things! Have to hold the chicken down while the chefs are sculpting look a like feet from tofu. I know, I used to work in a chinese restaurant.

the best dim sum meal


/ chow down

altid2000: ZzeusS: Lots of good stuff there. But you can hold the chicken feet.

Came here to say this...


I dig a lot of Japan and Korean stuff too. But each culture has some stuff on the far end of the Wacky scale that I stop at.

Whole tongue. Hoofs and claws. Entire tentacles of things raw.

Calamari I will do but not a huge thing I have to chew raw. Sushi is of course awesome. But not a handful of raw salmon eggs.

Omnis_evil_twin: KrispyKritter: Dim Sum is Fark for eyegasm. someone should write down recipes, put them in a book or something. when i was a little girl recipes didn't include such nonsense as "use two 10 1/2oz cans of pumpkin pie filling". you picked a pumpkin out back and cooked it down first.

/ we had AM radio
// and we LIKED it

I hate when I'm searching for a recipe, say for lemon poppy seed cupcakes, and the first recipe is something like:

Ingredients
One lemon cake mix prepared according to box
Half cup poppyseeds

Gee, thanks.

Maybe I'll serve it with some of Paula Deen's English peas.

Yeah, I hate WikiHow too.

Jon iz teh kewl: PF Chang's is best

No.

What if I want two thousand of something?

if I need a "Field Guide", I'm already in trouble

Straelbora: Blackbird: Beef Tripe (stewed and steamed)
Curried Cuttlefish
Dough fritter wrapped with rice rolls
Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce

Dessert Tofu

Was going to say- where's the curried cuttlefish?

Sadly, only one pathetic dim sum place here in the middle of the cornfield where I live. However, my wife is from China and we're doing a hot pot this week with some other Chinese friends.

Go on...

syrynxx: The one time I tried dim sum in SF chinatown was the last.  Let's take carcass, organs and body parts Westerners would throw away, fry them, and sell them.  Brilliant!

Welcome to Chinese cuisine!

If you don't like dim sum, there's something wrong with you.

Except if it is the "dim sum" my co-workers and I were served at a hotel restaurant. It wasn't even remotely dim sum. It was some kind of extruded vegetable/soy paste that was then cut and twisted into various shapes and deep fried - no filling, no meat, no shrimp, no nothing. I said repeatedly as everyone expressed their disgust that that wasn't dim sum and to not get the idea that they didn't like dim sum by this faux example. Unfortunately, I wasn't ever able to take them anywhere to show them the difference.

/dim sum place finally did open up in town
//excellent
///my birthday lunch last year

Happy to see the dim sum love here.

Be sure to order your noodles and vegetables ahead of time, farkers, if the dim sum place is any good, its usually as sane as bedlam and quiet as a hen house by lunch time.

No fried spring rolls, beef ribs in fermented black bean sauce or curried cuttlefish on the list? I am disappoint.

My red-haired, green eyed freckled friend uses chopsticks like a pro and adores deep fried crab claws. Always goes out with me for dim sum because her parents are scared of anything different (or that I'll order chicken feet).

/seriously wouldn't eat chicken feet, they walk in their own filth
//extra har gow and siu mai, please

Dim sum is almost awesome. By its very nature, I should love it. My favorite meals are those that I get to try lots of things. Unfortunately, most dim sum is bland. There are some nice dishes here and there, but most are lacking. Even the pigs blood and chicken feet are bland.

Has anyone ever seen a Sichuan dim sum place? That would be freakin awesome.

Came for the chicken feet comments, leaving satisfied.

For Colorado Farkers, The Empress in south Denver does a great Dim Sum every Sunday.

elysive: GungFu: casual disregard: How the heck do we get "dian xin" out of "dim sum"? Did some ancient Englishman decide to fark up every Chinese translation on purpose?


FTFY. Cantonese is an older language than Mandarin. Dim Sum is Cantonese.

Forget the age of the languages...most dim sum restauranteurs are Cantonese. I once lived near a restaurant that served Mandarin/Northern style small plates, but it functioned very much like a tapas restaurant and was much more upscale. My fave Cantonese dim sum restaurant used menus instead of carts, but they also used garbage bags as table cloths and would regularly seat multiple parties at a table during the chaos of a weekend service...

/list fails mentioning custard and taro desserts but omitting red bean

I had some awesome adzuki (aka red bean) paste candies years ago, and I have had no luck finding any in the States.

Ronin_S: My red-haired, green eyed freckled friend uses chopsticks like a pro and adores deep fried crab claws.

how _you_ doin?

thisiszombocom: the best dim sum meal

[24.media.tumblr.com image 850x541]
/ chow down

The words "pork" and "buns" spring to mind.

Glancing Blow:
Did you get your fresh vegetables from a horse-drawn cart?
Was your milk delivered to your front door - and have a little cream erection on freezing days?

Fresh vegetables came from the garden dirt. Milk came from a cow's teat and then went through a cream separator.


Did your margarine come in a package that had a color pellet to squeeze and spread around to change the color to yellow?

I never even heard of margarine until high school. But I churned butter using a Mason jar and rocking chair.


Did you have to get out of the chair to change the TV channel?
Could you grab onto the backs of cars and slide during snowy days because snow plows didn't exist?

In junior high, I saw my first remote control TV. It was a Heathkit color TV my friend's dad built himself. Impressed the hell out of me.
Snow plows were a dump truck with the back gate chained down. Sometimes it'd be a few days before the county got to us, so I got extra snow days just because my road was hilly and unimportant. :)