Good Buy At Chinatown, San Francisco

Do you know that Chinatown in SFO is the largest Chinatown in the world outside of Asia?

Some of the stuff I bought this noontime in Chinatown:

1. Sesame Sauce- I have not tried using this, but in the Chinese Recipe Book that I borrowed from our North Beach Library, this is an essential spice in traditional Chinese cooking. So I bought this!

Last week, I purchased plum sauce and hoisin sauce. I tried using them with the stir fried vegetables I cooked and husband loved it! He said the taste was very good- he didn't even have to go look for meat in it. According to him, it was so tasty!

When cooking vegetables, I seldom use meat. These days, upon seeing and tasting the veggies at the Chinatown restaraunt we like, Yee's, I noticed that they use big fish like sole fish for the stir fried veggies. I tried it and it is delicious! Try it!

2. Spicy Cracked Beans - this is a very crunchy and very spicy snack! Great with beer, soda or any cocktail drink- with alcohol or virgin drinks. It is only 99 cents but in the groceries and supermart it is thrice the price. I love shopping in Chinatown. Cost of commodities are reasonable plus poultry, fish, seafoods, fruits and veggies are fresh!

3. Brown Mushroom- for stir fry cooking. This is $2.49 a pound. This has a peculiar taste more than the white mushroom. I cook this with oyster sauce. First I fry the garlic then I pour the mushroom, add a bit of water and chili powder the presto- it's yummy!

4. Enoki mushroom- This mushroom is eaten as a variety mix in garden salad. I learned to it this when I was posted in Tokyo, Japan in winter 1992. This is priced for 99 cents a pound.

5. Crab mushroom- this is my first time to see this musroom. They are $1.40 a pound! I learned to eat raw mushrooms here in the USA. I only associated eating raw mushroom if they are small like the Enoki mushroom above. This should taste good as well. Happy cooking!


BTW, thanks to TITO and CELIA for making an overseas call to me tonight. Ciao!