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There's some wine flavour. Marinate it with some wine.
Soy sauce... Smells very good.
They ask, "Why does your food taste so good?" -- it's because of these ingredients.
What kind of wine do you like to use? Rice wine.
Pork belly. Cut it and marinate it with Five-spice Powder
and soy sauce. Add some wine.
Makes it tastier. Marinate it.
Marinate it until the flavours are in the meat, then you can use it to put in the bamboo
leaves. And egg yolks.
Dried shrimp. Stir fry them so the flavours come out.
Chinese mushrooms. Wash them, soak them in water.
Then change the water, wash them again, and add fresh water to soak one more time.
Soak the mushrooms until they are soft throughout, then cut the stems and stir fry in a wok.
For the mushrooms, I add some oyster sauce while stir frying. Stir frying makes them
tastier. Other people don't add this ingredient.
Your gramma adds this herself. What are those?
Choy bo Other people don't include this.
Add some chicken essence Some salt.
Add some oil. How much oil?
About one cup. The oil makes it so the rice doesn't stick
to the leaf. Add some Five-spice Powder.
How much of that? How much?
Some people don't add this, but I do. Your uncle says that it tastes better with
it. He says it tastes weird without it.
Now we mix it all up, ok? Will you mix it with your hands?
Or with a spatula works too. Ok, you're watching?
Salt. Oil.
5 Season Powder. Add some chicken essence.
Peanuts. Now you mix them up evenly.
Using the spatula to mix this keeps your hands from getting dirty.
How even do you have to mix it? Mix it up evenly!
If it's not even, you have to make it even, because that's better and tastes better.
If you want more peanuts, just add more peanuts. Do you like peanuts?
Some people like it with peanuts. Add a bit more oil...I'm afraid it doesn't
have enough oil. There's not enough oil?
Companies that make this to sell don't use oil.
They don't use oil? They don't add oil, so when it's wrapped up,
it's more dry inside. I do it so there's some oil inside.
So when you unwrap it, the rice doesn't stick to the leaves.
Adding more? Yes, adding a little more peanuts.
It's good. These have been soaking?
Soaking overnight. These have to be soaked overnight.
Cold water? No, hot water.
Soak them in hot water. What are they?
They're bamboo leaves. And these?
These are salt water grass (my literal translation) Cut them in half.
Each one gets half a yoke. See? One side is pointy and the other is not.
What? Like this...see?
Place them so they overlap about one half of a leaf.
Why? So it's wider.
Twist it like this. Twist it so there's a little "foot" at the
end there. Watch your gramma twist it.
Hold the end with your index finger so there's it holds itself together.
Put one peanut at the end first, so when it steams, no rice leaks out.
Put some rice in there. Pork belly.
Egg yolk. Dried shrimp.
Chinese mushrooms. Then cover everything with more rice, and
that's it. Make sure the top is even.
Then twist the leaf down. Put pressure with the hand on the bottom.
Put pressure with both hands. Then twist the end.
And then it's done! Hold it tight from the bottom with one hand
so it doesn't fall apart. Get a blade of salt water grass.
Bite one end. Once...how many times do you wrap it around?
Two... You can wrap it two or three times.
And then what? Tie a knot there.
Tie it tight. Then twist it again.
Loop it once again and tie it. So there's our first Rice in Bamboo Leaf.
Very pretty. Next, we make a few more, depending on how
many you want... Ten, eight...we'll tie them together.
Put it right here. In a tray, so the water doesn't get everywhere.
Just add the ingredients in whatever order you like.
Pork first, or mushrooms, or shrimp...as long as you add them, then it's ok.
There's no first or last. When they're cooked and you open it to eat,
they look the same. What holiday are these for?
The Dragon Boat Festival. Dragon boats.
Oh, the one with dragon boats. Yes, the one with dragon boats.
What dragon boats? Dragon boats -- the May Holiday [5th day of
5th lunar month] That's when we make Sticky Rice in Bamboo
Leaf. You were wondering why we make these?
This is because one of China's ministers, Qu Yuan.
The country was in disarray and he went to ask the Emperor to change course, because
he saw the country heading in a bad direction. The Emperor would not listen to him, so that
day, Qu Yuan committed suicide [in the Miluo River].
On the anniversary of his death, to memorialize, the people were afraid Qu Yuan would be hungry,
so they wrapped rice in bamboo leaf and floated them into the river.
Every year, the people make sticky rice in bamboo leaf.
[Chinese wordplay here...about the twisting of the leaves]
This wordplay/phrase is one way we remember. You should change out of your pajamas...
Your grandson says you should change your clothes.
It's 12:30 in the afternoon! I forgot to talk about the dragon boats.
They paddled the boats quickly to rescue him. Yes, they took the dragon boats out to try
and find him. And they were afraid he would be hungry, so
they wrapped the rice in leaves to float out on the river to him.
What's the name of the river? [Gramma makes a joke here I don't understand]
Now see this... This is an entire bunch. One bunch.
You buy them in bunches? Yes. This is they sell it now.
This is the head -- bigger and lighter in colour.
This is the tail -- darker and skinnier, so it's more brittle.
So you use the head on the heavy part? Yes.
One, two, three, four, five... Ten, exactly ten.
Good! Your gramma's intuition is good.
Ok, so you take ten, or eight of these. Put all their ends together, twirl it around
to tighten it. Then tie the ends together so it becomes one
bunch. When they're done steaming, then we can just
pull them out all at once. And just cut off the end.
The water's boiling -- it's time to put them in.
20 can fit in there? Grampa, there's one more bunch over there.
So you fit all 30 in there and then... ...then we wait for the water to boil.
There's not enough water, we should add more water.
It will take a little more than an hour, because we have to wait for this to re-boil.
See, I drilled two holes in this lid, so the steam can escape when it's closed.
That makes it easier for it the cook through. So, that's it.
Later, I'll use a hook to bring each bunch out.
I'll bring them out and show you. They'll be cooked. We succeeded! We can eat!
I'm taking off the lid... Adding water?
Adding some water because we're going to cook the other bunches over there.
Now we bring them up. Hang them here to dry.
It's ready. Very tasty.
Ok, let's go inside. They're ready to eat.
Grampa! Ready to eat.
Good, they look tasty. So good...
You still didn't change? Why didn't you change clothes today?
I don't know, I didn't want to go out. It's 5pm!
It's almost time to shower before bedtime!