First burger down, now let's make some pork belly

YOUGUYS. Let's talk about the Hawksmoor Spitalfields Christmas Burger for a minute. I don't know what's different from last year's (on paper the elements are the same: one turkey burger, one pork patty, with bacon, sprout tops, spiced cranberry ketchup and a slice of Ogleshield, all topped off with a pot of turkey gravy) but I don't even care because it was INCREDIBLE. It was so juicy that you didn't even need the turkey gravy to rich it up (though we poured it on anyway, because obviously) and the meat wasn't so thick you couldn't get it all in on a single bite (a hindrance with a lot of these loaded burgers). And the bacon was so RIDICULOUSLY crispy it was basically bacon crumble. Every bite was a drippy, crunchy delight.

Also Christmas NUGGETS, that beauty in the foreground, filled with creamy cheesy turkey goo, which we devoured in about three seconds.

So of course now I have all the regrets, because what if I started with the best one? WHERE CAN THEY GO FROM HERE?

Today is going to be the opposite of Christmas Eating: we have friends coming over and we'll all be cooking from The Land of Fish and Rice. I'm excited. I have almost no experience cooking this style of cuisine, and the recipes are gorgeous. We've already had our first adventure just sourcing half the ingredients. Noble, heroic Rich volunteered to go to the Chinatown supermarket, a maze of epic proportions, with a list that included dried lily flowers and snow vegetable - which is not what you think it is - and within seconds was sending pics through to the group chat: 'Is this the Shaoxing dried fermented greens? Or this? Wait what about this?' Turns out there is also a billion different varieties of peanut, maybe more. I was absolutely useless: 'Yes?' while his wife helpfully supplied snapshots: 'You're looking for mei gan cai.'

She's clearly going to be the one keeping us from self-harming in the first hour.

Now I've got to go tidy up so that we can make a proper mess. Wish us luck tonight, and see you tomorrow!

Hugs,
Essss