Ganbatte!

I am a Japan-o-phile, in love with anything and everything Japan. The food, the cute, the cracked up crack, it's all awesome. And especially awesome is the notion of "ganbatte", which means, "Do your best". Spend 15 minutes watching a Japanese drama, anime or variety show, and odds are good that you will hear ganbatte. It's an encouragement if said to someone about to attempt something, and an assurance (to themselves or others) if said by the person about to attempt something.

Ganbatte is such a simple concept, with tones of William Hung's "As long as I do my best, I will have no regrets."

Yes. Do your best, ganbatte, and no regrets. You da man, Mr. Hung. By the way, I just found out he went back to Hong Kong shortly after his Idol 15 minutes and made an honest to goodness movie. Like a real movie, not a youtube video or cheap porn. An actual Hong Kong comedy, with recognizable stars in it. (Dammit, Nancy Sit is a star, despite the younger generation's "Huh? Oh, the mole on the forehead lady.") Of course, I tried to find it on DVD, but have been fruitless thus far. That says something about the quality and popularity of the movie, right?

But back to ganbatte. Sure, it's easy to say "I'll do my best," but of course, one has to ask: Are you really doing your best? How can you know if you are? Can't you always do better, if given more time, more resources?

I think that's actually besides the point. I think the "doing" is what we need to focus on...as long as someone does, attempts, tries, while putting in an effort (best or less than best) then they really should be proud of themselves and not feel any regrets. Because they TRIED. They didn't talk themselves out of something and say "Why bother?" They didn't punk out, they didn't give up, hiding behind a scornful, contemptuous bravado of, "I have better things to do," or "Why waste my time?"

This spirit of tenacity, the courage to try, even if you risk making a fool out of yourself, is admirable and vital. And should be kept alive. Even if you're goofy-looking, tone deaf, delusional and auditioning for Idol. While wearing an Autobot-anteater-panda-cop-costume.

Conwoocious Fail

Oh man, has it been over ten months since my last post? Fail. Epic fail. What can Conwoocious say but "my bad"? But I resolve to post more. The quality will suffer, but dammit, quantity will be maintained. And in this now now now instant gratification world, quantity trumps quality. Tweets, twits, status updates and the like, more more more of stupid stuff. Perfect. I can post stupid inane crap more often. (Not that the previous stuff was not stupid inane crap, just more thought-out inane crap.) So what shall I rant about in this crap post, er, post? How about how much I hate Twitter and status updates on Facebook? And self-absorbed bitter ranty blog posts, for that matter? Too close to home? Too negative? Okay, then, I'll turn this post around and make it positive. Puppies and sunshine positive. Aren't McNuggets wonderful? They're the most wonderful fried chicken parts unknown ever. Especially now that, and I quote Fast Food News or whatever random website that I ran across: "Chicken costs have decreased…allowing for more competitive promotions by fast food restaurants." Cheaper fried bits of chicken parts unknown to dip into tangy cartons of sauce shaped perfectly to accommodate nugget-shaped nuggets? YAYY!!! Life is good. Life is shortened due to clogged arteries, but still good. Fail.

Rice Cooker Adventures: Hotpot in my Rice Pot

I am a “rice bucket” (fan tung, in Cantonese) which means I loves me my rice. So when I moved away from home (albeit temporarily), I knew that in addition to a fridge and microwave, I had to have a rice cooker. I bought a 6 cup version that came with a steaming rack, and knew I would be set.


I decided to challenge myself and see how many different types of dishes I could make with a rice cooker. Actually, this challenge came about because I was too cheap to buy pricey infrared stovetop friendly cookware. Details, schmetails.

After challenging the Steamed Meat Cake, I decided to go for something that’s super popular in Hong Kong: Hotpot, which is basically a boiling cauldron of savory broth that you cook loads of stuff in. A quick search online shows that everyone’s got a particular mix for their broth, ingredients, and dipping sauces, and that it is a very “anything goes” dish -- so me like. I headed off to the supermarket with a hazy idea of needing meat, vegetables and some sort of soup base.

As HK is hotpot-friendly, the supermarket has a section dedicated to hotpot, with pre-chopped vegetables, thinly sliced meat and cleaned seafood, and other things, like mushrooms, fish balls, and fried tofu cubes in neatly saran-wrapped in trays. I opted for pork, which is uber cheap here, and the tofu cubes. I decided to get unchopped veggies, since it was cheaper and gave me more variety to choose from.

I chose baby napa cabbage, which is called wah wah choi, scallions, and enoki mushrooms from Korea, which were half the cost of enoki from Japan. Go figure.

For soup base, I went with a carton of good ol’ Swanson chicken broth. I also bought a couple of packs of Lee Kum Kee concentrated hotpot soup base (pork bone and satay) that you dissolve in boiling water just in case the broth wasn’t enough. I also picked up a bottle of sukiyaki sauce, which you can use to flavor the hotpot broth, or also use as a dipping sauce. In total, I think my hotpot ingredients cost about US$10.

Upon return home, I poured all the chicken broth into the rice cooker, pressed "Cook", and then started adding ingredients. I chopped up half the scallions, cabbage, and mushrooms and tossed them into the pot. Once that came to a boil (about 10 minutes or so), I added half of the tofu cubes and let them absorb the yummy liquid. After a couple of minutes, I started dropping in the meat. Now, you’re supposed to swish-swish, then extract, shabu-shabu style, but I am a paranoid obsessive hypochondriac deathly afraid of salmonella and other germies, so I let the meat cook until the broth came back up to a mad boil. So yes, the meat was a wee bit overcooked. But still quite excellent, especially when dipped in the sweet sukiyaki sauce.

My hotpot experience was quite good. One pot lasts me about three meals (when served with rice or noodles), and the ingredients I bought were enough to cook two hotpots, which translates to six meals. So $10 for six meals is a bargain...and it was a cinch to make, even for a non-cook such as myself. My beloved rice cooker boiled up the pot in record time, and kept things hot for as long as I wanted. My only complaint? You can’t cook rice and hotpot at the same time in a rice cooker! But you can cook noodles and hotpot at the same time...so it’s all good. And it was.