A particular variety of the hot pot a Chinese dish in which vegetable, meets, seafood and other item are boiled in a large pot in the table, has became very popular in Taipei recently: spicy pepper pot. Restaurants have responded by introducing many special new flavors and other variation to the traditional hot pot format.
Just seeing the words “spicy” and “peppery” we know that his kind of hot pot must come from the Chinese province of Sichuan. According to historical materials, as early as Emperor Tao Kuan of the Ching Dynasty, people in the province of Sichuan were already avidly consuming spicy pepper hot pot, particularly in the areas around the Yangtze River and the city of Chungching. The earliest versions of hot pot were available on the city from roaming vendors. For the hot pot , beef organs were washed and clean and cut into small pieces. A pot full of hot pepper soup boiled on the top of a charcoal fire inside a clay stove. Customers would drop their sliced beef innards into the hot pepper soup and then eat them right there on the road side. Later, a Chungching restaurant moved this street-side affair into a shop and provided each proton with his own copper pot for boiling and dipping sauces. Spicy pepper hot-pot shops caught on quickly and the popularity of this dish has extended down to this day.
The traveler who happens on the back roads of Burgundy in eastern France will notice a certain amount of festivity during the late summer season of each year. It is after all a time of celebration, a time when cries of joy can be heard rising from the fields. It is the time of a vendage, the annual grape harvest where the first step in producing a premium wine is the picking of the sweet, juicy clusters of vine-ripened grapes. Even though the cutting off of clusters of grapes in a position which is far from ideal for the back, and hauling heavy baskets along between the rows is not exactly a restful occupation, the pickng of the grapes throughout Burgundy is a time-honored tradition.
Here, in contrast to many other wine-producing regions, there are no mechanical grape-picking machines. Everything is done by hand. Many of the pickers are students, retired people, or travelers, and a good portion have been coming to Burgundy for years-especially for the harvest. “I would not miss the grape harvest for anything,” says one retired worker, “I have been picking grapes for the same family for more than 20 years. Not only does this give me a chance to see friends, I also feel a sense of loyalty toward the family.
The Island of Taiwan is blessed with abundant fish resources. Each winter, large school of mullet fish follows warm currents to the south in other to spawn, providing high income to the villagers along the southern Taiwan coast. Full-grown mullet fish are about a foot long in length, and each part of the fish’s body ha economic value. The meet, which is rich and tender, is good in rice-noodle soup. Its air bladder and tendon contain high level of protein and make for an expensive seasonal dish in seafood restaurants. And its plump, golden-yellow roe, after being preserved, is a long-standing delicacy in Taiwan and a popular gift item during festival and New Year.
In the past, catching mullet fish and preserving their roe was a prevalent profession in the winter month in the fishing villages around Chia Ding Town in southern Taiwan. Because of the popularity of the preserved roe, which always sells out at New Years, and the fact that the mullet-fish catches in southern Taiwan can’t always meet, demand, mullet roe has traditionally been shipped in from North, Central and South America. This is way stores island-wide are able to stock mullet roe year round without running out.
Reassuring traces of an age, admittedly idealize, can still sensed amidst the heavy overlay of recent success stories in agro-industry, food processing, fishing port development, and service infrastructure. There are at least 31 banks, 15 financial and investment houses, 60 insurance companies, and 15 real estate developer in the provincial capitol, Iloilo City – attesting to healthy assets. Ilonggos (pronounced ee-long-gohs), though preferring everyday informality and characterized as highly conservative, are very hospitable and big spenders, too.
One guest thought she was being given an exquisite tray cloth, only to discover the real gift underneath: a trayful of diamonds! A few months ago, a real estate developer cancelled its Saturday sales luncheon because all lots had been sold during Friday night’s extension cocktail-some purchased in cash! International cocks derbies are Iloilo have winnings (and loses) in the millions! Ilonggos culture at its best is both delicate and dazzling.
The effects are apartment in two very old traditions: Jaro’s February Fiesta honoring Our Lady of Candelaria, Patron of western Visayas, with its candle motif and court of lovely lasses; and the marvelous Arevalo Fireworks Festival on the on the Feast of the Holy Child. In 1968, the Dinagyang was introduced every second week of January for the Holy Child (Santo Nino). In tipical Ilonggo flair, the costumes are most spectacular traditional undok-undok, uroykoy, dinapay and sinulog dances are executed with verve on the main streets.
In the olden days dating back only to the last century, seeds were used by goldsmiths to measure a quality of gold. This has been the most fundamental of known system of weights based upon the weight of seeds. In particular, the saga (Adenanthera pavonina) seeds found in tropical Asia were used as a measure for gold, and small units of gold are still referred to as saga. Because of the prestige of the renowned saga seeds for their durability, reliable and stability, our first Made-in-Malaysia car has been given the name Proton saga.
Seeds stored in the germplasm or seed bank as generic resources for the future generation have been described as a treasure far more valuable to mankind than all the hoards of gold, precious stones and other material wealth in the world. This is because agriculturist general and seed technologist in particular believe food (seed) holds the key to a better world and plant breeders are busy developing even more productive seeds to help the meet the challenge of food production for the future. Man’s exploitation of plants in agriculture depends upon seeds. Despite in the modern technology there exist the threat of worldwide poverty and also hunger.
