Dim sum brunch - Sept. 6, 2008 - Low Down Dirty Grub Club

Greetings from New York City. We had a fabulous event today, our very first. Today's theme was dim sum and it went very well, considering the nasty weather we endured.

Mira and I met up at my apartment, and immediately hit it off. We had planned to shop in Manhattan's Chinatown today before the brunch, make a few specialties, and serve our guests. Before we left for the shopping, we made tea eggs, which take three hours or so to cook on the back of the stove. We also looked over the hallway in my building, which is a common area and would be the 'front of house' for our restaurant, to decide how to fix it up. I had already put two low tables in the hall, along with an area rug, to serve as our dining area.

We took the train and got off at Canal Street and walked over to New Kam Man to purchase a half of roast duck and some raw tripe for later cooking. Instead, we ended up buying the half duck and cooked tripe (listed in the butcher area as 'pig stomach'), as well as some lotus root and other items. Then we walked over to Mandarin Court and bought steamed roast pork buns, right after stopping into Ten Ren for some 'Eight Treasure Tea' in foil packets. Finally we bought two flavors of ice cream at the Chinatown Ice Cream Factory. We ended up stopping to buy some baby bok choy at the local farmers market and came back to my place to finish set up.

I had bought several albums of Chinese music from iTunes (please look for my 'Dim Sum Music' iMix on iTunes) and played them through a boombox located in the hallway behind a parasol. Mira cooked up some lotus root and shitake mushroom to go in with the chicken feet.

Our Menu:

Teas- Long Ling Organic and Pai Mu Tan from Modern Tea with Company, a company run by our purveyor/teamistress/member Holly, who could not be here today.

Tea eggs

Pig stomach

Steamed roast pork buns

Crispy Roast Duck

Chicken feet with lotus root and shiitake mushrooms

Chinese barbequed beef (brought by Yiming and her sweetie)

Bok choy with lotus seeds and garlic (cooked by Yiming)

Two ice creams - black sesame and almond cookie.

Wine (brought by Yiming and her sweetie)

Shiu-mai and gyoza (brought by Beena)

Tea-themed goody bags, crated by Holly of Modern Tea with Company

Two of our guests, who were friends of Mira, were Chinese, and they pretty impressed by the spread. We all ended up talking, pigging out, and listening to music. At the end we talked about the next themed meal- it will probably be Japanese-inflected bento.