Here's the thing with a blog - you've got to devote some time to it. I am infamous in the household for taking pictures of meals and never using them on the blog. So, in an effort to procrastinate finishing my master's thesis (uh oh, two incompletes is the most you can take!) I will try to post some of my photo backlog and talk about some of them... Let's see how it goes.

As a well-known carnivore, it may be surprising that my new favorite chinese dish is tofu! When we first moved to Derwood, we ordered chinese from China Jade, near our kids' daycare. It was awful! I have a secret love affair with General Tso and his chicken, and their version is big fried doughballs in super-duper-sweet sauce. YUCK! So awful was it that for two years, we never ordered there again, instead making the trek to our Germantown favorite, House of Fortune. (Still recommend them for the BEST "americanized" chinese take out).

Recently, however, the WaPo wrote up China Jade as having an outstanding traditional menu. Skeptical, our family visited after the winter concert at the daycare. This restaurant should just discard the "non-traditional" menu.  After ordering from the "traditional" menu, we see the appeal in this place! I had KungPao Chicken (not nearly as sweet off this menu) and Meg had a noodle soup (simple, yet delicious - it had seaweed!) However, the real revelation came when trying to order a vegetarian tofu dish for Meg in our recent take-out. I thought "Ma Po Tofu" sounded great.  Little did I know...

Tofu, ground pork (yeah - not vegetarian...), chili oil, bean paste, green onions, and some kind of seasoning (five spice?) made this a spicy, yet delicious hit.  General Tso, get the hell out of here!  Jerk!