I went to a fish dinner at Yu Joy organized by local food blogger Chaxiubao. It was an eelpout dinner. Eelpout. Wiki it. I got the Evite and thought, “I don’t want to eat this creature.“ It made me imagine that the entire table would be pouting throughout the whole dinner. Not Nightlife column material. But then my friend Dorothy nudged me to reply, and I figured, well I ought to attend just to fan the flames of envy among all those other food writers who weren’t invited.
We tried this meaty, rubbery ginormous mother of an eel cooked in three ways, soup in a heady medicinal broth, stir-fried with string beans, and in a casserole with winter bamboo, tofu skin and a rich brown sauce. I translated it as Flower Brocade Eel after its Chinese name.
Chaxiubao also did his own translations of the poetic names of the dishes on the menu. “Back to Home in Bling Bling” (blanched fish skin salad), “Be the Richest Guy of One Area” (a deconstructed Chinese mud carp, or dace, beaten to fishball consistency and then placed back into its own skin in whole fish form—very postmodern, but actually, an age-old Cantonese recipe from my ancestral town, Shunde).
The dish that kept us all guessing was the one named and designed by Chaxiubao as “Loaded with Passion and Vigor”—little fish hearts on a steamed egg. He warned us that there was a lil’ sum’n sum’n in there as a special ingredient. Fish sperm. Not bad, but I couldn’t stomach the bitter hearts. But Jake from Michigan and Laura from Lincoln, Nebraska, finished it all and proclaimed to have enjoyed the dish. She also speaks fluent Putonghua with all the Pekingese pirate aaarrs. Double kudos, matey! Tai niu le!
Their acclaimed dessert lived up to its acclaim, fantastic buns filled with a sweet gooey almond purée. I asked Chaxiubao if there was a lil’ sum’n sum’n in them as well.
Next was Rachel Barr’s thirtieth birthday at the Hidden Vine. Happy Bday, girl! Well, she told everyone that she was turning 30, so I can too. I think the Singaporeans had too much bubbly; one fell flat on her bottom, the other ran into a wall while she was rushing to the toilet to puke. Ow!