Rebelling Against the Chinese Way of Eating One Recipe at A Time!

I choose not to eat Chinese food anymore, there are a couple “western style” restaurants with “Chinese type” cooking that I love, but I just can’t do it anymore!  My poor husband eats sub par lunches in the cafeteria (they have no microwave so I can’t pack him a lunch…plus he thinks it may seem rude) while I eat my expensive grilled cheese sandwiches (we totaled it up and a homemade grilled cheese sandwich is about $2.50 US).  Although I am ok with eating the same thing every day for lunch for the rest of my life…it would be nice to have a choice.

Today I made my own bagels and they were actually edible!  I halved the recipe (next time I will try the whole recipe) and I lost track of time while they were in the oven…they didn’t “puff up” like the internet said they would and they are a little overcooked.  Other than that they are really good!!!  I am in a total fight against Chinese food (and before you disagree…they don’t have General Tso’s chicken here…and if they did it would be 1/8 chicken the rest bone and the sauce would be oily and leave a taste that you can’t brush away).  I am so tired of going through the grocery store and not finding staples that all Americans should have in their home (wheat bread, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, pretzels, milk by the gallon, real eggs, baking mixes, all purpose flour, boneless skinless chicken breast, and beef).  After taking a couple day trips to Hong Kong and realizing how easy it is I plan on smuggling groceries on a regular basis.  The only problem is food is more expensive in Hong Kong then it is in America (a bottle of vanilla cost me $15.00 US…but totally worth it).  So to keep my grocery budget at a reasonable level and have foods I like I will be making more things myself.  On Tuesday I went to Hong Kong with a friend for a day (and since we have to carry groceries ourselves through Honk Kong and onto the train we are limited to what we can get).  I bought yeast, unbleached all purpose flour (I couldn’t carry bread flour as well), a bag of pretzels, tortilla chips, salsa, and tortillas.  I made chicken tortilla soup for dinner and bagels for lunch!  I am so glad to finally have salty snacks and carbs (that aren’t from steamed rice) back in my life.