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The Laughing Buddha – A Hotei Statue For Bartenders – Is A Patron Saint?

I’d seen a Hotei Statue many years before I ever knew who or what it meant. When I was a young boy I would frequently get dropped off at grandma’s house for baby sitting and since her husband had served in WWII for the Navy in the battles for Japan he became familiar with Japanese culture and art; and thus brought back several Large Laughing Buddha Statues to decorate his home with. They were gold leafed and very pretty. At that time I was unfamiliar with who Buddha was and just looked at them as silly decorations.

I think my second encounter with seeing a Hotei Statue was as a preteen, at the age of 13 years, when I was at a Chinese food restaurant my parents loved to frequent. Once again, I never paid the laughing Buddha Statue any attention and just figured it was a cultural decorative piece. Continue reading “The Laughing Buddha – A Hotei Statue For Bartenders – Is A Patron Saint?”

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MSG and Acne

MSG is a food additive that has been highly publicized to produce harmful effects like nausea and dizziness when consumed.  For this reason, the general public plays it safe and tries to avoid products that include MSG whenever possible. But what you probably don’t know is that MSG is hidden inside almost every single processed, packaged, canned, or frozen food you can think of – just labeled under secret names so we won’t know its there!  The truth is that we are all consuming massive amounts of MSG every day. So how harmful is MSG really, and can its consumption contribute to acne? Continue reading “MSG and Acne”

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Quitting Smoking And Extreme Anxiety

In my 15 years assisting clients to quit smoking, occasionally I have seen a response that was confusing. It happened to a few people who don’t normally suffer from anxiety.

In these cases their anxiety was overwhelming, causing them to feel so bad they couldn’t work or barely hold a conversation. When I dug into this problem I found what is referred to as a glutamate storm.

The extreme form is common in head injuries and stroke, but a lesser storm can be seen in some individuals when nicotine is suddenly withdrawn from their brain. Continue reading “Quitting Smoking And Extreme Anxiety”

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Seasoning Your Cast Iron Wok With Pork Fat & Chinese Chives

I’ve cooked having a wok for lots of years but never bought a cast iron wok till just recently. I’ve frequently employed carbon steel and have been content with that. The wok above I bought as a kit from wokshop.com. It’s a 14 inch cast iron wok and also the kit included, a metal spatula, wok ring, lid, and bamboo cleaning brush.

This wok is currently proving itself to be an indispensable piece of cookware in my house.

A couple of months ago I came across a book known as The Breath of your Wok by Grace Young and Alan Richardson, suddenly I was amazed by a cuisine that I believed I previously knew so a great deal about. The Chinese talk about “Wok Hay” which translates into “The Breath of your Wok”. This refers for the fantastic flavor that’s infused into food by a properly seasoned wok. If you’ve ever wondered why you couldn’t accomplish the flavors you locate at your favorite Chinese restaurant at dwelling, you most likely ought to think about the pan or wok you’re stir frying in, and whether or not it can be effectively seasoned. Continue reading “Seasoning Your Cast Iron Wok With Pork Fat & Chinese Chives”

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Five Secrets In Dating Chinese Women – How to Win Her Heart

If lovely Oriental ladies are your type, then dating Chinese women is a great way to meet the girl of your dreams. Not only are they beautiful, they also have with them a very interesting culture to match. Whether you like a shy, brown-eyed girl at your favorite Chinese restaurant or the stunning and sexy Chinese partner at your firm, you will need to know these secrets to dating Oriental beauties:

1. Become interested in Oriental culture.

This is the first secret to dating Chinese women and ladies from sensual Asia. Show her your interest in their culture, tradition, food, religion and all their ways. You can start by going to places rich in their culture and tradition. You are sure to meet a lovely lady who will capture your heart. These people are very much into their culture. They have great respect for their history and are passionate about their culture. Immersing yourself is how you can find good-quality Chinese women to date. Continue reading “Five Secrets In Dating Chinese Women – How to Win Her Heart”

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Heal Your Emotions With Food

These foods can help you regulate your moods in a natural way.

