Friday, May 12, 2006 @10:08 PM
Chinese has rich culture about food, especially the Southern part of China. I love food, in particular Chinese cuisine.
Do you know “touch of heart” (点心)? Yep, that’s one of my favorite Chinese cuisines. “Touch the heart” or more known as Dim Sum is the quintessential Hong Kong and most cities in the Guangdong province eating experience featuring an incredible variety of dumplings, buns, pastries and soups served at breakfast or lunch. Dim sum is usually served with pots of tea and thus referred as yum cha, which literally means drink tea.
Yum cha began dated back to the olden days when travelers on the ancient Silk Road needed a place to take a nap, hence the establishment of teahouses along the roadside. Then rural farmers would also go to teahouses for afternoon tea after working hard in the fields. Teahouses subsequently became popular. In the beginning, some believed that the combination of tea with food would lead to excessive weight gain. However, it was found out that tea aids in digestion. Therefore teahouse owners started in adding more variety of snacks, which led to how the tradition of dim sum was evolved.
In Hong Kong, it is a tradition for the elderly to gather to eat dim sum after morning exercises. These folks often like to enjoy their morning newspapers there too. For many southerners in China or those immigrants emigrated from Southern China to elsewhere, yum cha is often treated as a weekend family day.
As far as I could recall, my family loves to go for dim sum, even since I was really little. That was the time I was introduced to the world of yummy food. My family has a habit of going for dim sum almost every week, as a family event, well sort of. When I was a lot younger, I only went for the delicious food. After I left home, I began to really miss the family weekly yum cha event. I frequently visited the Chinatown in Country B while I was there. Once in a while when I had this strong craving for dim sum, I would go to one of the Hong Kong dim sum restaurants with a couple of friends or with my sister.
I really love yum cha, not only for the sake of a wide spectrum of choices, from sweet to salty from meat, vegetables, seafood and fruit, served in a small basket or on a small dish. I realize going for dim sum is providing a great opportunity to sit down and have some relaxing moment, in solitude or with a bunch of people. I love the moments having yum cha with my family. I enjoy going yum cha with a couple of friends and chit chatting there; close friends or friends of general acquaintances. It is strange to discover that by just going to the same place for yum cha, but with different groups of people (family versus different category of friends) can generate different atmosphere yet they are all happy jolly moments.
Great, I’ve been really craving for yum cha since I got back from my conference trip. I really miss it although I just had one not long ago during the trip. Oh by the way, I would never forget all the funny scenes during that yum cha. Perhaps what I miss more is the fabulous of the companionship of him in that yum cha restaurant? Ah, no wonder it is known as "touch the heart"!
