More Banana Varieties: Red Bananas and Oritos

I continued my banana quest at the market and found some red bananas and Doles' version of mini bananas (which is different from Chiquita's version). You can see them in the picture on the left, next to the Cavendish banana. 


Of course a taste test was in order, so I had a fabulous time eating! I read that you should eat the small bananas when they are almost brown, so I selected the almost "over-ripe" version that you see in the picture. 

I believe the small bananas in the pictures are orito (little gold) bananas. These bananas are grown in Ecuador and may be less susceptible to disease than the standard Cavendish. Oritos grow wild in the Upper Amazon region of Ecuador. They were quite creamy, with flesh that is more golden than that of the other two varieties. It was quite flavorful!

Red bananas are thicker but shorter than the Cavendish. I found them to be more flavorful with perhaps a slight raspberry taste. They seemed denser than the Cavendish and sweeter.

Domesticated bananas do not have seeds as you can see on the left. Farmers plant corms to get new banana plants. Also, notice the thickness of the Cavendish and Red Banana peels compared to that of the tiny orito on top. 


You can see a picture of a wild banana with its seeds at this site. Musa velutina produces bananas with many seeds sprinkled within the banana flesh. When the banana ripens, the peelings pop open so that the seeds can escape, fall to the ground, and create new banana plants.

The picture on the right shows slices of the three different banana varieties along with their peels so that you can compare them. Better yet, do your own comparison and savor the subtle taste differences between them. I hope you have as much fun with it as I had!

Chocolate Cravings: Oaxaca to Naga!

Vosges, the company that makes the Black Pearl Bar, makes many other chocolate bars with interesting flavor combinations. This week, as part of my "chocolate journey'" I tried the Oaxaca Bar and the Naga Bar.


Unlike the Black Pearl Bar, the Oaxaca Bar acquired its zip from fruity quajillo and subtle pasilla chilies. And with 75% cacao from Tanzanian bittersweet chocolate, it packed a punch indeed! But not the knock you in the chest and land you on your back kind of punch. This is the friendly fist to your upper arm kind of tease.

And how appropriate to name it for the land of the "moles," sauces that entice the palate by blending chocolate with chilies. 


The Naga Bar is more like a gentle kiss. Its 41% milk chocolate is much more subtle than the 75% bittersweet chocolate of the Oaxaca Bar. The sweet curry and nutty coconut flavors create a fitting homage to this far eastern area of India that fits snuggly between Assam and Myanmar.


Nagaland's mountainous terrain and people with a distinctively East Asian appearance pull me to find out more about the area. It is famous for wonderful beads and according to Katrina at Vosges, a beaded necklace from Nagaland inspired the Naga Bar.

Chocolate Cravings! Wasabi and Black Pearls

How could I resist a chocolate bar called a "Black Pearl Bar?"  Especially in a beautiful wrapper boldly announcing ingredients such as ginger, wasabi, black sesame seeds and dark chocolate! Well, as you probably figured out...I didn't.


Even when chocolate was in its infancy as a delicacy, during the Aztec empire, chilies were mixed into the chocolate potions for zip. So wasabi played the role of the chilies.


Wasabi (ワサビ（山葵）is sometimes known as Japanese horseradish and is in the Brassicaceae family along with horseradish, cabbage, and mustard. The root of the wasabi plant is used as a condiment, either finely ground or made into a paste.

The zip in wasabi is more like that of a hot mustard rather than that of chilies which results from capsaicin. The burning sensations are felt more in the nasal passages than the tongue like the sensations from capsaicin.

The burning sensations of wasabi are not oil-based, therefore they are somewhat ephemeral compared to those of chili peppers. The stimulating effect of wasabi vapor is similar to that of smelling salts and has been tested to create a smoke alarm for people living with deafness. One sleeping person awoke within 10 seconds of having wasabi vapor sprayed into the room.

The pungency of wasabi comes from a compound, isothiocyanate, that is produced when enzymes are released from cells ruptured by grating and grinding. Some isothiocyanates inhibit microbe growth, so maybe in the future wasabi can be used to prevent food spoilage and as a disinfectant.

Wasabi grows along stream beds in mountain river valleys of Japan. However, people are beginning to grow it commercially in the United States in the Pacific Northwest and the Appalachian Mountain regions of North Carolina. You can see pictures of the North Carolina crop at this site.

