Happy Lunar New Year!

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Today is the first day of the Lunar New Year, the Year of the Rabbit, but we here at eatTV have been celebrating, er eating, for days.

We had a Chinese banquet-style meal at Congee Village, where we chowed on dishes symbolic of all the things we wish for this year: lobster for happiness, noodles for a long life, scallops for prosperity, and lettuce for wealth.  We’re hoping the oysters will bring us good things, the fat choy (“hair vegetable”), more prosperity, and the scallops, well, same thing. Get the theme here? Hey, we’re a startup!

In honor of Tết, the Vietnamese Lunar New Year, we shall eat some more. Today we’re having bánh chưng, banana leaf-wrapped sticky rice cakes filled with pork that are so indicative of the holiday. Operations manager/superstar Sandra is showing us non-Vietnamese types the proper way to eat them: steamed, with giò lụa (Vietnamese bologna) and pickled vegetables. The cakes are incredibly labor-intensive to make (unless you have a few days and an outdoor fire), but you can pick some pre-made ones up at a Vietnamese market (sometimes Chinese markets carry them as well).

Lastly, let’s not forget Seollal, Korean New Year. For that, we’ll try to get our hands on some tteokguk, the traditional rice cake soup eaten in celebration. It’s a tough time of year here at eatTV….

For a quintessential Chinese New Year dish, check out Jamie making Lobster Longevity Noodles here:

And get the recipe here:

In honor of Tết, enter the bustling streets of Vietnam as the country shops and prepares for the holiday here:

And, speaking of Vietnam, there’s a large community of Vietnamese immigrants living and farming in New Orleans that have exciting plans to build a state-of-art sustainable urban farm right in the middle of the Big Easy:

From all of us, here’s to a healthy, wealthy, delicious food-filled New Year! Chuc Mung Nam Moi!