Sorrow and grief: Reach for cauliflower, turnips and asparagus. These foods resonate with the immunity system, lungs and large intestine organs which in the Chinese medicine system are associated with processing emotional grief.

Asparagus naturally supports healthy bronchial tissues to open up the lungs when grief is causing you to feel like you just cannot take a deep breath. The turnips and cauliflower help to support your immunity system so that the process of living with and healing grief does not leave you vulnerable to developing colds, flu and bacterial infections. It can be challenging enough just dealing with the emotional impact grief without the added stress of becoming physically ill. So, try these foods to help protect your health during a process of grieving. Continue reading “Heal Your Emotions With Food”

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A Few Japanese Dating Phrases That Will Help You In Your Date With Japanese Girls and Women

What more can melt a Japanese girl’s heart than by saying Japanese dating phrases truthfully? Yes, it’s only words and words are all you’ve got to take a Japanese woman into falling for you. This may sound like something from a love song, but there’s plenty of truth in that. Women generally like to be flattered, but don’t overdo it because they can tell if you are telling the truth or not (at least most of them do). Dating a Japanese girl requires extra effort if you really like the girl. You must learn a bit of the language to impress. Learning a few phrases is not a very difficult task. You just have to focus and remember certain phrases and their corresponding meaning.

The following are some of the Japanese dating phrases which you can use that can make flashing chink eyes brighten. These phrases might be difficult to memorize at first and repeated vocal practice might be necessary. Continue reading “A Few Japanese Dating Phrases That Will Help You In Your Date With Japanese Girls and Women”

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China’s Chocolate Market Dominated by Foreign Brands

Foreign chocolate brands such as Dove, Cadbury and Hershey’s have now captured about 70% of the Chinese chocolate market. As Barry Callebaut, the world’s largest chocolate manufacturer with 25% of the global market, recently opened its first chocolate factory in China in Suzhou City, the top 20 chocolate companies in the world have now all entered the Chinese market. But in the face of global competition, China’s local chocolate companies have been further suppressed down the value chain.

Second largest chocolate market

As the CHF 4 billion-revenue-per-year Barry Callebaut set up its first production line in Suzhou, a complete multinational chocolate industry chain is also emerging. Industry insiders suggested that this would be a blow to local Chinese chocolate companies in this globalized competition. It further indicated that keeping up with international competition is particularly important, or the Chinese industry chain will become even more vulnerable. Continue reading “China’s Chocolate Market Dominated by Foreign Brands”

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Benefits of an Electric Wok Appliance For Cooking

Woks role is cooking Southeast Asian cuisine like Thai and Chinese food. However, they specialize for stir-fry, then you could use them for boiling, deep-frying, steaming, braising, and making stews and soups. They are versatile cooking utensils made from a variety of materials. You have woks made from stainless steel, cast iron, carbon steel and aluminum. There is also an electric wok. You do not need a stove to cook in such a wok. Simply plug it to an electrical source and the wok itself acts like a heating element.

Advantages of using a wok that uses electricity are several. Apart from cooking delicious food, they have some advantages over other woks. Let us highlight some of them:

Continue reading “Benefits of an Electric Wok Appliance For Cooking”

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How to Prepare the Perfect Black Fungus Salad

Only a few years ago, we went back to my hometown in China to see my parents, my dad ordered this once in a restaurant. I totally fell in love with it.

It is traditionally prepared only with Chinese black fungus and cucumber. But, one day, I had some fried peanuts left, and I was just looking for a way to finish them off. So, I put the peanuts into the dish, and it worked, and it combines so well with ‘old vinegar’. So I started adding peanuts in. However, the peanuts are totally optional.

About Black Fungus

There is a lot to say about this ‘Black fungus’. It is a kind of Chinese mushroom, the most famous one is from the mountains called ‘Da Xing An Ling’ crossing the whole three Northeast provinces.

Continue reading “How to Prepare the Perfect Black Fungus Salad”