Ginger is another "zippy" ingredient in the Black Pearl Bar. The pungency of ginger comes from volatile oils similar to those of mustard (therefore wasabi). Detailed information about the differences between the zip in ginger and wasabi and chilis can be found at "Fire and Spice."  

Black sesame seeds add a delicate crunch to the Black Pear Bar and a bit of the sublime. The phrase "open sesame" from the Arabian Nights refers to the fact that the pods containing sesame seeds pop open when the seeds are ripe. Assyrian gods drank wine made from sesame seeds when they met to create the world. In Hindu legends, sesame seeds symbolize immortality.

And the glorious dark chocolate matrix supporting all of these wonderful ingredients adds to the allure of this tasty indulgence! So Black Pearl Bar is a fitting label for such a treasure.


Black pearls are rare. In Tahiti they were reserved for royalty and are surrounded by mystery. They are thought to be a gift from God that is endowed with healing powers. They symbolize hope for wounded hearts.


Throughout the world many myths about pearls involve heavenly dew, tears, the moon and the sacred feminine. In one Tahitian legend, the God of peace and fertility, Oro, descended on a rainbow to offer an oyster to humans as a gift. The oyster gave birth to an exquisite black pearl, which Oro offered to princess Bora Bora as a symbol of his everlasting love and affection.

According to another Tahitian legend, oysters are attracted to the moonlight falling on the ocean. They rise from the depths to bask in the moonlight and the moon endows each oyster with a drop of heavenly dew. After the drop becomes polished, it wraps itself with shimmering garments in the colors of Tahitian black pearls, including gray, blue, green, gold, and pink. 

To the Ancient Greeks, pearls symbolized love and marriage and when worn would bring marital bliss. They believed that pearls were conceived from drops of water that fell from Aphrodite as she emerged from water.

An ancient Sri Lankan myth involves a lake of tears created by tears shed by Adam and Eve. Eve's tears produced white pearls and Adam's tears produced black pearls. Black pearls are rare compared to white pearls because men shed tears less often than women according to the legend.

Indian warriors believed pearls formed from tear drops, so they placed them on their swords before battle to remind them of the pain and suffering caused by using swords. 

The ancient Chinese believed that black pearls were created in the brains of dragons and fell from the sky when dragons fought. From this belief came the human pursuit of the "pearl of wisdom." To the ancient Chinese this required the difficult process of slaying the dragon which was equivalent to achieving wisdom through the difficult experience of the journey of a hero or heroine. You need to kill a live oyster to obtain a valuable pearl. Similarly you must surrender to the struggles of life and release old attitudes, identities, values and behaviors in order to obtain something of great value. 

You must look over the dark and ominous sea for a tiny simmering light emanating from a tiny pearl. You can test your values, courage, and determination by seeking the tiny pearl or stand on the shore looking at others who are brave seekers. If you seek the gift of the goddess you can heal old wounds, purify your old heart and mind, and shed obsolete thoughts and behaviors.

Soon after I enjoyed my Black Pearl Bar, when I was at Whole Foods Market, I encountered morsels of chocolate with wasabi and chocolate creme inside. Of course I bought one to try! 

You can see the morsel on the right! It even had sesame seeds. I must admit that it was richer than the Black Pearl Bar, but it was a "blob" not a bar so it was not as tidy to eat. I loved them both...and I will add chocolate with wasabi to my list of passions...which already includes black pearls.

Airline Snacks Chinese Style!

My friend Mike recently returned from a journey to China. He shared with me a snack packet from his flight from Beijing to a city in the south. You can see the packet on the left and the contents below. 


He didn't know what it was, so we were trying to figure it out. The contents were uncomfortable similar to worms...but we persevered and popped some in our mouths. Immediately I detected a distinctly seaweed flavor. They were salty, and although I don't intend to go buy hundreds of packets, they were not bad for quick revitalization. 


So how do they compare to the peanuts that we commonly receive on flights within the United States? I think they are quite similar, however the sliminess of the Chinese snacks does not appeal to me. I just can't get past their resemblance to worms!

Bananas: Monocultures and Diseases!

 I am reading, "Banana: The Fate of the Fruit that Changed the World," by Dan Koeppel. According to the book, the Cavendish banana is under threat from a fungal disease that has already rendered the Gros Michel variety non-commercially viable.

Since there is nearly a world wide agricultural monoculture of Cavendish bananas, the disease could wipe out most of them. So when I saw Chiquita minis in the grocery store, I was excited to think that another variety is being sold. Of course I bought some, which you can see on the left. The Cavendish banana is there for comparison.

