“I WANT CHOICES!”

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Everyone says they want choices. Then when presented with too many choices, people get overwhelmed by decision paralysis that they realize that they don’t want too many choices, but just enough to feel like they are actually choosing from an array of things. The last several months before heading off to school, we’ve really simplified Kaia’s first breakfast of the day (I say “first breakfast” because she gets a SECOND breakfast when she arrives at school!) so that it’s really just cereal: it’s Weetbix or (organic, Whole Foods brand) Cherrios, and occasionally she can have some toast with peanut butter. But I realized that I really want her eating oats more regularly as she used to, and not just in baked healthy muffins and cookies. So I started making my oat porridge fingers again with oats, peanut butter, flaxseed, and milk. She ate them for breakfast yesterday, but this morning, she got really mad when I presented them to her along with a cup of milk.

“I don’t want this!” she yelled. “I don’t want to eat oats today!”

I told her that mummy made them just for Kaia, so she should eat some for her brekkie.

“I WANT CHOICES!” she yelled back. “I DON’T WANT OATS! I DON’T WANT OATS!”

I always have to stifle a laugh whenever she goes into these little indignant outbursts. I want her to know I take her seriously, but at the same time, I cannot help but think how comical all of these situations are. If we went back to 3-year-old me, circa 1989, and I yelled at my mom like this, she easily would have just whacked me or slapped my face to get me to shut up. She would have hit me into submission until I ate every last bite of oats. But here, I ended up relenting with one other option: I asked her if she wanted toast with peanut butter. She said yes, and I went ahead and prepped that.

Who knows — maybe one day, when Kaia is in her 30s, she will be in therapy and recount the time when she was 3 years old, when her mom *almost* forced her into eating peanut butter oat porridge fingers. And that that felt a traumatizing experience to her.

The fridge breaks down and gets hot!

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This morning as I was getting Kaia ready for school, I reached into the fridge to grab her some milk when I realized that it felt weirdly warm. The top shelf of the fridge was hot. The temperature reading on the fridge said it was 53 F. WHAT?

We called the handyman to come see what was wrong and ended up having to completely empty out the fridge and the freezer. They had to be completely replaced, so they gave us a spare fridge sitting in the basement of the building. Some collateral damage happened along the way, too: the handyman and porter lost grip of the (extremely heavy) fridge facade glass door, and the corner of the door fell onto the bamboo floor boards. This resulted in a huge hole in the middle of our kitchen floor, which they said they’d replace and fix tomorrow.

So I ended up having to spend time cleaning all the bottoms of jars and containers in the fridge and then spraying and wiping down the new parts of the replacement fridge we were given. It was annoying, but luckily, all our perishable goods still have a place to go into and won’t go bad.

It’s in these moments when I realize that the premium we pay to live in our building actually does have a lot of value to us. In these times, we immediately get help and replacements, and it’s just included in the high rent we pay. And that’s a pretty darn good thing to have.

The worst cooking class I’ve ever been to

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For Christmas, Chris gifted me a South African cooking class at a cooking school in the Lower East Side. I attended the class on Saturday night, and unexpectedly didn’t arrive home until midnight. When he asked me how the class was the next morning, I told him that while I love him, to please never, ever get me another cooking class at this school ever again.

The class was over capacity, lacked a proper kitchen setup, was cramped and borderline claustrophobic (22 students, two teachers, a bartender, two photographers, and an assistant in a tiny basement room), completely lacked instruction or teaching of any technique or background of any recipe, was disorganized in that the ingredients were not laid out well or explained; the class started over 35 min late. 

For some details on what happened in this class: 

1. The class was over capacity in a cramped, tight space that is certainly not meant for a cooking class: The class was in a small room in Abigail’s Kitchen’s (a restaurant) basement. It had a bar setting, so I’d imagine the room is usually used for small private parties. The class was basically in this small room with several long tables set up where class participants were meant to gather, eight at each table. They somehow managed to cram 22 people (there were 24 people who originally signed up, and 2 didn’t show) into this tiny space. Abby and Lorna (the guest chef/teacher who is from South Africa) kept emphasizing over and over that the class would be “cozy.” “Cozy” is simply real-estate code-speak for a crammed and extremely tight space. 

2. No instruction or technique was taught. We were told the names of dishes, but not their cultural significance or any special techniques on how to make them. We were simply told to follow the recipe, and the chefs would walk around, observe, and give feedback. Copies of recipes were not distributed. Instead, each table got the equivalent of 2-3 parts of the different recipes. We all had to look over each other’s shoulders just to see how much of a single ingredient to measure out. In my pair (I randomly paired up with someone standing next to me), we worked on the yeasted dough for the South African donuts. Lorna kept telling us that the dough was too dry, while Abby told us it was just right. We had no direction on the recipe card and conflicting messages from both of them about what the dough should be like. 

