A Cozy New Year Dinner

 The Lunar New Year starts this Sunday. You can celebrate the Year Of The Rabbit in a fancy restaurant but a smaller homemade meal is perfect too. There are many easy dishes  that both Asian and non Asian home chefs can try. It's just a fun day to experiment,

You could try Genvieve's Ko's wontons if you're adventurous. Ms. KO gave the recipe for them and wonton soup in wednesday's New York Times Food section. She gave them the traditional Hong Kong filling of shrimp and pork. They can also be filled with crab or chicken too. Keep in mind that making the wontons are easy (it's a basic pasta recipe) but then cutting them and filling them is another story. They have to be filled and sealed assembly line style and that involves another set of hands.Chow mein is an easier cook and you can have fun adding the ingredients you want.It's usually made with rice but you can add crispy noodles for crunch.It's just frying them up in canola oil until they're golden and crispy. These are set aside after cooking. It's then adding mushrooms and bok choy  and cooking until the bok choy is wilted. Add a sauce comprised of oyster and soy sauces, spiked with ginger and sriracha sauce (you can omit the sriracha if it's too fiery). Everything is then mixed together and  served. 

A truly delcious meal and one that's a snap to create is the Szechuan ants climbing a tree or ma yi shang shu. This is cooked glass noodles (which resemble vermicelli) ar e first boiled and then cooked with any kind of meat. I usually use Gardeins crumbles mixed with chopped or sliced scallions and soy sauce for flavoring. These are cooked first until the crumbles are crispy . The noodles are then added .The original recipe calls for ground pork but you could add ground beef or chicken.It's first cooking minced ginger and oil and then adding a fermented bean paste for heat. The chicken or pork is  added and fried until done. There's also a  sauce of chicken stock, mixed with light and dark soy sauce. The scallions and noodles are added to this and it's mixed with the meat. I find this to be too saucy and a bit too fiery. The soy sauce works for me and it doesn't overpower the crumbles and scallions flavors. What to serve for dessert? The Chinese usually have a plate of oranges since the Chinese word for orange is the same for gold. You also could try an easy almond gelatin which is just gelatin cooked with almond flavoring and sugar.

Celebrate the Year of The Rabbit with a simple home cooked meal. It's a nice way to bring in the New Year with good food. These are meals easy to make  but complex with flavors.