Introducing Beijing's Only Cat-Powered Entertainment Guide

We at City Weekend are thrilled to unveil our newest supplement magazine, Kitty Weekend—Beijing's first reader-powered cat fancier magazine for expats, by expats. It hits the shelves this week, so be sure to get your paws on a copy. To get you excited, here's a little sneak preview:

Community

An understanding of the local cat community is essential to getting the most out of life in Beijing. This issue, we bring you an in-depth profile on the cats of the hutongs.

Dining

We've rounded up the best kitty eats around town, from local hutong fare to embassy-district dining to delicacies from the Guanyuan Pet Market.

Cat owners will also love our feature story on the best foods you can share with your cat, including a fantastic recipe for tuna carpaccio to give your fluffy one a taste of real fine dining.

Health & Beauty

We weigh in with the doctors at ICVS on the most important health and fitness questions for cats. This issue we find out: Should you stretch before you nap?

Nightlife

Abandoned the cat lady stereotype now. Just because you're cat crazy doesn't mean you can't enjoy the Beijing nightlife scene. We've rounded up the city's best cat-friendly clubs and DJs so you and your furry companion can party together in style. We've also got a review of the latest in drinking: Hello Kitty beer. The label's awesome, but will Mr. Whiskers approve of the taste?

Also coming your way is our feature story on kitty litter for every budget, a fashion spread on great cat-inspired threads for spring, and profiles of Mary Peng of ICVS and Scarlet Zhang of Beijing Cat. Check it out at vet clinics near you this week

Miao!

Pork Stomach & Celery

by Caleb

With 10 months between posts you might think I’ve given up on cooking food, that I’m resolved to drowning in buckets of KFC, frequenting ma la tang street stalls, and sampling the hundreds of restaurants within walking distance. But the truth is I’ve never cooked more in my life.

Problem is, I’ve been cooking completely normal dishes, at least relative to my location. Or more accurately, the problem lies in the fact that I think normal dishes are a problem. I’ve come to consider this site a place to explore new and original dishes, where recipes need to be refined over and over, ingredients explained and defended. Where if nothing else, I end up waxing too damn poetic on whatever shit I’m cooking. It’s mentally cumbersome and unfair. These “normal” dishes deserve their time as well, and most of them may very well strike my American readers as abnormal, invalidating my own neurosis.

So it’s time for a small change. I’ll be posting recipes. Quickly. As in with little explanation. Because the second I go down that road it turns into weeks of obsession, and more often than not, an abandonment due to lost hope or diminished excitement.

In the last year I’ve moved to a mostly primal diet, with a few concessions now and again. Most dishes will fit this mold. Most of them are whatever I cooked for lunch that day, with little forethought.

With that out of the way (I promise, short posts from here out), here’s the first dish. Chances are you’ll never make it.

What I Used

• Pork stomach, sliced
• Chinese celery, 2 inch slices (regular celery will work just fine)
• Garlic, thinly sliced
• Premium dark soy sauce
• Pickled spicy red peppers, chopped
• Ground black pepper
• Olive oil
• Sesame oil

What I Did

• Rinse the pork stomach and add it to a pressure cooker. Cover with water and cook under pressure for an hour.
• Pour out (or save, if you’re into it) the reserve liquid from cooking the stomach, but save a few tablespoons and transfer it along with the stomach to a bowl. Add a half teaspoon of dark soy sauce (just for color), a healthy dose of black pepper, and a tablespoon of the pickled red pepper along with the brine, which should be easy if you’re getting the peppers from a jar like me. Stir.
• Heat a wok or pan to medium-high heat, add the olive oil, then add the celery and garlic. Sauté for a couple minutes, or until the celery begins to soften.
• Add the bowl containing the stomach and sauce to the wok. Continue to stir and cook for a minute to let all the flavors mix.
• Right when you cut the heat, add two drops of sesame oil, stir, and serve.

A tip on adding the sesame oil: I’m willing to bet money that 9 times out of 10 when you use sesame oil you add too much. It’s a flavor you want to add with subtlety but by volume it’s among the strongest oils. A cruel combination. Take it away from the dish, over the sink or garbage perhaps, and pour as little as you can on your stirring device, a wood spatula in my case. Let the excess drop off leaving a thin coat of sesame oil on your stirrer, and continue. If you’ve ever made a good dry martini, this will come naturally to you.

Hainan Chicken Rice @ Singapore Restaurant 海南雞飯 @ 星洲名廚

目前流行的海南雞飯在海南是吃不到的。這道菜可能起源於海南，但卻在新加坡和南洋一帶發揚光大。做海南雞飯要先將用油炸過的連皮大蒜和羌塞，再加些蔥，以及馬來人叫“馬蘭”的香葉一起進雞肚子裡。然後把雞放在鍋裡用水煮，水開後加入一匙鹽；水再開，再加鹽，憑經驗決定水的鹹度。雞外皮抹上一層鹽，把雞放入湯中，燙5分鐘，撈起，過冷水河，水再開時，再燙一次。要看雞的大小，來決定燙煮的次數，不能默守陳規。最後把雞挂起風乾。燙過雞的水表面浮著一層雞油，用它放入鍋中炸香幹蔥，再把米放入鍋中炒一炒，炒過的米放入另一個鍋中煮，煮飯的水也是用剛才燙雞的湯。用一半湯煮飯，另一半留著，加入高麗菜和冬菜一起煮，成為配湯。