These minis are a variety called Piseng Mas and they are extremely sweet when allowed to ripen. They are not ripe until they turn brown.

The mini has a thinner peel and has fruit that is slightly darker than that of Cavendish bananas as you can see on the right.


The sweet taste of bananas belies the brutal agricultural history of the fruit. Huge companies manipulated leaders in Central and South America and sucked the life out of workers in return for meager wages.


Gastronomista has posted some interesting historical banana commerical materials that you might want to see. 

Pablo Neruda wrote a moving poem about the banana struggles, along with a translation which you can see below.

United Fruit Company

When the trumpet sounded, everything
on earth was prepared
and Jehovah distributed the world
to Coca Cola Inc., Anaconda,
Ford Motors and other entities:
The Fruit Company Inc.
reserved the juiciest for itself,
the central coast of my land,
the sweet waist of America.
It re-baptized the lands
"Banana Republics"
and on the sleeping dead,
on the restless heroes
who'd conquered greatness,
liberty and flags,
it founded a comic opera:
it alienated free wills,
gave crowns of Caesar as gifts,
unsheathed jealousy, attracted
the dictatorship of the flies,
Trujillo flies, Tachos flies,
Carias flies, Martinez flies,
Ubico flies, flies soppy
with humble blood and marmelade,
drunken flies that buzz
around common graves,
circus flies, learned flies
adept at tyranny.

The Company disembarks
among the blood-thirsty flies,
brim-filling their boats that slide
with the coffee and fruit treasure
of our submerged lands like trays.

Meanwhile, along the sugared up
abysms of the ports,
indians fall over, buried
in the morning mist:
a body rolls, a thing
without a name, a fallen number,
a bunch of dead fruit
spills into the pile of rot.


Cuando sonó la trompeta, estuvo
todo preparado en la tierra,
y Jehova repartió el mundo
a Coca-Cola Inc., Anaconda,
Ford Motors, y otras entidades:
la Compañía Frutera Inc.
se reservó lo más jugoso,
la costa central de mi tierra,
la dulce cintura de América.

Bautizó de nuevo sus tierras
como "Repúblicas Bananas,"
y sobre los muertos dormidos,
sobre los héroes inquietos
que conquistaron la grandeza,
la libertad y las banderas,
estableció la ópera bufa:
enajenó los albedríos
regaló coronas de César,
desenvainó la envidia, atrajo
la dictadora de las moscas,
moscas Trujillos, moscas Tachos,
moscas Carías, moscas Martínez,
moscas Ubico, moscas húmedas
de sangre humilde y mermelada,
moscas borrachas que zumban
sobre las tumbas populares,
moscas de circo, sabias moscas
entendidas en tiranía.

Entre las moscas sanguinarias
la Frutera desembarca,
arrasando el café y las frutas,
en sus barcos que deslizaron como bandejas el tesoro
de nuestras tierras sumergidas.

Mientras tanto, por los abismos
azucarados de los puertos,
caían indios sepultados
en el vapor de la mañana:
un cuerpo rueda, una cosa
sin nombre, un número caído,
un racimo de fruta muerta
derramada en el pudridero.
--Pablo Neruda, 1950

Yogurt: Medium of Bacteria Evolution!

Imagine yourself as a Neolithic herdsperson in Central Asia around 6000 B.C.E. The goats are quietly grazing and you fall asleep in the sunshine. You have a milk-filled container fashioned from a goat's stomach.

The container basks in the sun with you as you sleep and when you awake, your goat's milk has transformed. Bacteria such as Lactobacillus Bulgaricus have transformed the milk into a tangy, thick concoction with an fresh smell.

Since it is the Neolithic, food is scarce, so you need to try to eat it. The taste isn't bad, and it doesn't make you sick. You even grow to like the taste. Maybe you even share your discovery with  other people. You have discovered yogurt. 

Of course, this is hypothetical, but historians really believe that yogurt originated this way.  Eventually people discovered that this curdled milk kept longer than regular milk which was a tremendous advantage.

Something interesting that I discovered about yogurt is that its bacteria provides information about the process of evolution. Since the genome of Lactobacillus Bulgaricus has been sequenced, scientists found that it was originally associated with plants because some of its genes metabolize sugars from plants. In an environment of fermented milk, these genes are not as useful so most likely the Neolithic  Lactobacillus Bulgaricus had more of these genes. In modern strains, the genes have been replaced by genes that are more adaptive to the fermented milk environment. 

