Egg Tarts and Dumplings

Here's two trays of the dumplings we made

Over the Christmas and New Year holidays, I tried to do some decent cooking because in Hong Kong, the kitchens are small and mine is not very well stocked with ingredients let alone cooking equipment.

I managed to try a brownie recipe from Jamie Oliver's Christmas Cookbook. It called for dark chocolate, white chocolate, sour cherries and I added nuts in there. It turned out a bit gooier than I expected, but it wasn't too sweet thanks to the sour cherries.

For our New Year's Eve party, my visiting nephew told us he would contribute to the potluck by making egg tarts and we were surprised and skeptical. Could he really make them? He said he had made it before and found a recipe online.

Some of the finished egg tarts that tasted really good!

On the day I watched him make it, carefully mashing the butter with a fork, then mixing it with flour, letting it set in the fridge, and then making the egg custard. When the dough was ready, my niece and I helped him shape the dough into each of the holes of the cupcake pan which was a tedious process, before pouring the egg custard in and then baking it in the oven.

In the end it turned out quite well! One of my uncles who doesn't normally eat sweet things had one and a half egg tarts before dinner. The crust was a bit tough, but it was strong enough to hold the egg custard, which was actually quite delicious.

On New Year's Day, we planned to make dumplings. We had some minced pork but not enough meat, so my mom came up with the idea of adding leftover turkey meat that she shredded by hand.

Added to the meat was minced garlic, chopped spinach, mushrooms, some oil, sesame oil, Chinese wine and salt.

My mom and I started wrapping them, and then my niece and nephew came back from shopping and they started helping out too, the first time for them to wrap dumplings. They learned pretty quickly and soon we were all done, with a few wrappers left over.

And the dumplings tasted so good -- they tasted even better thanks to the roasted turkey meat, and with a hint of ginger was very tasty!

So if you ever wondered what to do with leftover turkey -- make turkey dumplings! And always use the carcass to either make a broth or congee. Your stomach will love you for it!

A Step Closer to the Hustings

Carrie Lam announced her resignation as Chief Secretary today

The leadership race for Hong Kong's next chief executive just got more interesting today with Carrie Lam Cheng Yuet-ngor resigning from her Chief Secretary post earlier in the day.

At 5pm she held a very short news conference where she said: "There is only one reason for me to resign at this juncture. That is, if my resignation is approved by the Central People's Government, I intend to prepare to contest the upcoming chief executive election."

She sounds pretty confident her resignation will be approved.

John Tsang's resignation has yet to be approved by Beijing

This contrasts starkly to former finance secretary John Tsang Chun-wah's status. He resigned on December 12 and it still hasn't been approved by Beijing yet. It's bizarre, but pundits believe the two former civil servants' resignations will be approved next Thursday, putting them both at the starting block at the same time.

However, it looks like Lam has a greater chance than Tsang of having Beijing's blessing because her resignation will have the appearance of being approved in a shorter time period.

Nevertheless, according to a recent poll conducted by Chinese University's Centre for Communication and Public Opinion Survey, Tsang seems more popular with younger and educated people, while Lam is a favourite among seniors and less educated. Lam's support rate was 10.2 percent among those aged 18-29 and 18.5 percent for those aged 30-44.

But when it comes to the middle-aged and elderly, she received 29.7 percent among those aged 45-49, and 29.7 percent from those 60 and older.

Regina Ip more popular with elderly and less educated

And by the way, the same could be said of Regina Ip Lau Suk-yee, who gets little support from those with tertiary education.

Tsang got 42.5 percent of support from those who described themselves as pan-democrats, while 34.9 percent of localists backed Tsang.

Even former judge Woo Kwok-hing got 22 percent of pan-democratic supporters, and 20.5 percent of localists.

"The poll results show that Lam and Ip's backers are of the same kind and they are more pro-establishment, while the other three potential candidates look like they're backed by the pro-democracy," explained Professor Francis Lee Lap-fung of the Chinese University's Centre for Communication and Public Opinion survey, that conducted the telephone survey of 1,024 people.

It's a small selection of people, but still worth considering. But hey -- our opinion doesn't count so much when only 1,200 people get to decide who are next leader is...

Mao's Loyal Army

Fans of the Great Helmsman make sure critics are silenced

It used to be that criticizing Mao Zedong would result in disaster for one's entire family, so the younger generation is shocked to find that criticizing him can still ruin careers.

Television producer Liu Yong was fired after he defended a critic of Mao online around December 26, the great leader's birthday.

Liu, a producer at Luohe Television in Henan province, was suspended for "wrongful speech that violates political discipline and morals", his employer posted on social media.

