A quick heads up—today’s post is potluck. After you read it, I expect you to bring a comment to share with everyone. Also, I’m doing a double post today, the second in honor of Valentine’s Day. So be sure to scroll down.
If you’re a regular at Blue Kitchen, I figure you either like to cook or are a friend or family member who feels honor bound to visit. Or maybe you’re C.) all of the above. But there are times even those of us who loooove to cook either don’t have the time or the energy or C.) all of the above. What do you do then? Drive through? Pizza? What are your defaults? Your delights? I’ll go first.
For us, if we’re not up to cooking, it’s usually because we’ve worked late or have umpteen things to accomplish after dinner. If that’s the case, we also don’t have the energy or time to go someplace and sit down for a nice relaxing meal. So it’s got to be fast and on the way home. Cheap is good too. Our defaults, driven more by geography and speed than desire, are usually Chipotle or Taco Bell. I know. Shut up.
But then there are the guilty pleasures. We recently rediscovered one: Egg foo yung, those pancakelike deep-fried patties of egg, vegetables and meat or seafood. A longtime staple of rather suspect Chinese American restaurants, they’re often found next to those ersatz Chinese dishes, chop suey and chow mein on the menu. And in St. Louis, they’ve even invented something called the St. Paul Sandwich—an egg foo yung patty on white bread with lettuce, tomatoes, mayo and pickles. So I was stunned to recently discover that egg foo yung is actually based on an authentic Shanghai dish.
Before going any further, I have to say that Marion and I are regulars at more than a couple of restaurants in Chicago’s Chinatown, places where we would probably not be allowed back if we ordered egg foo yung. And we tend to avoid generic food court Chinese food at all costs, in no small measure because the foods they serve tend to feature the same gloppy brown sauce that is a key ingredient of egg foo yung. But there’s something about egg foo yung that transcends national origin to become one of the world’s true comfort foods.
And never was it more comforting than one night a few years ago. In a fit of temporary insanity, we had agreed to our older daughter’s request for a sleepover birthday party with six guests. A total of seven girls, including the birthday girl, who needed all the caffeine and sugar buzz we’d also intelligently provided like a shark needs swim fins. They weren’t being bad, mind you—it was just the perfect storm of noise and energy and gross out humor. Silly me. I thought having daughters, it would be all Barbies and tea parties and I would escape the various bodily function jokes of my own childhood. I’ll wait while my women readers enjoy a good laugh at my naivete about now. That’s okay. I deserve it.
Marion and I were hunkered down in our room, grimly watching Saturday night TV and each privately longing for a tranquilizer dart gun as the party raged on outside our door.
And then we remembered the late night Chinese take-out place not two blocks from our house.
Twenty minutes later, we were sitting in our room with wonderfully satisfying plates of egg foo yung, steamed rice and gloppy brown sauce. I think we must have also had a couple of glasses of some modest white wine. The world was suddenly a better place.
Okay, your turn. What’s your default take-out or delivery? What’s your guilty pleasure? Try to stick with fast and cheap and, if at all possible, greasy this time. I’m sure we’ll talk about fancier options in a future post.
