Backyard Season

Once Labour Day passes, I start feeling wistful. Where did the summer go? What did I do this summer? 

This morning at my bus stop, a father and son was waiting there. I'm assuming it was the boy's first time taking the bus to school. His dad stepped back when the bus arrived and headed home, I guess they knew not to embarrass each other. The boy stepped up and politely asked the bus driver to call out his stop, not knowing that stop announcements were automatic now. Thank goodness I don't have children, watching this big milestone made me want to cry. I miss those first-day-of-school new starts!

We had a great end of August week. My aunts, uncles, and cousins came to visit and we ate. We ate a lot. Chinese food. Vietnamese food. Seafood. Brunch.

We feasted at home, spread out around the house and in the backyard. Howard impressed us all by grilling some steaks.

My brother did the seasoning, grinding the pepper mill with grace (ha ha).

My dad, the backyard farmer, supplies us with so many healthy vegetables to cook with. He grows barrels of Taiwanese lettuce, also known as A-choi.

Not my favourite, but we have plenty of bitter melon hanging about. Check out what's also hanging on the top left corner of the net. *Shudder*

This grassy looking one is a favourite of mine, gau choy or Chinese chives. Chop it up and mix it in egg, dough batter, or in a dumpling and I'm a happy camper.

The bitter melons aren't the only ones hanging out in our backyard. We have sing gua or silk squash too.

Howard loves pickled sher li hon or mustard greens. I always pick this out of my beef noodle soups.

Finally, tomatoes! We don't ever need to buy tomatoes during the fall. We simply can't keep up with them. So now that the cooler weather's creeping in, we'll harvest our vegetables and reminiscence about the good old summer times.