Pork and eggs with cellophane noodles over brown rice.

Somehow, as if by magic, weeks have gone by since I’ve made a dinner worth posting here. Dinner tonight is really no exception but decided to document it anyway.

I know: this doesn’t look like much. I came up with it while I sat at my desk working and craving completely different things — pancakes and eggs, fish curry, possibly a burrito — but knowing that I hadn’t done a shop in awhile and didn’t really feel like doing one tonight. So I worked with what I had: ground pork, eggs and the usual assortment of dry goods, including cellophane noodles and dried shrimp, which give this dish a nice umami flavor. It’s finished with a drizzle of toasted sesame oil that lingers towards the end of the bite. It reminds me of several Cantonese dishes I grew up eating, so I’d classify this as comfort food.

Another old favorite, “Ants Climbing A Tree (Bean Thread Noodles with Minced Meat) (Ma Yi Shang Shu)” from Fuchsia Dunlop’s Land of Plenty. Eaten over zakkoku mai, Japanese short grain rice with mixed grains.

“Pock-Marked Mother Chen’s Bean Curd (Ma Po Dou Fu)” from Fuchsia Dunlop’s Land of Plenty.

One of my favorite things to eat, although also a dish I haven’t made in months. In fact, the last (recorded) time I made mapo tofu was in February. But I’ve been craving it for awhile and — though it’s not quite winter or even cold yet — after the rediscovery of my super secret (read: forgotten) stash of pork in the freezer, I realized that all signs pointed east. Or west? Maybe north — you could go over the North Pole. However you do it, get yourself to the Sichuan province. Mapo tofu is one such way.

Lemon-thyme rubbed pork chop with spinach-walnut pesto. Very adjusted version of “Mustard-Roasted Potatoes” from Smitten Kitchen. Brussels sprouts with pancetta.

Spice-rubbed pork chop with Brussels sprouts and roasted potatoes.

Meat and potatoes. Brussels sprouts with pancetta. Double plus porky!

Pork chop with herbed potatoes and green beans with shallots and mustard.

Fried rice with cha siu (Chinese roast pork).

I keep cha siu in the freezer for when I’m not feeling “that hungry” and therefore I don’t feel committed to making dinner. But I don’t want to skip it either. Fried rice is perfect on evenings like this.

My only rule for making fried rice is “don’t use fresh rice.” It’s too wet. Aside from the pork, this rice had egg, garlic, scallion and peas.

Stir-fried rice cakes with pork and broccoli.

“Chengdu Wontons” and “Green Beans Stir-Fried with Chili” from Ken Hom’s The Taste of China.

I can’t begin to tell you how good dinner was tonight. Wontons — especially when they’re homemade — are wonderful but these reached a new level for me. They have an all-pork filling that’s mixed with sesame oil and ground Sichuan peppercorns. The dipping sauce is vinegary (Chinkiang), spicy (chili oil), sweet and slightly thick from the dark soy sauce. The wontons can absolutely stand on their own but coupled with that sauce — !

And the green beans were also quite good!

Hom calls for 30 to 35 wonton wrappers, each containing about a teaspoon of filling. I ended up making 51 wontons using a measured scant teaspoon of filling, which is really the perfect amount for the way I fold them. Also, I should note that I substituted an equal amount of freshly ground Sichuan peppercorns for the black pepper that the recipe called for. Incredible. One of my smartest substitutions to date.

“Stir-Fried Peppers with Black Beans and Garlic” from Fuchsia Dunlop’s Revolutionary Chinese Cookbook. “Stir-Fried Pork and Leeks” from Gloria Bley Miller’s The Thousand Recipe Chinese Cookbook.

Another Thousand Recipe dish. Miller didn’t really hit it out of the park with this one but that’s often my expectation when I cook from this book, which begs the question, “Why cook from it at all?”

In part, I began documenting my dinners as an extension of learning to cook homestyle Chinese and Japanese food, which grew out of the desire to have paid attention as a little girl when my grandmother tired to teach me little bits about Cantonese cooking. So I look for ways of learning more in many places — including books that are generally relegated to the “Reference Only” shelf. Part of my learning process has always included learning what doesn’t work, understanding why something is about to fail and figuring out ways to save it. In that respect, Thousand Recipe has been slightly valuable.

(Not to say that it’s a terrible cookbook or anything — it’s not. There are simply much better ones.)