Dim and then sum

Hav­ing grown up in a fam­ily that refused to stay put, I’ve spent much of my adult life try­ing to put down roots. I found them in an instant when I walked into Toronto’s feisty, colour­ful and inim­itable Kens­ing­ton Mar­ket one sunny day in the late 1970s and knew imme­di­ately that this was home. Its eth­nic mix, Jew­ish his­tory and cheaply cheer­ful warmth proved irre­sistible and I lived hap­pily in the heart of this won­der­ful place for more than 25 years, nearly all of them in the same house on Augusta Ave. fac­ing a lively park.

Once you’re con­sid­ered part of the Kens­ing­ton fam­ily, there’s no look­ing back. A foodie through and through, I was in the right ‘nabe to pur­sue my passion.

Munch­ing a fresh-from-the-oven Por­tuguese bun with but­ter at break­fast; sip­ping a frothy cap­puc­cino nes­tled at win­dow seat at tiny Casa Acore­ana mid-morning and dim sum at least once a week at Bright Pearl Seafood Restau­rant all became rituals.

I love dim sum at Bright Pearl partly for the food — my favourites are shrimp and beef dumplings, lit­tle pork or beef ribs laced in black bean sauce, bok choy in oys­ter sauce and the won­drous deep-fried squid ten­ta­cles — but mainly for the way it’s deliv­ered to the table on trol­leys by Asian women who’ve come to know me and with whom I com­mu­ni­cate by point­ing at what­ever steam­ing offer­ings I want.

But there’s another rea­son I love Bright Pearl, located at 346–348 Spad­ina near St. Andrew. Every Chi­nese New Year, owner Stephen Chan and maven-of-all-things Chi­nese Valerie Mah host a superb ban­quet to raise money for TEOF, a non-profit group that pro­vides nutri­tious snacks to schoolchildren.

Those ban­quets are noisy and some­what chaotic with raf­fles and auc­tions throught the meal. But the food is always great.

So what a plea­sure it was to attend the 10th anniver­sary at this upstairs eatery this sum­mer fea­tur­ing a high-end, no-holds-barred, multi-course Chi­nese menu the likes of which I’ve never eaten.

It kicked off with a bar­be­cued pork and jel­ly­fish plat­ter that was sen­sa­tional. Also amaz­ing was crispy chicken stuffed with sticky rice that was served whole and sliced at the table. A dish of lob­ster with gin­ger and scal­lions was out of this world. Like­wise for chicken soup laced with gin­seng and pieces of conch.

I love it when this restau­rant cel­e­brates. Gath­ered at a round table, my co-diners and I always have lots of fun. And so what if the con­ver­sa­tion is mostly about the deli­cious food. If I feel like din­ing here while read­ing the paper in the mid­dle of the after­noon, dim sum deliv­ered to my table per­fectly fits the bill.

Here’s a favourite dish I like to order in Chi­nese noodle/BBQ houses.

Steeped Steamed Chicken

3 cups Chi­nese cook­ing wine

About 10 cups water

6 green onions, cut in pieces

10 gar­lic cloves, crushed

¾ cup sliced fresh gin­ger root

2 tbsp kosher or sea salt

About 4-lb/2 kg chicken

Place all ingre­di­ents except chicken in large stock­pot (at least 8-litre size). Bring to boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low; sim­mer, uncov­ered, about 15 minutes.

Lower chicken gen­tly into broth, breast side down, and com­pletely sub­merge. Over high heat, return broth to boil. Lower heat so broth barely sim­mers with occa­sional bub­bles pop­ping up at inter­vals for 15 min­utes. Remove stock­pot from stove; let chicken sit in broth for 3 hours.

Using tongs, gen­tly trans­fer chicken to large bowl being care­ful not to break skin. Cool to room temperature.

Mean­while, strain broth. Freeze or store in fridge to use as a base for Asian or other soups.

To serve chicken, cut in pieces with kitchen shears. Gar­nish with Gin­ger Scal­lion Sauce or serve it on the side.

Makes about 4 servings.

Gin­ger Scal­lion Sauce

This is more of a condi­ment than a sauce (scal­lions are green onions) and is fab­u­lously pun­gent. Store left­overs in air­tight con­tainer in fridge. Any veg­etable oil except olive oil will do. I use my small food proces­sor for this.

1 cup chopped fresh gin­ger root

1½ tbsp kosher or coarse sea salt

1½ cups chopped green onions (about 12)

1 cup peanut or other veg­etable oil

With mor­tar and pes­tle or in food proces­sor, grind or process gin­ger root and salt to a slightly chunky con­sis­tency. Add green onions; reduce to chunky paste. Trans­fer to heat­proof bowl.

Heat oil in saucepan until very hot and begin­ning to smoke. Pour over ginger/onion mix­ture. Stir to com­bine. Cool.

Makes about 1½ cups.