My good friend K likes to indulge in conspiracy theories. And like any serious conspiracy theorist, he is also a prepper. K always has sufficient food in his home to feed his family for at least 2 months. K and I also like to play this hypothetical “zombie apocalypse” game and test our decision-making skills if the cinematic doomsday scenario is brought to life. For example – “where is the perfect place to hide during a zombie apocalypse?” The answer according to K is on a boat in the middle of a lake because zombies can’t swim. I can’t dispute his logic, until the cinematic universe invents swimming zombies, I think he’s good on this one.
So, what does the zombie apocalypse have to do with cooking? Well, nothing really but Covid turned me into a bit of a prepper as well. I don’t think we can necessarily last for 2 months like K, but I think I’ve stocked up to as much as a month’s worth of food in the Kuo household. In the meantime, I’ve learned a lot about what best to buy and keep at home if we expect to be confined for a long period of time. Here is my list of apocalypse survival tips in order to enjoy the long confinement comfortably.
Survival tip #1 – get a foodsaver vacuum seal. This has been a game changer for me personally. I’m able to extend the shelf life of food and also save a lot storage space. I would make a week’s worth of meals at once and portioned them and stick them in the freezer, whenever I’m hungry, I’ll just defrost a pack and dinner is served. Which leads to…
Survival tip #2 – buy in bulk. Costco is your best friend. This is pretty much a no brainer. If you cannot cook to save your life and the only thing you can do is boil a pot of water, Costco’s got you covered. With marinated bulgogi, all you have to do is simply heat a pan and wash some rice and push a button on the rice cooker, and voila, dinner is served. Costco caters to the seasoned home chefs as well as the culinarily challenged.
Here are some of the best things to buy from Costco:
1. Meats especially beef, you gotta go American when you get there but USDA prime is very rare and definitely get some when you see them.
2. Noodles and condiments. Costco sells so many different versions of dried noodles and each one better than the next. Noodles are also easier to make a meal out of than rice. Makes things much simpler for you. We bought a whole box of noodles because the sampling lady was handing out noodles with a bit of chili oil and konbu soy. Oh yeah, we bought the chili oil and konbu soy too.
3. Baked goods. Honestly, Costco is far from being a great bakery, in fact, I would under no circumstances eat a Costco croissant unless, my MIL had bought them then it’s the best croissants in the world. But, there are a few gems at the Costco such as the English muffins and bagels and they keep well in the freezer. I am 80% certain the English muffins at Costco are the same ones McDonald’s uses. Which brings to my recipe today. The sausage egg mcmuffin from, what the Aussies call, Mackers.
My good friend DLin (the boy, not to confused with DLin, the girl) gave me some advice to this blog and write through the lense of fatherhood. So I thought about it and I think breakfast is the most important meal for both working parents because it is the “theoretically” the most meals most parents eat at home. Lunch you are certainly eating with colleagues or alone at your desk. Too many things can disrupt dinner at home, you can work later than usual, or have business dinners with colleagues and clients. So, breakfast “theoretically” is the meal you’re most likely to have at home with your family. I say theoretically because I often leave the house at 5 am in the morning to go exercise and then the nanny will take care of the breakfast for Justin but on the weekend, it is definitely something Justin and I can bond over.
Sauage Egg McMuffin has become sort of the go to breakfast if we have nothing at home. Barbara sort of brought it into our lives since we started dating in Beijing. I introduced it to Justin around 1.5 yo. And I’ll be honest it was out of pure laziness. It was a Sunday, I was tired and didn’t have anything good to make so I ordered McD. Since then, it’s become more of a weekend ritual, along with some Michael Jackson music.
Making it – the most difficult part is finding the English muffins. As I mentioned, Costco has them, they have the McDonald’s variety. If Costco is too far, expat grocery shops such as Alex’s shop, Avocado lady or delivery services such as epermarket will have them. The expats shops are sold in packs of 5 and they are often softer and tastier. I think Costco’s are in packs of 16, and the outside is definitely harder and texture wise much closer to the McDonald’s version. The patty is made of ground pork, dried sage and salt, that’s it! Throw in a fried egg and a slice of cheese and there you have it. In order to make the egg like McDonald’s, you’ll need a metal ring for the egg, it’s pain to do it and I don’t think it’s necessary. For my version, I also used a little bit of mayonnaise, not only for the taste but also I find the regular sausage egg mcmuffin is a bit too dry and I think a bit of mayo helps.
Was too hungry and forget to take a better picture
Now that you have your breakfast staple sorted, this brings my back to my next tip.