3. There’s no kitchen setup here, and ingredients/materials were disorganized. The space had some makeshift stove setups and random kitchen items laid out. You aren’t able to see the items go into the oven and be taken out as a result. You aren’t able to do a part of every recipe, either. Because I worked on the yeasted donut dough, I had a LOT of time where I was simply observing other students try to figure out their recipes and how to execute on them. When I needed something basic like black pepper, I had to hunt for it. When I asked Abby, she simply responded that it was where “all the other spices” were laid out, but this actually wasn’t the case. 

4. The class does not start on time AT ALL, and it ends LATE. The official start time is 7pm. Most cooking schools are prompt and start on the dot. This cooking class started at 7:35pm. We didn’t get served dinner until 10:15, and dessert did not come out until past 11. We were all starving. 

The one highlight of this class: unlike every other cooking class I’ve ever done, alcohol (beer and wine) were included and unlimited. This is pretty unheard of. So, it was no wonder that people were getting sloshed in this class. My donut yeast dough partner was already on his fourth beer before we started mixing our dough. People were visibly tipsy. I’m pretty certain repeat students of Abigail’s Kitchen come simply for the wine overflowing. 

There are a number of great cooking schools with proper cooking school setups throughout Manhattan, along with real instruction and background on recipe given. This is not one of them. Here, you won’t learn technique or any new skills. But, you will leave with lots of alcohol in your belly. That may be a fun night out with some food and lots of booze, but that doesn’t really make for a proper “cooking class” where you actually leave and can say you really learned something.

Cooking with chayote, aka choko aka su su

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For the longest time, I’d walk into Asian and Latin supermarkets and notice this slightly wrinkly, green pear-shaped vegetable that I had no idea what to do with. It kind of looks like a gourd, maybe a squash, and potentially like a not so pretty fruit. In markets, they’d be labeled as “chayote,” so it sounded like it came from Mexico or another part of Latin America. Based on what I’ve read, chayote, also known as choko or “su su” in Vietnamese, origins in southern Mexico and Honduras, and is technically a vegetable in the gourd family. It’s used the same way summer squash is used; it’s lightly cooked to retain a slightly crisp but soft consistency. The gourd is high in fiber and also contains folate, magnesium, and vitamin C. It’s also supposed to have anti-inflammatory properties and be good for gut health.

I got inspired to buy and cook with it after Chris got me a copy of Thanh Truong’s (aka the Fruit Nerd!) book called Don’t Buy Fruit and Veg Without Me! The Fruit Nerd is Vietnamese Australian, and his book has a number of family recipes that have a Vietnamese twist. One of them is stir-fried choko, which is simply chayote sliced up and stir-fried with some garlic, shallots, and a bit of fish sauce. I bought these from Hong Kong Supermarket on Friday and stir-fried them today with Kaia. And I actually enjoyed them! It’s sort of like a cross between a cucumber and a summer squash, with a hint of sweetness similar to an apple. It’s a nice, versatile vegetable to add into our rotation and increase the diversity of plants being added to our diet. I just wish I had discovered this vegetable sooner!

Shadow Puppets of The Little Prince

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One of Chris’s friends gifted Kaia a Shadow Puppets version of The Little Prince. The way the “book” works is with big sheets of beautifully cut out scenes from the famous book The Little Prince that you hold up facing the ceiling with a flashlight (or your phone flashlight) under it. As you go through the scenes, you also either read the story or have the narrator read it via the pre-recorded story on their website. The idea behind it is to add variety to bedtime stories and also to encourage sleep.

The funny thing about doing this at Kaia’s age is that while she loves getting exposed to new things as a toddler, she gets very easily frustrated when she doesn’t “get” it right away. She seems to have perfectionist tendencies in this way. She tries to hold the puppets up vertically (which you’re not supposed to do), and then gets mad when she doesn’t see their perfect image show up in the light from my phone flashlight. I have to keep correcting her. Then she gets excited when she sees the image render. Then she holds the puppet up incorrectly the vertical way, and then the cycle continues.

I really like these shadow puppets myself and love making shadow images. But I think it’s going to take some time for Pookster to really embrace this and “get” it. After about 70 percent of the way through the story, she gets mad and says she doesn’t want it anymore. So, we end up moving on to her regular books and have to turn the light back on.

