Cooking World

Chinese do not like to eat alone. As a rule, ten - fifteen people sit at the big round table, who for all two hours of a lunch break eat one dish after another and discuss their urgent business.

So, how to eat correctly? We shall start that lunch time is special for Chinese. Schoolboys, students and office workers leave for a break at midday to start work or study again only in two o’clock in the afternoon. In the large companies and business centers the dinner lasts for an hour and is obligatory.
Chinese do not like to eat alone. As a rule, ten - fifteen people sit at the big round table, who for all two hours of a lunch break eat one dish after another and discuss their urgent business.
In the middle of a table there is a turning disk with viands. Everyone has a plate, small plate for soup, spoon, and sticks.

Firstly are served cold dishes: bean sprouts, salad from asparagus, reps, radish, meat pieces, fried peanuts, wood mushrooms, rice noodles. Sometimes crust jellyfishes are also served as a cold dish, but there are some dishes, when it is better not to know, what you eat.

If you want buy it, get better the mature intact soft fruits of yellow color. Guava fruits at a room temperature can be stored for some days, and at temperature 7-10 С - 2-3 weeks.
Guava shouldn’t be stored together with other food-stuffs, as it is easily sated with extraneous smells. At the same time guava fruits can be stored frozen: they practically do not change quality and taste.

Before eating, fruit are peeled and seeds should be deleted. The crushed pulp is served with whipped cream.

These fruits are eaten in raw state, they are used in salads and puddings.
Pickled slices of fruits are served together with meat dishes.
Jelly from guava are especially popularly in tropics. It is good for syrups, and puree-like product called “fruit oil”.
Juice is used for cooking sherbet and ice-cream.

The ascorbic acid in fruits is not destroyed in the process of drying and conservation, therefore juice is used for making powder - rich source of vitamin C.
Cheese from guava is one of the best east sweets.

Have you never heard about grapefruit diet? It is strange, as this one is very popular, by the way. As the fighter with excess weight this fruit has no match. Recent researches in Scripps clinic in California have shown that so-called grapefruit diet considerably helps people to struggle with depot fat.

The main idea of the given system - half a grapefruit before each meal…
In addition to this, grapefruit contains elements which struggle with cancer cells. Sophie Loren keeps this very diet, and she can boast of a chic figure, even in her not so young age. And if you have overeaten, try to eat a grapefruit after it.

It will relieve you from feeling of heaviness in a stomach. Besides, half of fruit contains only 39 calories. If you want to achieve the best results, do not eat more than 800 calories after grapefruit. It is said that enzymes of this wonderful and tasty fruit can burn out such amount of calories.

Sappy fruits of cactuses are berries inherently. They are used the same way, as other berries: used for food raw, for jams, fruit candy, they are baked, etc. Prickly pears are even specially planted, and their berries have become the common foodstuff on the markets of many countries. In Vietnam, due to a damp warm climate, cactuses – epiphytes Hylocereus became widely spread. Their fruits reach 500 g and have already settled down in markets together with local tropical fruits.

Widespread mammiliaria after flowering form many red berries. They are juicy, with the pleasant sourish taste reminding fruits of a barberry. Seeds are very small and do not prevent tasting.

It is said, that the most tasty fruit among room cactuses gives well-known “Tsarina of night” – selenicereus. The only complexity is to find the second blossoming plant for cross-pollination, as a last resort it is possible to try to pollinate with pollen of other kind of cactuses. The formed fruit will be as an apple in size, rather tasty, with pleasant aroma. The peel is densely covered with fuzz and prickles, therefore such berry is simply cut half-and-half.

Fortunately, cactuses are nonpoisonous plants and all who wish can taste it.

Everybody knows that cactus is such exotic muricated creature. But very few people know that they are widely used in cookery. And everything except for thorns is edible: stalks, juice, fruits.

Fortunately, cactuses are nonpoisonous plants. The certain danger comes from thorns and glochidiums. Thorns can be easily enough removed from a surface of a stalk, but glochidiums demand much more caution.

Some species at the excessive use render undesirable influence on an organism because of presence in their juice substances of medication character. But, it is spoken, that these cactuses are unpleasant to taste, so can’t be eaten in large quantities.

In most cases the pulp of cactuses does not differ any especial taste, reminds just a grass more likely. But young shoots of prickly pears have certain taste and are widely used in cookery in hot dishes and various salads. They are spoken to remind cucumbers. Young shoots are also used for a sweet delicacy - candied fruits.

Ingredients:
4 cloves garlic
4 tablespoons olive oil
a half tablespoon dried rosemary or one tablespoon of fresh one
5 ounce of canned plum tomatoes
1 pound of canned chickpeas, drained and rinsed
2 cups chicken stock
Add salt and pepper to your taste and preferences
Garlic should be peeled and crushed. Fresh rosemary must be chopped finely. Heat the oil and fry the garlic slightly until it begins to brown. Add roughly chopped rosemary and tomatoes and lower the heat to a simmer when the mixture begins to boil. Cook for 25 minutes or so. When the tomatoes are ready, add the chickpeas and cook it for 5 minutes more. Remove and mix in the chicken stock. Season with salt and pepper to taste.

No make this chili sweeter we recommend to add some pineapples. And while this recipe is rather large, you might want to to take the half of the ingredients for a small family. The original recipe is made for 10 servings, will take 15 min to prepare, 25 min to cook and your chili will be ready in 40 min.

Ingredients:
2 pounds ground beef
6 onions, chopped
2 red bell peppers, seeded and chopped
2 (16 ounce) cans stewed tomatoes, with juice
2 (15.5 ounce) cans kidney beans, with liquid
1 (16 ounce) can tomato sauce
1 (16 ounce) can pineapple chunks, without water
2 tablespoons chili powder
2 teaspoons salt

Cooking directions.
The oven must be heated until hot over high heat. Add the ground beef, and cook until slightly pink. Stir constantly to break into small pieces. Stir onions and bell pepper, cook until the meat has browned, and the onions have softened and turned diaphanous, about 5 minutes. Pour meat into a large sieve and press to expel excess fat.
Place meat back into the oven along with braised tomatoes, kidney beans, tomato sauce, and pineapple chunks; flavour with chili powder and salt. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low and boil uncovered for 10 minutes, or until chili reaches the needed consistency.