The picture at the top shows yogurt made from sheep's milk on the right and cow's milk on the left. The yogurt on the left is Greek yogurt, so much of the liquid has been removed and it appears thicker. Also, it has a more creamy texture. The yogurt on the right has more graininess. Although yogurt originated from goat's milk, yogurt is today made from the milk of many animals including buffalo and camels. 

Yogurt has been associated with longevity and many health benefits. It is thought to strengthen immune systems and it is a great calcium source. Even Genghis Khan's hoards were allegedly kept fit for battle by eating yogurt. 

The tangy yogurt flavor is popular throughout the world now, especially when it is mixed with fruit jams and other sweet flavorings. I have a feeling that those tiny Lactobacillus Bulgaricus bacteria will never have problems finding warm milk environments in which to ferment and evolve. People will make sure that they exist.

Ful Medames: Making use of Fava Beans

Ancient beer and fava beans are two symbols of the proud Egyptian culture. Fava beans have been found in 3000 year old tombs of Pharoahs and provide the main ingredient ful medames, a an ancient dish that is still commonly found in modern Egyptian households.


For ful medames, Egyptians use a smaller variety of fava beans than those shown in the bowl on the left. However, the larger kind are mostly found in stores in the United States and can also be used to make ful medames.


Recipe
The ingredients in ful medames are

• olive oil
• lemon juice
• garlic
• onion
• spices 
• fava beans.

1. Soak the fava beans in water for 8 to 12 hours. Start in the morning to have you ful medames for breakfast the next day.
2. After they have soaked, drain the beans. Place the favas, red lentils, onion, garlic and cumin in a large saucepan and add enough fresh water to cover by 2 inches. Bring to a boil, reduce heat to very low, cover and simmer for 8 to 10 hours, skimming the scum off the top occasionally.
3. Remove from heat and mash lightly with a potato masher or the back of a spoon. Stir in the lemon juice and salt to taste.
4. Place the beans in a serving bowl and garnish with a drizzle of olive oil or melted butter. Serve with fried or hard-boiled eggs and pita bread.

My ful medames are shown on the left. I mashed the beans, although sometimes the beans are not mashed. The taste was pretty good! I can imagine eating them every day if the spices were changed often, but I think I would grow tired of the same taste day after day. I made these from dried beans and it took quite a bit of time.


In Cairo during the middle ages, wood for fires was scarce. The Princess Baths, a public bath always had fires. During the daytime, bath-attendants stoked fires to heat huge pots of bath water. Embers from the fires continued to burn after the baths closed, so cauldrons of fava beans were simmered all night to provide ful medames for breakfast in the morning for Cairo residents. 

Natural Sweetness: Japanese Sweet Potatoes

It's hard for me to believe that these contorted "lumps" are related to delicate morning glories, but it is true. Sweet potatoes, Ipomoea batatas, are in the same family as morning glories. Since I have mostly known sweet potatoes through the grocery store, I had to discover from photographs how their flowers looked, and I was amazed at how much they looked like those of the morning glories in my garden! like those of morning glories. They have wonderful delicate leaves also. You can see a sweet potato bloom below and a morning glory bloom below that. Also, notice how similar the leaves are between the two plants! 


Sweet potatoes have a long history of providing nourishment for people. An 8000 year old wild form was found in a cave in Peru. They were probably domesticated first between Venezuela and the Yucatan Peninsula and evidence of their domestication in Peru about 2500 BCE exists. By the time Columbus landed on Caribbean Islands, sweet potatoes were common food. Columbus liked them so much that he took some back to England. 

 Although sweet potatoes originated in the Americas, they were being eaten in Polynesia as early as 1200 AD. When Captain Cook first reached New Zealand in 1769, sweet potatoes were the primary food of the Maoris.

The tropical tuber was spread around the world quickly by the Spanish and Portuguese. Today, more sweet potatoes are consumed in China than in all of the Americas.

The sweetness of most sweet potatoes is produced when an enzyme breaks starch molecules apart during heating. This produces the sugar called maltose which is made up of two glucose molecules and which is about a third as sweet as table sugar. Slow baking gives the enzyme more time to break up the starch. The enzyme is most effective between135 and 170 degrees Fahrenheit (57-75 degrees Celsius).

Sweet potatoes are an excellent source of antioxidants and vitamin A. You can find a full discussion of nutritional benefits of sweet potatoes at the Whole Foods Website.