“Happy Valentine’s Day!” from Kaia Pookie

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I’ve lost track of when, but years ago, Chris and I stopped celebrating or acknowledging Valentine’s Day. I think it’s far too commercialized. The number of flower and chocolate says just for the day itself is completely out of control (you should also see the premium it costs to have flowers delivered on the day of Valentine’s Day!!). And for people who are newly coupled or dating, the day comes with so much ridiculous pressure to prove one’s affection that it just seems pretty senseless to me.

But I will say that there is one sweet spot for Valentine’s Day, and that’s with arts and crafts, especially for kids. Years ago, I used to make and send/give Valentine’s Day cards to my friends; for me, it was just an excuse to be crafty and exercise my artsy side. At school, Kaia and her classmates made “love bugs” that they painted and decorated with different rhinestones; she was very excited by this. And today when I picked her up from school, she immediately wished me a happy Valentine’s Day and showed me some of the little gifts she got from her teachers and classmates. The teachers gave each child a “Smoochy” heart stuffed animal, along with some candy and chocolate. One of her classmates in another class gave her a little puzzle as a Valentine. I like the move away in schools from candy/sweets to cute little tokens like these. They seem a lot more creative, and well, it’s better for one’s dental hygiene, too.

When Chris got home as we were getting ready for dinner, Kaia immediately wished her dad “Happy Valentine’s Day!” And instead of giving his equivalent of an eye-roll, he warmly greeted her back and was pleased to hear these well wishes from his child. Maybe we can learn to semi-embrace Valentine’s Day again just for the fun and joy of our toddler.

Kaia embraces Chinese songs (again)

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When Kaia started daycare four blocks away when she was about 17 months old, she started showing a clear preference for her English kid songs versus her Chinese ones. Oftentimes, when I’d try to play the Chinese ones or sing them to her, she’d protest and demand “Wheels!” She did have one exception, though: She loved it when I sang the chorus for “Lao Shu Ai Da Mi” or “Mouse loves Big Rice.” That is technically not a Chinese nursery song, but apparently a song that is often used to teach people Chinese easily; the words are very straightforward, the meaning is cute, and the tune is catchy. I learned it during my second year of Mandarin in college.

Since September, Kaia has been in a Mandarin immersion 3K, so she’s had half English, half Chinese instruction. I’m still not clear exactly how much Chinese is spoken, taught, or emphasized, as sometimes the teaching can seem like a black hole here. We definitely do not have the same level of updates at this current school versus our last, but it’s hard to blame them given they are stretched thin here (and it’s publicly funded). But since January, they’ve been emphasizing and singing a lot of Chinese New Year songs, so Kaia’s been getting really into all her Chinese songs. She will sing them at home. She will ask me to play them. And she will even take out her Bao Bao Chinese song book and play the songs and sing along on her own, even ones she used to reject, like “Xiao Yanzi,” or “Little Swallow.” That’s honestly not my favorite song since it has a pretty sad tune, but it really made me so happy the other day when I saw her singing along to the songs in her Bao Bao book, completely on her own and without prompting. I couldn’t help but beam and see my sweet bilingual baby embrace her second language.

The day we always expected finally came today

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This morning when I went to take the compost out to our trash room down the hall, Kaia came out running after me to find me (she loves trash room visits. Take what you want from that). I emptied the compost into the bin and when we came out, our neighbor was coming back from a walk with her new six-month-old puppy. I think the dog is a dachshund; her name is Natasha. She is golden, long-bodied, skinny, low to the floor, and screaming with energy, literally. She was jumping nonstop and whimpering when she saw us, as that was her way of saying “hello” to us. Kaia usually loves dogs, but with this dog, given she was yapping away and jumping like crazy, Kaia kept a semi-safe distance and just admired her and kept smiling at her.

To be honest, while I generally do like dogs, I cannot stand this dog even though this was the first time I have actually laid eyes on her. Since the neighbor got this rat-dog, I’ve heard it yapping and shrieking nonstop throughout all hours of the day and night. I can hear the dog crying the clearest when I am either in our entryway hallway, or when I am in my bedroom, which I HATE; if only the sound didn’t travel so easily down from their unit.

On the walk to school in the morning, Kaia finally asked Chris the question I figured she would ask eventually: “Can I have a dog?”

Of course, Chris responded negatively to this.

“No dog!” he responded without hesitation. He hates dogs as domesticated pets. He does not want dogs around him, and he definitely wants no dog in his living space. He had said repeatedly, before Kaia was even born, that he didn’t care what his child wanted; there would never be any dogs around as long as he was alive.

