Friday Favorites: Vien Huong
I was born in upstate New York. While my parents were finishing up school, I lived with my grandparents in Taipei. In our neighborhood, there was a gwe-a diam, or “rice stick shop” in Taiwanese. These were common back in the early 80s, though sadly, I couldn’t find a single one on our recent trips to Taiwan. Gwe-a, similar to ho fun, but often roughly cut from a sheet of rice noodle, was my favorite food as a kid. I’ve always loved noodles, and rice noodles especially. I don’t know much about the Teochew diaspora, but a lot of Teochew / Chao Zhou / Chow Jew people ended up in…
Grandma’s fan qie chao dan (番茄炒蛋) – stir-fried tomato and egg
If you give my Ama a few tomatoes from the garden, she’ll tell you how pretty they are (they are!) and how our tomatoes are THE BEST (I started them from seed, so I’m pretty biased too), and then she’ll stir-fry the tomatoes with eggs. Use the best tomatoes you can, whether homegrown or from a farmer’s market. You only need a few, but this simple dish is all about the fresh sweetness of tomato. Honestly, I’m not sure I’d even bother making this dish in the winter. Maybe try Ama’s garlic chive eggs instead… These are Purple Russian tomatoes, also known as Ukrainian Purple. Flavor-wise, these are definitely the…