So I took some of the Japanese sweet potatoes (the red ones in the picture at the top) and heated them, then sliced them and sauteed them in butter.  Many varieties of sweet potatoes exist, and I had never tried this variety. I'm not sure whether they are naturally incredibly sweet or the way they were prepared made them so sweet, but I ended up with something that was quite sweet without adding sugar or any other sweet flavoring. These were delicious morsels, and generally sweet potatoes are not really expensive...so they are a treat that doesn't bend the budget! You can see my results below.

Ancient Beer In Honor of Egypt

This post is in honor of the Egyptians struggling to bring democracy to their country. The sons and daughters of a great civilization, they are peacefully protesting the tyranny to which they are being subjected.

Beer played an important role in the lives of ancient Egyptians. They believed that their god, Osiris, taught them how to brew beer. People from all segments of Egyptian society drank beer, including children. Sometimes wages were paid in beer and beer was used as offerings to the the gods.

A few weeks ago, I watched a television show about some brewers from  the Dogfish Head Craft Brewery in Delaware who decided to reproduce ancient Egyptian Beer. They traveled to Egypt with an archaeologist to research the techniques and ancient ingredients. They made a beer with Emmer wheat, loaves of hearth baked bread, and yeast from a native Egyptian strain and flavoring with dom-palm fruit, chamomile, and zatar. They called their concoction Ta Henket. Heket is the name of beer found in hieroglyphics.

These modern brewers were pretty true to the ancient procedure. Evidence shows that the ancient Egyptians used barley to make malt and emmer wheat in the place of hops. Crumbled bread may have been added. They heated the mixture, then added yeast and fresh malt, then allowed it to ferment.  Without hops in the beer, it most likely tasted less bitter and more fruity than modern beer. Some people believe that ancient Egyptian beer was not very intoxicating because it was such a staple, however there is evidence of people being intoxicated from it during festivals. 

So I looked around Austin for this reproduction of ancient Egyptian beer, but I couldn't find it anywhere. However, I found another concoction from Dogfish Head Craft Brewery. It was called Midas Touch and it was the result of the group reproducing an ancient Turkish beer recipe from 2700 year old drinking vessels from the tomb of King Midas. This ancient ale was made with barley, honey, white muscat grapes and saffron. Not exactly the Egyptian recipe, but ancient none-the-less. 

So, as you can see, the Midas Touch is truly golden. It has a nice taste, described as somewhere between wine and mead. They tasting notes are described as honey, saffron, papaya, melon, biscuity, can succulent. I didn't really pick up the papaya and melon taste, but it was sweet and biscuity.

So, although I did not taste Egyptian beer, I tasted an ancient beer in honor of Egypt. It is a proud and complex country whose people deserve to live in freedom. 

Chocolate Cravings: Lavender and Chocolate!

I made a new discovery...Belgian chocolates with lavender made by Zaabar.What a combination..dark chocolate and the sweet scent of lavender! It reminds me of chocolate mixed with rose water. Both blend the quintessential culinary extravagance with beloved floral scents that transform into flavors.

I understand how integrated our senses of taste and smell are with each other, but I am puzzled by how something that I associate so clearly with a certain scent becomes a taste. Rose and lavender fragrances are so grounded within my mind that I almost cannot conceive of their taste.

 I shared the chocolate with two other people. One person was not thrilled with the taste because she thought she was eating soap. The other person was not thrilled with the taste, but was okay with it. But I was really intrigued by it! The chocolate is a rich, dark chocolate...so the bitter-sweet flavor is strong enough to resist being overpowered by the lavender taste. And the lavender was a wonderful complement to the chocolate. Not only was the taste wonderful, my nose was quite happy with the wonderful lavender-chocolate aroma.

Lavender is valued in India for its anti-depressant qualities and other medicinal uses. In Europe, lavender is valued for its healing, invigorating, and cleansing qualities. The ancient Romans used it to freshen linens and perfume their baths. I love bath gels with lavender scents!

Ancient Grains: Wheat

On my way to work in the mornings, the flaxen grasses dance with the wind and draw my mind to their mysteries. What was it like to be a prehistoric woman, collecting grains from these graceful stalks. Would I find enough to feed my family? Would I have to prepare the grains so they were digestible?

What if I lived in the Karacadag region of Southeastern Turkey around 10,000 years ago? This is the area believed to be the origin of our modern wheat through domestication of Einkorn and Emmer wheat. So here I am in Karacadag, trying to feed my family. I'm gathering berries and nuts and greens with the other women of my community.

