Icy Chicken and Dirty Rice

When he woke up this morning, I asked the birthday boy what does he want for lunch. Without hesitating, he said "icy chicken and dirty rice". It took me awhile to understand what he meant, then I realized he meant Hainanese chicken rice. 

Jook, the Memory Trigger

When I was a kid, my siblings and I ate huge breakfast at 5am because we wouldn’t be able to eat again until 3pm. We did have recess at school, but it’s about 15 minutes and we HATE eating in a rush. Sometimes the food goes down the wrong pipe. My grandma would cook us either fried rice or steamed buns or fried noodles (typical Chinese leftover-turn-into-breakfast). When she was feeling adventurous, we might find pizza (for breakfast? Why not?) or French toast (I say adventurous, because in my Chinese family, we almost never eat French toast at home) or donuts. But breakfast item I love the best is jook.

 

Served with preserved eggs and fried wonton skin