Dinner last night

was really good. I don't have time to cook anymore, so when I do, I really enjoy it. Yesterday we set up an interactive appetizer: spring rolls. I showed people how to soften the wrapper. Then we had an assortment of ingredients you could put in. Bean threads, bean sprouts, thai basil and thai mint were the basis, usually with some hoi-sin sauce. Then you could put any number of additional things - we had enoki mushrooms sauteed with a lot of garlic, green onions, jalapeno peppers, different hot sauces, fish sauce, or dumpling sauce. There may have been more, but it was a pretty good spread.

For dinner, we had three dishes. Chinese broccoli sauteed with oyster sauce, honey walnut shrimp and chicken with cashews. I think everything was a big hit. There were 2 and a half pounds of chicken, and 2 and a half pounds of shrimp. By the end of the night, the shrimp were totally gone, and considering we had 8 people, I think that's pretty impressive. We all stuffed our faces.