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2013-03-12
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My friend invited me to join his family's Chinese New Year celebration this year at their village in Yuen Long. Poon Choi, otherwise known as Big Bowl Feast, is traditionally eaten on this occasion. Even though his village still practices many traditions, the villagers nowadays no longer go through the painstaking process of preparing their own Poon Choi and will order from caterers instead. My friend's family ordered their Poon Choi from a long-standing caterer in Yuen Long, called Man Lee Yuen
農曆年期間我到了我朋友鄧氏的村吃盆菜。我以前只在酒樓吃過盆菜，所以有機會到元朗吃正宗的盆菜十分興奮，但原來準備時間太長，現在很多鄉村都是買回來的。萬里緣盆菜專門店的盆菜材料非常豐富，有鮑魚，燒肉，雞，燒鴨，豬皮，蘿蔔，芋頭等，醬汁也很惹味，很有風味。唯一是肉有點乾，而且有味精。
As Poon Choi is supposed to be made with precious ingredients, meats and seafood are the main ingredients and there should be relatively little vegetables. Our Poon Choi from Man Lee Yuen had to be reheated, and it was absolutely gigantic - it was almost enough to feed a whole village, literally!
The meats formed the top layer of the Poon Choi. As there were so many types of meat, I only just managed to try one piece of each of them. The amount of abalone, squids, chicken, prawns, roasted pork, roasted duck and fish balls was very generous, and the meats were all cut into big, hearty chunks. The chicken, pork and duck were a tad dry and overcooked, but were very tasty as they soaked up the delicious flavours from the sauce. I also liked the fish ball, which was smooth and bouncy.
As unhealthy as it seems, the braised pork skin was moreish, as it was light and spongy and soaked up a lot of sauce. There were some vegetables at the bottom of the basin: deep fried taro, Chinese mushrooms, bean curd sheets and Chinese radish. Out of these, the Chinese radish and the deep fried taro were the most popular at the table. We appreciated the lightness of the Chinese radish after eating a lot of meat, and the deep fried taro had a beautiful, powdery texture. While I normally enjoy eating Chinese mushrooms, they were a bit too filling for me at this meal.
We battled for 2 hours but only managed to finish two thirds of our Poon Choi. Man Lee Yuen's offerings were very generous, and the variety of ingredients was great. Even though the MSG made us rather thirsty and there were tiny pieces of fractured chicken bone in the Poon Choi, it was overall an authentic and satisfying meal.
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