I notice some golden seeds scattering the sunlight and drawing me toward them. My friends and I collect as many as I can find. We take them home and everyone likes their taste. We are just chewing them at first. The following spring when I'm gathering food with my friends, we find some more of the golden seeds. We take them home and eventually we have the idea to plant them so that we will not have to wander far to find some of them.

Year after year, we gather seeds from our plants, but the best seeds are large and puffier that other seeds. So we select the large seeds and plant them. Eventually all of the plants have large seeds. The seeds that stay attached to the plants are easier to collect, and the larger seeds seem to stay attached. We begin selecting for size and "staying attached." Eventually we have wheat with traits for which we have selected. These may have been Einkorn or Emmer wheat.

Archaeologists have found evidence of Einkorn and Emmer domestication from the Karacadag area around 10,000 years ago. After chewing on the whole seeds, people probably began experimenting by grinding the seeds and making powder or gruel which they ate. If the "gruel" was cooked over a flame, perhaps a flatbread was developed.

Yeast is found everywhere, and it is not hard to imagine some yeast landing on some flatbread and causing the flatbread to become puffy. The people liked the result and tried to create the same "puffy" bread again and again. This is how I imagine the origin of bread as we know it. How do you imagine the origin of bread?

Kisir: Savory Turkish Delight!

After a week of good intentions, I finally found time to make Kisir. The unusual snowfall here in Texas last night provided me with this gift of time.

So I found a variety of recipes for Kisir. Not wanting to venture onto the snowy roads, I was restricted to the ingredients I had on hand, so I modified the recipes a bit. I worked with a recipe that involved pomegranate juice and another recipe with fewer ingredients and created something between the two with a few modifications.

The major ingredient in Kisir is bulgur wheat. In the pantry I had a mixture of couscous and bulgur wheat that I used instead of plain bulgur. I peeled two tomatoes and cut them into small pieces, then sauteed them in olive oil with diced green onions. I added cumin, mint, parsley, salt, and lemon juice. When the tomatoes and onions seemed ready, I added the mixture to the bulgur and guinoa. After mixing it thoroughly, I allowed it to cool.

I liked it, but some of the other members of the household were not used to the taste of cumin and didn't like it. I'm going to try it again with less cumin and perhaps pomegranate juice instead of lemon juice.

I think Kisir is a nice dish for a summer picnic. I like the blend of flavors, but perhaps I added too much cumin for my family. I will try it again with slightly different proportions and perhaps garlic and a few different spices.

Kisir is a side dish in Turkish cuisine. There are many other aspects of this fascinating cuisine that I need to explore.

Happy Lunar New Year!

I visited my local Asian food market last night to prepare for Lunar New Year. Okay, I procrastinated! But in spite of my ignorance, my heart was in the right place.

I really wanted to celebrate Seolnal, the Korean version of Lunar New Year so at the last minute I visited the market expecting to find "ready made" rice cake soup, Tteokguk. This soup is traditionally eaten eaten at Lunar New Year to bring good luck and an extra year of life in the New Year. Every person is considered one year older at the same time at Lunar New Year. You can learn a lot more about Tteok from Korean Dreamer.

The market had the ingredients to make tteokguk, but I was running out of time with Lunar New Year only hours away. I wanted to take something to share the occasion with my colleagues at work, so time was running out! I looked around, and found the Chinese candies that you see in the picture. Candies like these are given to children as part of the Chinese New Year's Celebration. I also bought some ginger candies as you can see on the right. These candies are quite gummy and sticky and have a sharp ginger taste. I like to suck on them until they disappear in my mouth. These would be perfect to share at work.

Another Chinese tradition for Lunar New Year is to post "couplets" by your doorway. These are pairs of printed wishes for the new year. I put a couplet on each sides of my office doorway at work. My couplets are printed on red cardstock in beautiful Chinese characters. One says " May you be blessed with peace and safety in all seasons" which in Chinese would sound like "si ji ping an." The other one says "May you be blessed with peace and safety wherever you are" which in Chinese would sound like "chu ru ping an."

I shared the candies with my coworkers with hopes that they will have a safe, healthy, and profitable New Year. Guonian is a Chinese New Year expressions that means that we made it through the old year. Another Chinese New Year expression is Bainian which means congratulations for the New Year.

So to you I say Guonian and Bainian and hope that you have a healthy and prosperous New Year!