Snow feeds glacier in the same way that rain feeds the rivers. For glaciers are frozen rivers – following, creeping, draining, tumbling off the mountains, wherever temperatures are low enough to keep the snow frozen throughout the year. They are driven by gravity, down the slopes, off and away from their mountain origins and their careless movement accounts of most of the complex variety of shapes and patterns into which they can evolve. So they are much more than just great white barriers; glaciers are active components of the landscape, powerful, just little mysterious and often very beautiful.
Where snow fall accumulates on a massive scale, great ice sheets can build up – with the two largest blanketing the central parts of Antarctica and Greenland. These are among the world’s most desolate environments, with flat or gently rolling white surfaces reaching to and beyond every horizon. The ice begins to develop more character where it flows as glaciers, down the slopes and away from the ice sheets. The scale can be tremendous; there are glaciers over 100km long in Antarctica, and the longest glacier outside the polar regions is one just 75 km long in the Karakoram mountains of Pakistan and that was very beautiful.
Despite Taiwan’s long-term political isolation from the international community, the people of Taiwan have still been able to make contributions to the betterment of people around the world. This is due to the desire of the people on Taiwan to reach out to others in friendship and solidarity. Several examples illustrate this situation.
One of the international relief organization that’s been active in Taiwan is the Christian Children’s Fund (CCF). Originally here to provide relief services for Taiwan’s people, because of rising prosperity, in 1985 the Taiwan branch of CCF began using funds collected in Taiwan for relief operations elsewhere. The organization provides relief for needy children. In addition to sponsoring Chinese children, the foundation began sponsoring foreign children in 1987
Twenty thousand people in Taiwan sponsor children. Each contributor NT$1,000 a month. CCF also has eight thousand foreign sponsors who give NT$600 each month.
Most people in Taiwan prefer to sponsor Chinese children. However, due to the limited number of Taiwanese children, people must wait up to three or four months for s suitable candidate. The Chinese Children’s Fund, therefore, encourages Taiwanese people to consider sponsoring foreign children. The number of people sponsoring foreign children in Taiwan has grown in recent years.
An act of kindness may loom no larger than a pebble in a pile of rocks, but its effect may ultimately change an entire world. It is interesting to reflect that such a pebble – cast by Kuwait a hundred years ago when it gave shelter to the Al-Saud family – was to be repaid by such a solid rock of support earlier this year.
This September celebrates the 59th Saudi National Day. This year of 1991 also marks the 100th anniversary of the expulsion of the Amir Abdulrahman Al-Saud and his family from Riyadh into exile in Kuwait. Among the exiles was the Amir’s ten-year old son, Abdul Aziz, who vowed that he would one day reclaim his family’s lands.
That he did so is both a matter of history and legend. His successful storming of Musmak Fort in 1902 with just a small band of like-minded warriors was to set Abdul Aziz on the path to glory, not only for himself but for what was to become a great Arab nation – Saudi Arabia.
In the years which followed, the young warrior mellowed into the great statesman. Under his guidance a programmed of restoration, consolidation and modernization, consolidation and modernization molded the formerly disparate territories into a united whole – culminating in a new nation, born in 1932, embracing most of the Arab Peninsula, with Riyadh as its capital.
They called the lime-green concoction of gelatin, whipped cream, buko (young coconut) and pandan leaf essence, Claude’s Dream. I thought the name primarily had to do with the light, cloud-like consistency of the dessert. And the man it was named after was not necessarily its creator. I learned otherwise, and by accident too. But that is getting ahead of my story.
It all began as an observation. “You have this passion for food. You must like to eat and cook”. That was enough for Claude Tayag (painter, sculptor, and furniture-designer) to invite me to his house for lunch. “At the rate I carry on about food, people will soon overlook my being an artist, for my cooking. But, I will cook for you. Bring your friends,” he said grandly, a grin spreading across his face. It was then I thought of inviting Claude, in turn, to contribute a recipe for the magazines. The planned lunch evolved into a plan pictorial in Angeles, a city in the province of Pampanga, about an hour and a half drive northwards from Manila.
“My house still unfinished but it is fine to live. You must excuse the mess,” Claude warned, when he confirmed our lunch date.
Hualien, the largest city among the east coast of Taiwan, is a popular leisure resort. Although the city is prevented from becoming a major economic area because of geographic considerations, Hualien still has the potential to become the premier city of eastern Taiwan.
Along with wonderful natural scenery and an active tourist industry, Hualien has the richest mineral supplies in Taiwan, including marble, various crystal rocks, limestone, dolomite, serpentine, tale, asbestos, soft jade, feldspar, mica and quartz. All of this minerals are important building minerals and for crafts and jewelry.
Hualien’s marble is particularly famous in Taiwan, and Hualien is the island’s center for craft’s made from marble. Marble quarries are located all along the East-West Cross-Island Highways and at the tunnel of Mine Turns. The A-la-May area, which is located to the west of the city Yu Lee in center Hualien County, has a marble quarry that extends over an area of 40 square kilometers. The areas of Herping and Hershan are also rich in marble.
The color of Hualien marble ranges light grey, grey and green-grey to black. The color of serpentine ranges from light to dark green. But regardless of the color, uniform quality and bright luster are the signature characteristics of Hualien marble.