Happy Bah Zang Day!

Bah zang la, the glutinous rice dumpling with meat? Ahhh..

But of course it's not Bah Zang Day. It's - almost wrote 中元节 - it's 端午节. Now do you know the origin of this day? Good boy/girl if you do, else pls dig out that pri/sec school Chinese textbook!

I spent three brainless hours standing in front of the washing machine, layering two bah zang leaves (ok I don't know what leaves they are) and folding them into a cone before dumping in some glutinous rice followed by a generous* portion of meat-mushroom-etc mix to be topped up by some rice again. Then I flipped, tucked and folded the thing into the familiar shape you see in the markets before tying them with rafia string.

* Later Mother said I used too much meat and she didn't want any leftover rice. To avoid her nagging over my shoulder - erm, she's not that tall - more like at my arm, I replaced some meat with rice. Ended up, she had to go out buy more rice, duh! But less meat, still yummy!

Some teething problems though. Mother forgot to add sugar to the meat and she said nvm! I was pissed; I would only eat yummy bah zang =( Told her I wouldn't eat it or give to my friends if they turned out to be crap. Finally she relented, heh heh.. And a bit unsteady at first as I do this only once a year. After the first three, the rest began to look much nicer. But still no QC for size, some big some small, like breasts.. Oops, what am I thinking.. Cranky morning.. Anyway, we ended up with some 100 bah zang!! At least half had been given away and the rest should be gone by tomorrow. If they even survive today..

Had an idea to take pictures but no one else around besides Mother. Made use of the 15min rest when she was adding sugar to take some :)

Look at the meat!

Stove with brand new super pot!

Check out the long charcoal sticks - I've never seen these before..

A whole box of them!

Found some dry leaves and string lying around

I wrapped bah zang at the washing machine and turned around to tie with string hanging from the ceiling.

Last batch queuing to jump into super pot (final destination = mf's tummy)

ジャンジャン! *Drool*

Brought two bundles to office yesterday. We had a rice dumpling appreciation thing at lunch happily org by Siok :) That's Alvin's first attack, and Dor and Irene.

Off to have one for breakfast :)