Survival tip #3 – when you buy protein, skip the steaks and buy portioned meat like sliced beef, ground beef or pork and the like. Why? The answer - Flexibility. How many ways can you make a ribeye steak? For most people, one! You grill it, throw some butter, garlic thyme to baste and that’s it. Sliced beef? You can make yaki soba, hot pot, throw some in hot noodle soup, marinate it and make yakiniku. The options are unlimited. With ground pork you can make sausage egg mcmuffin like I just showed you or you can make this delicious bowl of zhajiangmian.
Seriously easy to make
Let’s take a break and play the…
Jimmy and K’s Zombie Apocalypse game!
Q1. Amongst our friends, who will be the first one to die in case of a zombie Apocalypse?
The answer: DLin (the girl). We reasoned, she’s so damn nice and will never say no to others in need. She’ll most likely let in one of her many many friends in Shanghai and that person will have already been bitten and will turn inside a confined space killing everyone. This is the reason we’ll never let DLin into our group during a zombie apocalypse.
Q2. What are the best zombies?
Best meaning the scariest and most effective at killing people. The internet has many different versions of this answer, I voted for World War Z zombies but I am no expert on zombie movies and I’m sure there are other better answers than mine. But what I do know sure is what are the worst zombies. The answer: Chinese zombies, have you seen them in movies? They hop around with their hands forward and can be stopped with some spell which you stick to their foreheads. They don’t even bite, or at least they don’t show in most movies. They are so slow, it’s like the scene in Austin Powers where the henchman gets ran over by a Zamboni from like 100 meters away. You deserve to die if you get killed that way.
Q3. Who would you choose as your buddy?
Everyone knows you never travel alone in case of a zombie apocalypse. Travel in twos is always a smarter option.
The answer is also DLin (the girl). She’s strong like an ox, she once carried me on her back and ran for 100 meters. She’s quick and has great hand eye coordination from competing in basketball. It has also been documented that she once physically subdued a grown man. You want DLin by your side when shit goes down.
Now back to my survival tips
Final Tip: Find something that makes you happy and store lots of them. If you’re a wino, make sure you have some great bottles. Speaking of wine, my good friend DLin (the boy) has a new IG focusing on his bougie wine tasting adventure. Go follow him on IG - bordeauxline.expert
For me that used to be whisky. Every time I travel abroad, I would always buy a rare bottle. However, due to the lack of traveling this past two years and also getting fucking older, I don’t really drink straight up whisky anymore. I drink highballs now and it really defeats buying expensive whisky as I mix it with soda water anyways. For me now, I like to keep some dumplings around in the fridge. Just makes me feel good eating dumplings for some reason. To me it’s the perfect food. There’s meat, carbs, veggies in a single bite and it’s good for breakfast, lunch, dinner and late night snack. It’s good steamed, fried, or in a hot and sour soup. I’ve decided if that one day comes, my last meal would definitely be a plate of dumplings. Right now my favorite dumplings are from the CJ brand. It’s thin dough and has plenty meat. You can get them from Costco or Hema, they’re fantastic. I’ll share with you my recipe for dipping sauce. I learned this from Duckbill, once upon a time my favorite darts bar in Taiwan before it closed. They used to have these fantastic handmade dumplings which I bought 100s at a time and stored at home, they also gave me the sauce which I later learned from the chef. It’s vinegar, sesame oil, chili oil, just a little bit of soy sauce (most people go heavy on the soy which is not right, it’s a half or even less than that of the vinegar, sometimes I omit it all together). That’s the base of the sauce, then there’s the minced garlic which is optional, I later also put in chopped cilantro, it all depends on your preference at this point. I honestly don’t use another dipping sauce since I’ve learned about this one.
The reason for all this is because covid like a zombie apocalypse turns the world upside down.Everything changes including people, some people will do anything to survive and do crazy things and while it may be tempting to follow the crowd, you must always remember who you are and this last tip I hope can help you keep your identity for a bit. The last two years have been rough and I’ve seen so many changes in people, some for the bad and some for being incredibly inspiring. I’ll admit I struggled a bit but in the last 6 months, I decided to recover to the old happy Jimmy and to be nothing but positive energy to those around me. I know I still have a lot to go and I will make it there, one dumpling at a time.
Best dumplings ever. So I made 6 dumplings here for Justin, he made a fuss saying he wanted a 100 dumplings and cried for a while, then we settled on if he can finish these 6, I’ll make 94 more. He ate 4.