While I enjoy dogs, I also have zero desire to own one. I don’t want the responsibility or the expense. I also just think that too many people care too much about their dogs/cats and prioritize them over human beings, which to me, makes zero sense. So it will be interesting to see if Kaia continues to ask for one and how she responds with the repeated “no” replies she gets.

Dried scallops – a mother’s show of love

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Growing up in an Asian household, I rarely got complimented. Though I did get told “I love you” quite a lot from my mom, a lot of the time it was hard to really hear and digest that when it was in the midst of a lot of criticisms and comparisons. I will say, though, that the one area where my parents have never, ever failed my brother and me is around feeding us. We’ve always, always had more than plenty of food to eat in the house and lots of variety. And it is always one of their very first questions they ask me when they see or talk to me: “Have you eaten yet?” It’s a classic Chinese/Vietnamese way of greeting someone you care about.

When I graduated from college and moved to New York City, one really sweet and generous thing my mom would do is pack me a one-pound, carefully wrapped box of super premium, extremely pricey dried scallops. They would always be huge, fat, uniform, and perfect. She’d check in with me on calls to see how my stash was going, and when I told her it was getting low, she’d go to her favorite herb shop in San Francisco Chinatown and buy me another pack. She would either have it ready for me to pack when I came home for the holidays, or if she were coming to visit me, she’d pack it in her suitcase and cart it over to me. If you know what I am referring to, you know that this product is likely one of *the* most expensive foods you can cook with in Cantonese cuisine. The highest quality, most beautiful and unblemished dried large scallops, oftentimes from Japan, can be sold for as much as $80-110 USD for a single pound. They are truly worth what they cost, though: dried scallops bring an incredible seafoody, umami burst to anything they are added to. There is really nothing that tastes like them that can mimic the richness they bring any single dish. I would always use them to make Chinese sticky rice, Chinese turnip cake, or savory taro cake, would occasionally add them to stir-fry dishes, and oftentimes would even add them to my jook/congee as a decadent treat. Some particular friends used to tell me that adding dried scallops to congee seemed a bit wasteful given what a premium item they are, but because my grandma and mom would always add a little to their congee, I continued doing this with mine when I had them on hand.

Well, since Kaia has been born, my mom hasn’t bought me any more scallops. In fact, she hasn’t even asked me once how my stash has been looking. Her whole focus now, predictably, is on her only grandchild. All the gifts she packs when I see her are all for Kaia. I’m not complaining — it is what it is, and I get it. Well, I finally used up the last bits of the last box of dried scallops she gave me this time last year to make Chinese sticky rice and radish and taro cakes. So this year, I had to go to a specialty shop to pick up my own because there was no way I was going to make Chinese turnip cake or sticky rice without it. I hesitated when I saw how much the fattest, plumpest, and most beautiful ones in the shop cost: $98/pound. Ouch. I looked at the next tier: $80. And the tier after that was $68. Okay, it’s okay, I told myself. I only need a small amount to make my dishes, so I’m just going to buy a quarter of a pound. I asked for 1/4 pound, the employee measured it out on a scale, priced it out and handed me the bag of my dried gold.

Well, that just did it: that is the single most expensive item I purchased for my Lunar New Year celebrations: about $17.50 for a quarter pound of semi-premium Japanese dried scallops. And I am pretty sure if my mom examined these, she would say these weren’t that good and that I probably got ripped off.

Baby shower at Monday at 8am?

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I went down to the gym at around 8am today for my usual weekday morning workout after Chris took Kaia to school. Our gym is on the third floor, which is also where the resident lounge is where parties can be hosted, as well as the children’s play room and laundry room. I was surprised to see a “Private Party” sign on the lounge doors so early in the morning. Inside through the glass, I could see a crowd of at least 15 people, a mix of men and women. There was a table full of what was clearly baby gifts. Several large bundles of balloons filled with helium decorated the middle of the lounge. Everyone was dressed up and chatting away.

I understand when people throw parties or or events at non-peak times. I get it when people host birthday parties or weddings or bridal showers on Fridays or Sundays versus Saturdays, as Saturday always has peak pricing since it’s the highest in demand. To be clear, we had our wedding welcome dinner on a Thursday night, and then we had our wedding on a Friday; we definitely got some discounts for having a Friday wedding vs. a Saturday wedding. But Monday… at 8am, really? Who wants to be anywhere at 8am on a Monday morning, the first day of the work week? And is it really this many people who are taking time off of work for this one person’s baby shower?