The statement didn't exactly explain what triggered the sacking, but Liu apologized on social media on Monday for "having hurt the feelings of the public".

A massive gold statue of Mao in Kaifeng, Henan province

Oh that wonderful phrase of "hurting the public's feelings" has been trotted out yet again.

Previously Liu had posted criticism of the Party and government, and on Sunday posted support for a professor who was forced to retire after criticizing Mao publicly on the eve of the late leader's birthday.

Deng Xiangchao, a communications professor at Shandong Jianzhu University, reposted a joke about Mao on December 25. Without naming Mao, Deng's post compared the late leader to an imperial ruler.

"Being an imperial ruler in China takes skill," the post read. "You should call hereditary rulers revolutionary comrades, and change the emperor's edict into a supreme instruction. But don't be honest about it."

The post angered Mao supporters, who held protests at the university last week. They held banners and yelled slogans such as "down with traitors".

Although some academics supported Deng on the grounds of freedom of expression, the professor, who was one year shy of retirement age, was forced to retire and stop teaching only a day after the protest, when the university accused him of posting "wrongful speech".

And now Liu is also a victim of this purge.

Let this be a fair warning to all!

The incident demonstrates that the country and its people still have very strong feelings about Mao. His followers are disappointed that rampant corruption and the widening wealth gaps were caused by market reforms and the intrusion of Western values.

But there are those who see Mao as a merciless and Machiavellian dictator who was indifferent to the loss of innocent lives, and who uprooted traditional culture and purged intellectuals and his colleagues.

And a posting on social media is enough to get you sacked!

Defining Hipsters

Identical twins Gary and Alan Keery from Belfast opened Cereal Killer Cafe

One more interesting documentary I watched on the plane to keep myself awake was Peter York's Hipster Handbook by the BBC.

York is a social commentator and dressed very dapper in contrast to hipsters -- who we should point out don't like to be called that -- who wear beards, flannel shirts, no mass fashion labels, have retro looks. tattoos and scruffy hair.

The dapper host Peter York contrasts with how hipsters look

During the one-hour documentary, he tries to figure out if hipsters are a fad or trend, and how it has influenced consumerism. When it comes to their look, it is decided that hipsters may be anti-fashion label, though they do appreciate authenticity, such as old school work overalls from the 1950s, say, or leather bomber jackets that are made today but look exactly like ones from over 60 years ago.

Many men may be identified as hipsters from their beards and man-buns, but York finds out that facial hair is in fact carefully groomed and there are specialist barbers that carefully shape beards and add products to them to keep their shape or condition the facial hair.

Hipsters are also usually in the creative field, and can be found in cafes with their Mac laptops and iPhones, and they have this fascination, obsession or passion for artisan-made products, from coffee to clothing. They like knowing where what they are eating or drinking comes from, preferably locally sourced, which creates a sense of belonging to community.

A man gets his beard groomed in a specialist barber shop

York observes the word "authenticity" creeps up again and again, how hipsters don't want something manipulated, but real and true to some degree, which is why they like decor to show things like exposed brick, old school style light bulbs.

A fun shop called the Cereal Killer Cafe is filled with lots of boxes of breakfast cereals from our childhoods all lined up on the shelves and people can choose which one they want with milk they pour into a bowl themselves.

The ironic thing is that the concept of "authenticity" and "artisan" have appealed to mass market brands and they have replicated the exposed brick look and co-opted the aforementioned key words in their marketing to appeal to hipsters or hipster-wannabes.

The Mast Brothers were exposed for not so authentic chocolate

In addition there are some allegedly faux hipsters, such as the Mast Brothers, known for their beautifully packaged chocolate. They claim it is from "bean to bar", but in reality some chocolate experts claim some of their chocolate included Valrhona mixed in.

The Mast Brothers differentiated themselves not only with the nice packaging to justify pricing at US$10 a bar, but also their distinctive look with bushy beards, and how they apparently travel the world sourcing cocoa beans.

Nevertheless, York still finds it a fascinating discussion with experts about the hipster history in the United States, where African Americans claimed hipsters were cool with black music, while in England, Shoreditch is an example of a neighbourhood that was previously not cool, but became so thanks to hipsters transforming the area.

In the end York concludes that hipsters are not creators of new products per se, but "curate" them, and look for things they are willing to spend on, like quality pints of craft beer or "authentic" fashion pieces as a way to live better.

The documentary was a fascinating discussion, and now I see hipsters in a new light -- and am more aware of big business co-opting the concept of "authentic" and "artisan" with varying degrees of success.

What's the next lifestyle trend going to be?

Peter York's Hipster Handbook

BBC4