Sushi and Turkey

I wish!

I've been MIA the last few days since there wasn't a whole lot to talk about.  On Saturday we didn't do much of anything all day as the air quality has been rather poor.  It was nice for the four of us to just chill out and play games together.  In the evening we ordered pizza and chicken wings then watched a movie.

On Sunday we dropped the kids at Jessica's place while Tim and I went to Metro for a little shopping.  I needed more blueberries and a few other things.  It was great shopping with just the two of us and Nicholas and Ryan had a lot more fun playing with the boys than they would have with us.  Afterward we went back to hang out for a while and have supper.  Jessica had bought some seaweed and crab so we could try making sushi, something neither of us had done before.  I mixed up the crab (imitation stuff) with mayo, lemon juice and green onion and she spread it and the rice on the seaweed and rolled it up.  It was awesome!  In fact, it was so good I was still thinking about it last night when I went to bed and wishing I had some more.

Today I had to make a last minute trip to the fabric market and since I really didn't want to take the boys, Sue offered to look after them for a bit.  I finished my fabric shopping quickly and decided to look around the second building of Nan Er for some nuts and dried fruit.  I walked and walked but never ended up buying anything.  Today, for some reason, the stares from the locals were getting to me and I couldn't get out of the building fast enough.  Since Tian Ye had to run an errand while I shopped I decided to walk down Taiyuan Jie, the pedestrian shopping street.  I grabbed a lemonade at KFC and had a lovely stroll.  Eventually I called him to come pick me up at Somerset and while I waited for him a Chinese girl walked over and asked me what time it was.  I told her and she tried to speak to me in broken English while I used my broken Chinese.  She told me she wanted to be my friend and at that point I was wishing I had just played the "I don't speak Chinese" card.  It was very sweet of her but I have plenty of friends right now and don't feel like trying to teach someone to speak English, which is what she was looking for.  As politely as I could I told her I didn't have time and just then Tian Ye pulled up.  Perfect timing!  I told her in Chinese that it was nice to meet her and beat it out of there.

My next stop was Ole for some hamburger and hopefully ingredients to make my own sushi.  I couldn't find seaweed or crab (real or imitation) but what I did find surprised me.  It was a beautiful, frozen turkey!  About twelve pounds.  Actually there were three of them.  I took a look at the price and called Tim, who's the one that really misses  a nice turkey dinner.  I asked him how much he really wanted a turkey.  $77 worth?  Yep, that's what this bird was worth.  Well, not to us.  We passed on it.

Lastly I made a quick trip to Riverside garden.  I began by looking in the freezer for some crab and instead saw something else very familiar, a box with a Canadian flag on it.  I pulled it out and thought the picture on it looked like lobster.  Score!  Then I started reading and unfortunately it wasn't lobster, or crab, but something called Arctic Surf Clams.  I had never heard of these things.  I looked more closely and saw that the clams were a product of Clearwater in Bedford, just one hour from where I'm from.  Pretty cool.  I checked the price and since it wasn't completely ridiculous (like the turkey) I bought them thinking that perhaps I could cut them up and use them in my sushi.  I continued to look around and also found imitation crab.  I was ready to buy it until I started reading the ingredients (I have an awful habit of doing that now) and quickly changed my mind.  I did find canned crab meat and figured that should be good mixed with mayo so I bought it along with some seaweed.  They didn't have the nice big pieces that Jessica had found but very tiny ones which I decided would do fine.  Wrong!

When I got home I enlisted the boys to help me with the sushi, a nice project for the three of us to do together.  Ryan wasn't interested but Nick didn't mind getting his hands dirty.  I made some sticky rice, mixed up the canned crab with mayo and decided to do some tuna as well.  We took out the tiny pieces of seaweed and began by spreading the rice on it.  On large pieces this is easy but not on these ones.  It was tedious.  Next came the topping.  I did the crab while Nicholas did the tuna.  We ended up with a little too much since when we rolled them most of the good stuff came out the sides.  What a mess.  I tasted mine and cringed a little, canned crab is definitely not as tasty as imitation crab.  Nicholas gave his a try and loved it.  He ate most of the rolls he made then Ryan got in on the tasting.  He liked the tuna as well but both of them didn't care for the crab.  I managed to save a few for Tim to try and again, the tuna was a hit while the crab was a bust.  Too bad I bought three cans of it.  Hopefully I can find another use.

So, my first attempt at sushi didn't go so well.  Perhaps I'll try again, maybe not.  Right now I don't really feel like eating it anymore.

Tomorrow the kids and I are headed out to an open house for a new English language school here.  Nicholas is set to go to the Shenyang International School in August but I thought we would check this place out anyway.  I'm not sure they actually have a building yet as the open house is at one of the housing complexes, but we will get the full story tomorrow.  In the meantime we will get to check out one of the other expat areas.

I have resumed my Chinese lessons and will have another tomorrow afternoon.  I haven't studied at all although the intention was there.  The week just seems to fly by and before I know it Tuesday is here again.

So that's it for now.  I hope everyone is well.  Drop me a note if you feel like it.