{"id":657,"date":"2012-01-31T15:07:46","date_gmt":"2012-01-31T14:07:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/eurotalk.com\/blog\/?p=657"},"modified":"2012-01-31T15:07:46","modified_gmt":"2012-01-31T14:07:46","slug":"dinner-starts-with-family","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/dinner-starts-with-family\/","title":{"rendered":"Dinner starts with family"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>For most people, \u2018Chinese food\u2019 would represent the customary weekend or end-of-the-month takeaway, which could include chicken fried rice, spring rolls or even barbeque spare ribs. It is a fact \u2013 little known as it may be \u2013 that many Chinese families do not eat these dishes on a regular basis.\u00a0 Most of them are probably cooking meals like these daily and are sick of it! \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/eurotalk.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Chinese-food.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-659 alignright\" title=\"Chinese family\" src=\"https:\/\/eurotalk.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/01\/Chinese-food-300x200.jpg\" alt=\"A family enjoying dinner together\" width=\"300\" height=\"200\" \/><\/a>Ever since I was young, my parents have stressed the importance of traditional Chinese cuisine, and as chefs, they know it\u2019s all about the flavour. Dinner is the most important meal, as this is the time when all the family sits down to eat.<\/p>\n<p>The main \u2018ingredient\u2019 to a usual family dinner is steamed rice or \u2018f\u0101n\u2019\u2013 always white long grain rice, never wholemeal or pre-boiled, and it is always cooked in a rice cooker. \u00a0Each person at the table has their own bowl of rice and they each pick some \u2018s\u016bng\u2019 &#8211; dishes that are laid out in the middle, so everyone can have a bit of everything.\u00a0 \u2018S\u016bng\u2019 can be things such as steamed fish with ginger and spring onions, cured meats or mixed leafy green vegetables with oyster sauce.\u00a0My father does most of the cooking so he sometimes creates his own dishes, such as stir-fried tofu with pork and sweetcorn or marinated chicken wings.<\/p>\n<p>The number of dishes available varies to cater for however many people are at the table, and dinnertime is only over when all of the dishes are eaten \u2013 it is sometimes a tough job but it has to be done!<\/p>\n<p>Since living in London, I have tried a number of different cuisines, such as Greek, Lebanese and Japanese, but nothing seems to fill in the gap of a family dinner. \u00a0Regardless of whether it is Chinese New Year or even just to celebrate the fact that it\u2019s Sunday, I have been unable to indulge in the comforts of a close-knit family dinner as often as I would like to and the idea of resorting to a takeaway, just to fill the void, seems like a somewhat empty substitute.<\/p>\n<p>Has the family dinner gone out of fashion or to some people, is there no place like home?<\/p>\n<p>Katie<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For most people, \u2018Chinese food\u2019 would represent the customary weekend or end-of-the-month takeaway, which could include chicken fried rice, spring rolls or even barbeque spare ribs. It is a fact \u2013 little known as it may be \u2013 that many Chinese families do not eat these dishes on a regular basis.\u00a0 Most of them are &#8230; <a title=\"Dinner starts with family\" class=\"read-more\" href=\"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/dinner-starts-with-family\/\" aria-label=\"More on Dinner starts with family\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[76,175,176,78,177,172],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=657"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/657\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=657"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=657"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/utalk.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=657"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}