Fifteen…

It was the 15th Night of the new Chinese Lunar New Year – the Year of the Snake, or what is commonly referred to as Chap Goh Meh. It is customary for the Chinese families to have dinner together to mark the end of the festivities so many who have come home from afar would usually make an effort to stay on till after this dinner.

You may recall from my previous post that I had succumbed to the intensely agonising pain in my left shoulder, elbow  and wrist and resorted to treatment via acupuncture and I was told in no uncertain terms that I was not to eat prawns…

…crabs, belacan, cincaluk and the like for at least a month.

We had planned to have Vietnamese rolls for the dinner that night and my missus was thinking of putting that off till another time but she had bought all the ingredients. In the end, we decided to go ahead with it and I could just omit the crustaceans from the ones I rolled for myself.

For the rolls, we had this rice paper…

…that we had bought and brought back all the way from Auckland, New Zealand.

You have to take out one the sheets…

…like this and dip it in hot water till it softens like this…

Then you have to put the ingredients onto it…

– lettuce, shredded chicken, taugeh (bean sprouts), crushed peanuts, freshly-pounded chili…and my missus and my daughter could add the prawns to theirs followed by the very most important and essential ingredient in Vietnamese rolls…

– the peanut butter hoisin sauce…and then, you roll it up nicely like this…

and eat it. I remember we had mihun when  we had this in Wellington, New Zealand but I guess my missus had forgotten all about it and I do think it is up to the individual what one would want to put in the rolls – I, for one, would probably add some thinly-sliced omelette as well…or crab perhaps – that is when the time comes when I will be allowed to eat that again. Hehehehehehe!!!! But it was all right. As it was…

…I found it absolutely delightful and wouldn’t mind having that again sometime. Anybody wants to join? Wink! Wink!

Each of us also had this individual serving roast chicken thigh with the mashed mixed sweet potatoes and potatoes…

…to go with the rolls and I would say we had had a really sumptuous and enjoyable dinner to bring the joyous  Chinese New Year festivities to a close for this year.