The Dinner Date Of The Year

Tonight is the eve of Chinese New Year. It is also the night where Chinese all over the world gather in someone's home to have the Reunion Dinner.  It is a family thing. This means if you don't have a family to reunite with, you're screwed. Most eating places are closed. Most businesses are closed. Except McDonalds and 7-Eleven.

Every year my family has the Reunion Dinner at my mother-in-law's home except for one year when my husband wanted it held at my home. It was a huge mistake because we spent the whole night cleaning up after.

This is the first dish for tonight's Reunion Dinner. It is a salad. But trust the Chinese to make a salad into a lion dance.

This is the salad with all the dressing (peanut sauce with peanuts) and crisps on it.

Here everyone arms himself with a pair of chopsticks and we toss the salad, the higher the better. Of course it could mean a messy table afterwards. This ritual is to wish for good luck or whatever you want. I wish for better sales and that my children will be happy.

 

 What else did we eat? Fried drumlets.

Fried prawn fritters and white rice. There were other dishes like 2 fishes (double happiness or something?) roast pork and green vegetables. But we never eat them.

We also come back feeling ill because of the oiliness, high salt and MSG. Then we spend the rest of the night drinking water.

 

This is no ordinary pomelo. It has the power to ward off evil spirits or something. My mother-in-law goes berserk if you do not obey her instructions to place it on the dining table. So here it is on the dining table. The 2 hongbao (red packets), I received tonight. It contains $28 each. (another lucky number) I received them from my mother-in-law and aunt-in-law. These are the only 2 hongbao I will get because my mother does not give me any. She's too cheap. Okay, she has 9 living children and that's a lot of money to give away.

This is a portable mahjong set which I bought recently for my children. My kids love to play mahjong and since my husband lent our mahjong table and set to his best friend (that was 5 years ago), we had been playing with the paper set. Somehow, mahjong doesn't feel right with paper.

Later tonight the four of us will play a few rounds or until one of the kids cry.

So to everyone, I hope you ate with your family tonight.